SMS Meer Designs State-of-the-Art Saudi Rod and Bar Mill for South Steel Company

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Written by Richard Finlayson, Senior International Editor for Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--The number of greenfield steel projects is increasing in the Middle East, as countries hitherto dependent on hydrocarbons move to diversify their economies and build up heavy engineering capabilities. One of the latest projects to be announced is a combined wire rod and bar mill to be designed and delivered by SMS Meer for Saudi Arabia's South Steel Company (SOLB). The mill, which has an annual production of 500,000 tons, will be built in Jizan Economic City, which is in the south of the country.

SMS Concast and SMS Meer previously supplied a mini-mill at the Jizan complex, with a 1 million-ton steel plant and a 500,000-ton-per-year rolling mill for the production of rebar.

The design comprises a 100-ton-per-hour walking beam furnace for billets. The roughing, intermediate and finishing mill consists of 16 housingless stands in a horizontal and vertical arrangement. One of the key components of the wire rod outlet is the 10-stand finishing block, featuring SMS Meer's state-of-the-art, highly advanced, single-drive technology, MEERdrive.

The formats rolled on this block are fed via the laying head to the loop cooling conveyor or to the cooling bed via a high-speed delivery system. Integrated quenching and tempering facilities are available for both lines. The high-speed delivery system is at the entry end of the cooling bed, enabling bars to be processed at speeds of up to 41 meters per second. The plant also has a fully automatic bundling and tying station for bars, and a coil-handling line, including a coil compactor. The new mill is scheduled to begin production in mid-2013.

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