Technology
Upstream
Vama will receive hot rolled coils from Lianyuan Steel, a subsidiary of Valin Steel located in Loudi, Hunan. These hot rolled coils are being produced on new high technology upstream assets
- Blast furnace in which liquid iron is produced has a total capacity of 3,200m³. After the blast furnace, liquid iron is turned into steel in steel shop with two BOF (basic oxygen process) converters. After casting, slabs will be rolled in the hot strip mill commissioned in 2009.
- This hot strip mill has an annual capacity of 4.5 million tons and has a reversing rougher, coil box and a seven stand finishing with laminar flow cooling.
Production in VAMA
Once the hot rolled coils arrive in VAMA, these coils will be further processed over PLTCM (Pickling & Tandem Cold Rolling Mill). This PLTCM has a capacity of 1.5 million tons, extendable up to 2 million tons in the second phase. The PLTCM line will have the most advanced available technology- E.g. Laser welder at the entry section, rolling forces of 3,500 tons and rolling power of 7000 KW.
The full hard material produced on PLTCM will be further processed on either mixed CAL (mixed Continuous Annealing Line) or CGL (Continuous Galvanizing Line). The mixed CAL has one of the most powerful furnaces available today, capable to produce Ultra High Strength Steel (UHSS) grades and it also has the possibility to produce aluminium coated products through an integrated aluminium bath.
The CGL line will produce both galvanized and galvannealed products. Both CGL and CAL will produce exposed material for automotive industry and therefore they are equipped with automatic inspection systems.
The coils produced on CAL or CGL can be further processed or inspected on one of VAMA’s two recoiling lines or can go directly to the fully automated packaging line after which they will be transported directly to the customer or further processed in a Steel Service Centre.
In order to ensure that VAMA will produce high end products needed by automotive customers in China, technology transfer agreements have been put in place between ArcelorMittal and both Lianyuan Steel and VAMA.
The technology transfer between ArcelorMittal and Lianyuan Steel focuses on development and production of high end hot rolled coils which can be sold directly to the market through VAMA’s sales network or to be used as substrate in VAMA.
The technology transfer between ArcelorMittal and VAMA included support during the complete plant design, specification and procurement. Development of all products in VAMA will be done with intensive support from ArcelorMittal to make sure that the VAMA product offer reaches the same quality level as the one from ArcelorMittal.
VAMA and Lianyuan employees are being given trainings at ArcelorMittal plants with focus on different aspects of producing automotive steelgrades and high quality control needed for the automotive industry.
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