COMPLETE EPS PRODUCTION SYSTEMS
Flexible EPS Production Lines
The Bottom Line: EPS flexibility lets you compete in the market for pickling services with an economical, environmentally-friendly and differentiated product. Explore the different EPS Production Systems below:
EPS Coil Lines
The EPS Coil Line is how many steel processors and picklers deploy EPS technology in their own facilities. EPS Coil Lines can be flexibly configured to accommodate a variety of production capacities. Placing multiple EPS Cells in series increases production with only minor increases in line length. Below are representative capacity values for increasing numbers of cells, based on 24/6 operation (actual values will vary according to product mix).
- One Cell – 19,000 tons/month / Line length: 35m
- Two Cells – 33,000 tons/month / Line Length: 43m
- Three Cells – 43,000 tons/month / Line Length: 51m
- Four Cells – 51,000 tons/month / Line Length: 59m
EPS Sheet/Plate Lines
EPS Unlimited is a special dry, oil-free EPS sheet product that’s very uniform and optimized for great paint adhesion and a superior finish. It’s also stretcher leveled, which eliminates shape memory and yields a product optimized for laser cutting. This combination makes EPS Unlimited the best performing sheet steel product on the market.
For steel processors who primarily supply sheets to their customers, the EPS Sheet Line can be an ideal addition to their business. It helps them “get in the game” quicker because the EPS Sheet Line’s capital cost and floorspace requirement are less than an EPS Coil Line. It’s also a solution for removing surface rust and defects from material that’s already in sheet form. EPS pickling steel in sheet form offers these additional advantages:
- Stacks from your CTL line are bundled to customer spec, so the CTL stops more frequently to offload stacks. CTL stacks going to the EPS Sheet Line can be much larger, so CTL line interruptions are reduced.
- If clean EPS’d coils are run on a CTL line, the blanks may pick up an oil and dust residue. The EPS Sheet line always yields perfectly clean blanks.
EPS CTL Plate Line
The EPS CTL line approach works with both Stretcher Leveling or Temper Pass. When using a temper mill, the line operates in continuous mode, much like an EPS Coil Line. When using a Stretcher Leveler, it operates in start-stop mode with the Slurry Turbines controlled by variable frequency drives which ramp up/ramp down slurry delivery to match the Stretcher Leveler cycle.
Users of large plate sections want a dry, scale-free product. It’s cleaner, simplifies paint prep and eliminates blasting operations. But few acid pickling lines that can run material over 12.5mm (0.50″) thick and few CTL processors can turn coils of 12.5mm – 25mm (1/2″ – 1″) material into sheets.
Solution: Integrate the EPS Sheet/Plate Cell into a heavy gauge Stretcher Leveling or Temper Pass CTL line. This creates an efficient, compact CTL line that produces ‘stay flat’, dry, rust-resistance plate up to 25mm (1″) thick.
Adding the EPS Cell presents only a modest increase in a CTL line’s length and capital cost because the smaller Cell (only 4 Slurry Turbines) achieves the needed scale removal at attractive line speeds for heavy material. If the plate only needs to be ‘cleaned up’, rather than thoroughly pickled, the speed can be increased by up to 3X.
The new Advanced High Strength Steel (AHSS) grades are very difficult and costly to descale by traditional acid pickling. The pickling line must be slowed considerably and sometimes the coil run through twice. By contrast, EPS pickles these grades thoroughly and economically, incurring only modest reductions in line speed compared to low carbon grades.
Using an EPS Cell to ‘pre-pickle’ AHSS coils ahead of the acid tanks can considerably speed up the acid line. The EPS Cell does not need to fully descale the strip – it can be run at 3X the speed needed for full descaling. But that can reduce the duty on the acid tanks enough to speed up the line overall and significantly improve economics.