Austria-based giant engineering and plantmaking company Siemens VAI Metals Technologies (Siemens VAI) has announced that it has received a major order from India's largest steelmaker Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL) for the supply of four long-product casters to be installed at its Bhilai Steel Plant.
The project in question includes basic and detail engineering as well as the equipment for two new six-strand billet casters, one new six-strand billet/bloom combi-caster and one new three-strand beam-blank caster.
The two billet casters, designed for open and submerged casting, will cast section sizes of 105 x 105 mm and 150 x 150 mm for the production of rebars and high quality steels.
The billet/bloom combi-caster with a billet section size of 150 x 150 mm and a bloom section size of 335 x 300 mm will cast carbon steel, alloyed steel grades and especially rail grades.
The beam-blank caster will produce sections with sizes of 405 x 285 x 90 mm, 620 x 440 x 100 mm and 1,024 x 390 x 90 mm.
According to a statement released by Siemens, the order volume is in the three-digit-million-euro range. The project is scheduled for completion in the last quarter of 2011.
The largest steel producer in India, SAIL has an annual crude steel production output exceeding 13 million tons per year.
The company has five integrated iron and steel plants at Bhilai, Durgapur, Bokaro, Burnpur and Rourkela, and four other plants at Bhadravati, Chandrapur, Durgapur and Salem which produce special steels, alloyed steels and also ferroalloys.
The new casters are part of a project for modernization and expansion to an annual steel capacity of seven million mt which is underway at SAIL's Bhilai Steel Plant.