OREANDA-NEWS. May 05, 2008. Ural Steel managed by Metalloinvest Holding tested a new four-strand continuous caster machine on the 28th of May, 2008.  The caster was constructed within a large-scale investment program aimed at steel and rolled divisions upgrade, reported the press-centre of Metalloinvest.

The result of еру test operation was production of 330x470 mm bloom billets. When engineering follow-up is over the machine will start to operate at full capacity. The introduction of continuous steel casting technology will provide for boosted cast bar output, along with reduced additional expenditure related to steel teeming into ingot mold followed by ingot blooming, lower cost price and increased production quality.

Sergey Shishkovets, Managing Director of Ural Steel considers this event of a high importance for the mill development. "For the moment, Ural Steel is the only enterprise in Russia to carry out the production of this type. This will enable us to occupy a new market niche and to satisfy the demand of our partners in Russia and abroad".

Thomas Shaiblich, Project director of SMS Demag mentioned that the launch of a new continuous caster machine may soon enable Ural Steel to become the leading enterprise in Russia and CIS in this market segment.

The new combined continuous caster machine will produce 330x470 mm bloom billets and large-diameter round billets of 430 mm, 540 mm and 600 mm in diameter. The total output is expected to reach 1 million tons per year.

The construction of the continuous caster machine started in 2007. The project was developed by "SMS Demag" (Germany) also responsible for the equipment supply and the supervision of the assembly works. The automatic management system for the caster machine was produced by "Allen Bradley".