Rolling of stainless steel in wide hot strip mills

Abstract

Measurements of roll force, spindle torque, and strip temperature were made during the rolling of a range of widths and gauges of 18–8 stainless steel strip on the semicontinuous wide hot strip mill at the Lackenby works of the British Steel Corporation, South Teesside Group. A method of calculating the temperature of the stock during its passage through the reversing roughing mill and the five-stand finishing train is established and modifications to the BISRA method of calculating roll forces and torques are proposed. These three components were used to construct a mathematical model and results from this model are shown to agree closely with measured values. An empirical method for calculating the rolling parameters relevant to stainless steel strip rolling is derived and values of roll force, spindle torque, and stock temperature calculated by this method are compared with measurements made on the Lackenby mill. An application of the method is demonstrated by the calculation of the minimum achievable gauge on a representative semicontinuous wide hot strip mill.