ThyssenKrupp Steel Europe announced that a new chemcoater integrated to coil-coating line 3 has started operation at its manufacturing facility located in Siegerland, Germany. The equipment considerably enhances workflows on the coating line and also contributes to the environmental safety.
The work for major upgrade of the coil-coating line 3 started three years ago and was finally realized in 2010. The coil-coating line 3 applies film and paint coatings to thin steel sheet. The film- and paint-coated steel is supplied in three different forms: cut-to-length sheets, slit strip and coil. The product has potential application in automotive, garage door, appliance and construction industries.
The chemcoater equipment is utilized in the steel industry for applying chemical materials, which are water-based intermediate with additives, to flat carbon steel. The additives help to pretreat the steel products and improve the corrosion resistance of film and paint coatings. The coating equipment performs chemical pretreatment processes that are essential for the successful painting process. It allows application of three different chemicals to the steel sheet through rolls. Ralf Wittkowski, team coordinator of the project, stated that the investment of six million euros on the chemcoater almost eliminates the requirement for corrosion-protection pretreatment processes for coated components. The company has achieved better corrosion protection by using zinc-magnesium hot-dip coated material. In addition, water usage is also decreased. With two cascade rinses, ThyssenKrupp has minimized the water consumption by 8,000 l/h.
Source: http://www.thyssenkrupp.com/