EuroWire January 2007

technology news

“ ACID-FREE PROCESS FOR STEEL ROD CLEANING & SURFACE PREPARATION” “New Way to Draw Steel Wire in the 21 st Century”

Nextrom: Towering above in China

Nextrom has installed its latest fibre drawing tower technology at Jiangsu Alpha Information Technology Co Ltd in Wujiang, China. The 26m dual-sided tower features include high speed wet-on-wet coating application, graphite induction furnace and high speed transferable dual winding. The pre-form feeding design allows for easy loading of pre-forms over 2m long. The wet-on-wet coating application is simpler to use and more space efficient than wet on dry coaters. Depending upon target line speeds, the added fibre cooling space reduces or eliminates the need for costly Helium cooling. For such a tall structure, the tower layout and controls are user friendly with operator stations at key spots, allowing for increased efficiency. During commissioning and early production on the new lines, Alpha reported extremely high yield rates.

DCCD process features: • Eliminates acid, borax and precoatings • Zero energy consumption • Direct drawing from bare rod with no speed limitation, for H/C and L/C • New Lubricant Viscosity Control provides exceptionally adherent coating • Adjustable lubricant residual • Zero lubricant waste • Recommended for severe drawing applications (spring, rope, bead, CO 2 welding, PC strand, plating quality) • H/C wire drawn at 18 m/s (3600 ft/min) • Up to 8 times longer die life • Exiting wire temp. 45°C (113°F) • Greatly improved wire ductility

Detail of Fibre Take-Up

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The lines were also commissioned at high drawing speeds up to 1,600m per minute. High yield and speed are key to Alpha’s low cost, high volume fibre manufacture.

DECALUB 31, avenue de Condé 77500 CHELLES, FRANCE Fax: +33 1 60 20 20 21 E-mail: info@decalub.com Website: www.decalub.com

Nextrom OY – Finland Fax : +358 9 5025 3003 Email : info@nextrom.com Website : www.nextrom.com

Soma matching customer need Soma offers a complete programme of drawing, rewinding and winding units for fine wire with a range between 0.5mm and 0.01mm (0.02–0.0004 inch). The programme includes the popular drawing machine type ZA, which is used worldwide in different applications. Soma develops customised options and solutions to match customers’ needs.

The drawing machine family includes three different types (ZAL, ZA and ZAM) which cover the fine wire market needs. Several types of spooling systems as well as take up, pay off and rewinding units can be used together with a furnace, wire cleaning unit, rolling unit or simply as a rewinder. One more speciality is the firm’s coil winding machine type RH-10/11, used extensively in the acoustic and watch industry. All fine wire machines are designed for maximum production output and the highest wire quality for ferrous and non- ferrous materials. Process stability and optimised operating comforts are other key points of the company’s product philosophy.

Soma AG – Switzerland Fax : +41 44 938 98 38

Email : info@somafinewire.ch Website : www.somafinewire.ch

USP 1000.2 – the modular rewinding solution for bonding and other ultra fine wires ▲

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EuroWire – January 2007