Duration
Start: 01-05-2021
End: 30-04-2025
Partners
Staff
Description
Emerging of “smart” industry 4.0 technologies challenges the conventional manufacturing processes such as rolling of the steel strips. In this regard, automotive and packaging industries requirements on surface texture of the steel strips are becoming increasingly stringent. Surface texture determines the visual appearance and tribological behaviour of the strips. These properties can be controlled or optimized by implementing new technologies, such as laser textured work rolls. These enable customization of the work roll surface texture and thereby the steel strip surface properties. However, these new texturing technologies require deep fundamental know‐how and advanced models to optimally deploy them.
The goal of this project is to understand the fundamental physics of the roughness transfer from a textured roll surface to a metal strip surface and to identify determining physical phenomena which take place at the roll‐bite contact. Furthermore, it is to develop a physical roughness transfer model that predicts the final surface properties of the strip based on the rolling process parameters. The model will be used by Tata Steel to design customized work roll textures for differentiated products and to ensure a robust and efficient transfer of the desired texture to the steel strip.