MBTool

MBTool – A software tool for generating shear buildups at the hot strip slitting line in steel industry

Client: Salzgitter Flachstahl GmbH

Duration: From 2015 to 2016

 

Responsible

  • Karen Puttkammer

 

Problem Setting

Hot strip slitting is an important process in steel industry. The slitting shear is composed of two shafts onto which circular knives are slipped. Spacers have to be inserted between the knives so that these are kept at distance in accordance with the demanded strip width.

In manual shear assembling small dimensional changes between two production orders may be realized by inserting and/or removing flexible spacers. Thus, a complete rebuild of the shear, in which all spacers and knives would have to be removed and slipped on in new composition, can be avoided.

The shear buildup, i.e. the sequence of spacers and knives, is computed by special software. Nevertheless, its use is limited. On the one hand existing software tools do not consider alternative cutting profiles. On the other hand shear buildups are only determined for one production order and do not consider dimensional changes.

 

Objective and Approach

The aim of the project is to develop a software tool for generating shear buildups at the hot strip slitting line with the following capabilities:

  • Generation of shear buildups
    • for production orders of different dimensions
    • for trapezium or parallel cutting profile
    • using as few spacers as possible
  • Generation of buildups for the separating shaft
  • Dynamically enlarging graphical user interface (GUI)
  • Graphical illustration of generated shear buildups

The approach consists of four steps:

  1. Collecting the technical restrictions and requirements of shear assembling
  2. Modelling the shear assembling problem as Resizing Knapsack Problem
  3. Development of a heuristic solution approach
  4. Implementation in a Java based softwaretool

 

Further Information

For further information please refer to:

  • Puttkammer, K.; Wichmann, M. G.; Spengler, T. S. (2016): The Resizing Knapsack Problem, in: Grubbström, R. W.; Hinterhuber, H. H. (ed.): Pre-Prints of the Nineteenth International Working Seminar on Production Economics, Volume 3, Innsbruck, pp. 281–289.