US289524A - Rolling-mill plant - Google Patents

Description

4 Sheets-Sheet 1.

(N0 Medal.)

W. GARRETT.

ROLLING MILL PLANT.

Patented Dec. 4, 1383.

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(No Model.) 4 Sheets-Sheet 2.

W. GARRETT ROLLING MILL PLANT. No. 289,524. Patented Dec. '4, 1883.

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' i; I IIIIIII (No Model.) 4 Sheets-Sheet a.

W. GARRETT.

ROLLING MILL 2mm o. 289,524. Patented Dec. 4,1883.

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W. GARRETT.

ROLLING MILL PLANT.

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TI 7' F Mum U T STATES- PATENT ROLLING-MILL PLANT.

SPECIFICATION forming partof Letters Patent No. 289,524, dated December 4, .1883,

Application filed February 17,1883. (No model.)

To all whom it may concern.-

Be it known that I, WILLIAM GARRETT, of Cleveland, county of Ouyahoga, State of Ohio, have inventedor discovered a new and useful Improvement in Rolling-Mill Plants; and I I do hereby declare the following to be a full, clear, concise, and exact description thereof, refer ence being had to the accompanying drawings, forming a part of this specification, in which-dike letters indicating like parts- Figure 1, Sheet 1,is a plan view in outline of my improved plant for heating and working blooms and billets and reducing them to wires or rods at a single heat and reeling them as deliveredfrom the rolls. Fig. 2, Sheet 2, is a view in elevation of a train of billet-rolls which I employ. Fig. 3, Sheet 3, is a view in elevation of an intermediate train or pair of rolls for reducing billets as produced by the rolls of Fig. 2 to a form suitable for entering the rod-train. For convenience of description, this pair of rollswill be hereinafter designated as the train D. Fig. 4, Sheet4, represents in elevation the right-hand end of one-half of the rod-train which I employ; and Fig. 5 represents in elevation the left-hand end or half of the rod-train, by means of which the work of rolling is completed.

-My invention relates, particularly, to a rolling-mill plant for heating and reducing a steel bloom of, say, two feet in length and four inches by four (more or less) in cross-section at one heat, by a continuous rolling operation ,to arod, say, about No. 4 or N o. 5 in size, more or less,

and from sixto eight hundred feet in length, and reelingthe same as it is delivered from the last pass of the rolls, so that it shall be in convenient form and condition for handling or further working, and also includes some details of construction or combination, as hereinafter more fully described. I

Heretofore in working such blooms into rods it has been usual, first, to heat the bloom, and then, by suitable rolls-known as a billettrain-reduce it to a bar form, say about one and a quarter square, or less. This productthen commonly known as a billet--Was then reheated and passed through the rod-train. Prior tomy invention I am not aware that the further work of reducing the product of a billet-train to a completed rod has ever been done with practical and commercial success, except. by or after a separate reheating of the same.

This work of reheating involves a loss of time as well as expense, and still further lnvolves waste of material from further scaling or oxiheat and one'operation, meaning by the latter a continuous rolling in the sense that thebloom bar or rod passes from one pair of rolls to another with such speed and rapidity that it is reduced to the size and form required before it has fallen below a working-heat, and as it is delivered from the last pair of rolls its for- By my improved plant and the con- I ward end is in convenient proximity to a reel,

so that it can be fed directly into the reel, where it is reeled while it is still hot enough forsuch'work. In practical operation with a plant thus constructed, I have found'that I am enabled to work from two to three blooms:

per minute, and that ordinarilyit requires from about ninety to one hundred seconds for the reduction of each. The work progresses with such rapidity that the second bloom can be started in the billettrain before the previous bloom, now in rod form, has entirely left the rod-train.

While the above is a general statement of the more important elements of advantage I which I have in mind, I also include in the same plant or in connection therewith such portions of a blooming-mill as are necessary for the complete working of an ingot from its original or ingot form to the finished or rod form; and, including the latter in my description, and referring to Fig. 1 G may represent (Repre- 1 the cylinder g, and power is communicated l therefrom in any suitable way to the main shaft.

' a, whereon is a fly-wheel, a, and thence through cut to lengths of, say, two feet, more or less,

so as to form blooms, which are then charged into the bloom-furnace A, of which one or more may be used, according as the capacity of the mill may require. These bloom-furnaces are of the usual or any known or desired form of construction or capacity, such as are adapted to reheating blooms properly for subsequent working. The blooms, as fast as reheated, are passed back and forth through the rolls of the billet-train. (Represented at B.) The manner of rolling is such as is ordinarily practiced in the art, and the rolls are of any suitable construction adapted to this end; but one construction which I believe to be suitable is more fully represented in Sheet 2, which represents this train in elevation.

The pinions nof Fig. 1 are more fully shown by the .correspondingly-lettered parts of Fig. 2, and the rolls a n n of Fig. l are also similarly shown in Fig. 2. The series of grooves in these rolls are made and proportioned in accordance with rules well known in the art with reference to doing the work presently to be stated. The plant, as I have constructed and am now using it, is for steel-rolling, and for this purposethe last pair of rolls of this train (between which ordinarily the billet will be passed but once) may be flat or smoothfaced, though, if so preferred, it may also be grooved, and should be for iron-rolling. The power to drive this train is taken from the main driving-shaft a. By a series or succession of passes back and forth in the ordinary way through the rolls of the train B, the bloom is reduced, preferably, to a bar form in crosssection, approximately of, say, an inch and an eighth by one-half inch, more or less; or it may be brought to an oval form of the same or approximately the same area in cross-section. From the last pass, which is through the last pair of rolls, n, of the train B, the bar or billet is conducted by atrough or conductor, b, Fig. 1, of any suitable construction, to the rolls m of what I term the intermediate or feed train D, which consists of pinions m and a pair of rolls, m, (more fully shown in- Fig. 3,) with housing, 850., such rolls having grooves suitably formed to reduce the billet received from the train B to the rod form, or to aform adapted for the rod-train, which form may be round, oval, or square in cross-section, or of any allied form, such as it is usual to give to material of this kind preliminary to its further working in what is technically known as a rod-train.

The trains B and D should be far enough apart to enable the bloom or billet, whichever it may be called, to be passed back and forth, as described, through between the rolls n and at? of the train B, to the end that it may be worked and reduced therein, as above de scribed. The delivery-pair of rolls a of the rolls B and the single pair of rolls m of the train D, it is observed, are in or approximately in a common line of feed, so that the trough or conductor 2) may guide or conduct the bar directly from one to the other. I prefer to make the distance between the rolls of and m, and consequently the length of the trough or conductor b, a little in excess of the length of the bar as it comes from the train B, so that such bar coming out flatwise into the conductor 6 may by the workman, with a pair of tongs, be turned upon its edge, and so feed edgewise into one of the grooves of the train D, and thereby be brought to rod form, as described; but instead of using a trough or conductor of such length the two trains B and D may, if preferred, bear-ranged in close proximity, and any suitable mechanism be interposed, whereby the bar, on leaving the train B, will be given a quarter-turn, so as to be presented to the train D in the position stated; but in any event space must be left for the manipulation of the bloom or billet in the rolls a n" of the train B, as above described. The grooves of the rolls m are so proportioned or sized that the bar or billet going therethrough is reduced from the flat or oval form in which it leaves the rolls a to about five-eighths of an inch square, more or less, or of equivalent round,- polygonal, or slightly oval form in cross-section, and it then passes directly by suitable trough or conductor, 1), and is fed into the grooves of the first pair of rolls, 8, of a rodtrain, 0 C, such pair of rolls being arranged so as to have exactly or approximately the same line of feed as the rolls m of the train D and the rolls n of the train B. In order to do good work and to effect the complete reduction.-say to a No. 4 or No. 5 rod-I provide in this rod-train for, say, eight passes, more or less, and to this end use substantially such a systern of rolls as is represented in Figs. 4 and 5 of Sheet 4, where the rolls 8 to 8 represent the corresponding parts shown in outline in Fig. 1. The grooves of these rolls, commencing with the right-hand grooves of Fig. 4 and ending with the left-hand grooves of Fig. 5, are made, in accordance with the rules well kn own in the art, round, oval, and square, or otherwise, as may be preferred, and successively smaller, so as, by a series of passes such as are usual in rod-mills, the rod received from train D may be reduced to the size required say to No. 4 or No. 5 rod. In feeding the rod from one pair of rolls to the next in such a rod-train, curved guides, such as already well known in the art, may be employed; or the work may be done by catchers and feeders, since the rod at this stage of its reduction is at such heat and so flexible that it may at different points of its length be coming through two or three or more pairs of rolls at the same time. On leaving the last pair of rod-finishing rolls-say the left-hand pair 8 of Fig. 5 its forward end is run out through a suitable guide, I)", toward and in the direction of the pair of reels R R, and as the floor at this point is open the rod may coil up more or less in case the reel is not immediately ready.

Ordinarily the two reels are driven from the same shaft, and a single workman operates both. By means of a clutch mechanism he throws either one into and out of gear as oocasion requires. The workman takes the forward end of the rod with a pair of tongs as soon as possible after delivery commences and inserts-it into the reel, and the latter, being capable of being worked at either high or low speed, reels up the slack wire before the rear end of it is delivered, and then reels it up as delivered, and as soon as one reeling operation is completed, and while the coil of wire so reeled is being removedrhe shifts his clutch to the other reel, so as to be reeling the next rod, the forward delivery end of which follows the first one with an interval of but afew seconds. In this way the product of the mill is reeled and removed as fast as produced.

It will be understood, of course, that the usual or necessary attachments, appendages, 820., of such machinery, trains, &c., as are herein described, are to be added; but as all these will come within the skill of the builder and operator, they need not be described.

For the purposes of running or driving the W trains D and G O, I preferably make use of two engines. One of them is represented by the cylinder 1", and this by suitable connection drives the band-wheel z, and a belt from this to the pulley z operates the main shaft 2 so as, through pinions s, to drive the train 0. A belt also passes from a pulley, c, on the same shaft around a band-wheel, o, onthe shaft of the pinion m of the train D, so as to operate the rolls of the latter, but at a somewhat less speed than the train 0. The other engine (represented by the cylinder r) operates the band-wheel u, and by a belt over this wheel and around the pulley a motion is communicated to the shaft .00, and thence to the pinion m of roll train 0; but other known suitable means of driving any of the trains described may be substituted for the means thus indicated, relative speeds being,

. however, kept in mind as the work to be done may require.

I do not limit myself to any particular number of pairs of rolls nor order of arrangement of grooves in either the trains B or C 0, providcd only that in the billet-train B there be such number, order, and arrangement that by a seriesof back-and-forth passes therethrough thebloom may be put into shape for the last pair, a and provided that in the train 0 0 they be such as to do the work required substantially in the manner set forth.

I am aware that roll-trains such as represented by the trains B and O O, separately considered, are old in the art; but I believe I am the first to combine such trains by means of an intermediate train, D, in any such way as to enable a bloom to be worked without reheating at some intermediate stage of the operation directly into a rod so small and in such condition as to be reeled as delivered at the last pass of the rod-train; and as an element of special importance in the construction oftheplant described, I believe it to be new with me to combine a billet-train, a rodtrain, and an intermediate train in such manner that the last pair of rolls of the billet trainby which I mean the pair through which the last pass is madethe first pair of rolls of the rod-train-by which I meanthe pair through which the first pass is made-and the single pair of rolls of the intermediate train shall be in or approximately in a common line of feed.

I am also aware that it has been proposed to do the work herein described by means of a continuous series of rolls, by which I mean i a series of rolls arranged in line with each other, so as to have a common line of feed through the whole series, and the several pairs of the series so close together that each pair in delivering will act as feeders to the next pair; but I am not aware that any practical success has resulted from such efforts, except in very short series, where the total reduction and elongation to be effected were comparatively small. In rodmaking the re duction necessary is so great and the elongation so considerable-as from a bloom two feet long to a rod from six hundred to eight hundred feet long, more or less-that it is exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, to proportion the grooves, space the rolls, and adjust the speeds in a continuous mill so as to do the work with anything like practical success. The same difficulty would exist, though to aless extent, in a mill wherein the billetrolls (herein represented by the train B) were arranged in a continuous series, such as above referred to, and such a series in combination with a rod-.train is hereby disclaimed. In a certain sense, the last pair of rolls in the billet-train, the intermediate rolls, and the first pair of rolls of the rod-train may in my improved plant be considered as constituting a continuous series 5 but usually and preferably only the last two pairs of rolls thus indicated will be so close together that the former will feed to the latter, and, while even these may be arranged farther apart, I consider it better to arrange them relatively to each other substantially as indicated; hence my invention contemplates, in general terms, the employment of three trains, substantially as described with the second interposed between the last pair of the first train and the first pair of the third train, and in or approximately in a common line of feed, so as thereby to effect the conversion of the bar-shaped or ovalshaped billet into rod form, or a form suitable for the rod-mill, and so as to facilitate the feeding of it to the rod-mill without complication of parts or machines, and without such loss of time or heat as to prevent the rod-train from doing its ordinary work on the rod so 5 produced.

I claim herein as my invention- 1. A rolling-mill plant for rolling wire rods directly from blooms, having in combination a billet-train, B. a rod-train, O O, and an i1i- [o 'termediate train, D, the rolls of which latter are arranged in or approximately in line with the last pair or delivery-rolls of the billettrain and the first pair or receiving-rolls of the rod-train, substantially as set forth. I 5 2. The three trains B, D, and O O, relatively arranged substantially as set forth, whereby space is left for the working of the bloom back and forth through the rolls of the train 13, eX- cept the last one, and from this one directly to the rolls of train D and thence to the first pair of rolls of train 0 C, substantially as set forth.

3. The roll-train D, arranged with its rolls in or approximately in line with the last or 25 delivery rolls of train B and the first or receivingrolls of train 0 G, in combination with said rolls B and O C, and with the trough b, or other suitable means, as described, whereby provision is made for turning the bar or billet intermediate between said trains B and 0 D, substantially as set forth.

4. A plant for heating the ordinary blooms of commerce and rolling and reducing them to rods at a single heat, and reeling the rods so produced, consisting of one or 'more fur- 5 naces, A, billet-train B, intermediate train, D, rod-train O O, and one or more reels, R R, relatively arranged substantially as set forth.

5. A rod-rolling-mill plant embracing one or moreingot-furnaces, H, blooming-train h, 40 shears A, one or more bloom-furnaces,A, billet-train B, intermediate train, D, rod-train G O, and one or more reels, R, substantially as set forth. 7

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set 5 my hand.

WILLIAM GARRETT. Witnesses:

GEORGE H. CHRIsTY, R. H. WHITTLESEY.

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