Integrated solutions for a fully-automated grinding of surface flaws on semi-finished steel products

Prior to further processing of semi-finished steel products, it must be ensured that the surfaces of the workpieces are free from scale, cracks and other material flaws. High-pressure grinding has been proven to be an optimal technology for removing such surface defects. With BRAUN's multi-functional HP high-pressure grinding machine, a highly flexible, state-of-the-art facility was developed that allows a fully-automated bright, edge and flaw grinding of billets, blooms, ingots and other products. Automated grinding of partial surface flaws, however, also requires an accurate detection of the defects. Furthermore, adequate editing of the flaw coordinates, subsequent transmission of these data to the control system of the grinding machine, as well as the capability of the grinding machines to accurately approach the flaw are an imperative. In this context, the thermoinductive crack detection system developed by vatron gmbh poses an ideal technology for inspecting the surface of the workpiece. Moreover, BRAUN and vatron gmbh have jointly developed solutions which allow the implementation of integrated, fully-automated systems for flaw detection and flaw grinding, including product identification, Dost-arindino re-inspection and data management.