Hunan Valin I&S Group Co. Ltd. (Xiangtan), P.R. China, recently started up a new 120-tonne Danieli Ladle Furnace.

The ladle furnace had been installed as part of the existing steel works upgrade project. The total project also includes a second ladle furnace and a new vacuum degassing unit of same capacity, also supplied by Danieli. The other facilities are due to start up later this year.

The two ladle furnaces and the degasser are designed to treat 2.5 million tonnes/year and 1.2 million tonnes/year of liquid steel, respectively. Together, they will be an integrated part in Xiangtan’s No. 1 new steelmaking plant, which will feed the existing round and square conticaster as well as the slab caster.

Steel grades to be processed at the new secondary metallurgy station are high quality tube and pipe steels, high-pressure boiler steel, carbon structural, shipbuilding, pipeline, boiler and pressure vessel steel plates.