Process excellence for exposed panels
Process excellence for exposed panels
The commitment of voestalpine to achieve perfect steel surfaces is keenly felt by leading automobile manufacturers who have relied for more than 50 years on the highly specialized products supplied by the steel and technology enterprise. What makes the surface quality so unique? Five beauty secrets are behind the success of these innovative steels used in exposed panels. You will learn everything you need to know about these secrets here!
Beauty secret No. 1: Ingredients
You will find many different ingredients in the steels made for exposed panels of the highest quality: Virtually unmixed recycled scrap optimally complements the ore used in steel production. The scrap is augmented by precisely measured alloys and additives, some weighing only a few kilograms, that help achieve the required material properties. Many samples are taken during the process to guarantee highest quality.
Beauty secret No. 2: Precision
This secret can be found in every single process and work step at voestalpine. We know that even the smallest irregularity can become visible across the entire length of the material and can impair surface quality. Precision is the key from hot rolling to cold rolling to galvanizing.
Beauty secret No. 3: Expertise
The zinc coating process was developed by voestalpine and has been optimized based on unique expertise on an international scale, decades of experience and elaborate simulations. The resulting production equipment and process control have been optimized to ensure slag-free and defect-free strip surfaces.
Our computer-aided fluid dynamics process model enables a better understanding of fundamental processes in the zinc bath. This makes it possible to establish optimized production schedules to achieve the highest-possible surface perfection.
Sandra Traint, Head of Quality Management, Coil Business Unit
Beauty secret No. 4: Control
Confidence is good, but inspection is better: This is why voestalpine invests much time and money in seamless monitoring and comprehensive testing throughout the production process. We look very closely, especially in hot-dip galvanizing, using scanning and other inspection techniques to guarantee the highest surface quality.
Beauty Secret No. 5: the people at voestalpine
So the secret to perfect steels for exposed panels is found in the use of the right materials, the highest levels of precision, expertise and inspection. These four beauty secrets would not be feasible without the people who put them into practice. Their versatile skills and passion for perfection are the reason why we continually set new standards and why our surface quality is always one step ahead.
