ECONOMY INDUSTRIAL CORPORATION

USS/Kobe Steel starts-up 2,000 ton per day pig casting machine

NEWS RELEASE                                            3/20/96

For immediate release                                
More info:  Tom  Allen

AMBRIDGE, PA,  March 20, 1996  -  For the second time in the past twenty-five years, a new pig iron casting machine is being built in the U.S.A.  The new installation for USS/Kobe Steel in Lorain, Ohio, was designed and built by Economy Industrial Corporation.  The state-of-the art casting machine has a capacity of 150 tons per hour of blast furnace pig iron.  The use of the pig casting machine will permit USS/Kobe to operate their blast furnaces at full capacity, without regard to varying demand from the BOF shop or outages at the continuous caster.  Monthly production is expected to be between 15,000 and 30,000 tons.

In 1994, Mansbach Metal Co. in Ashland, KY, purchased a similar machine, with a 100 ton per hour capacity limit.  Mansbach is using the machine to  cast  excess pig iron  from A-K Steel's Ashland plant into ten pound piglets.    The 165 ft. (50 m.) long machine began production in the fall of 1995, casting a 150 ton submarine ladle car in about ninety minutes, for a daily capacity in excess of 1,500 tons per day. 

While several used pig iron casting machines have been installed in other U.S. plants, the Ashland installation was the first modern machine to be put into service in the U.S.A. in recent years.  The modern design is based on Economy's experience in producing casting machines for ferro-alloys and pig iron for the export market, and features new patented technology to extend mould life and reduce maintenance cost.  Extensive automation has reduced operating manpower requirements, and provides simpler, reliable, and more accurate sub-system control.

Economy advanced design features have been successfully proven at the HISmelt direct reduction pilot plant facility in Kwinana, Australia, and in ferro-alloy plants in Norway, Colombia, and the Dominican Republic.  The green-field Australian plant was built to provide a large production-scale test facility for direct reduction of iron by a joint venture between Midrex and CRA.

In addition to its ferro-alloy and pig iron  casting machine installations, Economy Industrial has supplied a number of machines to cast stainless and alloy steel  for certified alloy producers,  brass and aluminum casters for  primary ingot production, and zinc slab casters.  A machine at the U.S. Navy Puget Sound shipyard is being used to convert high-strength alloy steel plate from de-commissioned Polaris submarines into ingots.  Economy has also been active in building casting machines for brass and aluminum re-cycling, serving several clients in the Middle East, in addition to the domestic market. 

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