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ALCOA's SuperMelt Rotary Furnace
ALCOA: Warrick Operations<>
PRESS RELEASE
October 2006
ALCOA Grants Contract for "SuperMelt" Rotary Furnace
Ed Mansell has received an order from Alcoa for his patented "SuperMelt" Rotary Furnace.
The furnace has a 60,000 lb. capacity and will be used at Alcoa's Warrick Operations in Newburgh, IN.
Alcoa searched worldwide for a rotary furnace to meet their requirements. They chose the "SuperMelt"
because of its versatility. In addition to the furnace being mounted on a tilting frame, it has a 360 degree
swivel base that allows charging and pouring from around the entire perimeter of the furnace to accelerate
the ability to pour to various stations without the need to reload and move equipment to the door.
This ability greatly reduces cycle time.
Alcoa will use the furnace to process coated scrap and recover aluminum from dross in addition to melting
other types of scrap aluminum. The new furnace will allow processing of dross and coated scrap on site
where currently it is shipped to a secondary processor for the metal to be extracted and shipped back for
use in Alcoa's ingot plant. This process creates waste through lost energy during the cooling, and excess
energy during reheating and transportation.
This will be the fourth "SuperMelter" and will have additional upgrades to make it even more efficient than
the typical fixed type rotary furnaces. Mansell currently has several quotes out worldwide for this type of
furnace.
Alcoa Warrick Operations is one of the largest aluminum smelting and fabricating facilities in the world
housing a 309,000 metric ton per year primary aluminum smelter and rigid packaging operation employing
more than 2,100 people, with more than 120 acres under roof and 14,000 total acres.
VIEW VIDEO- Click on Image
ALCOA: Warrick Operations
PRESS RELEASE
March 2008
Warrick's New Rotary Furnace Taking Shape
The Ingot
Department's new $7 Million furnace will begin operating in April
processing dross
and
Describing the furnace in terms that any of us
can understand, Chuck
Bargeloh, Warrick engineer
in charge of the installation, said "Some of us
describe it as a massive cement mixer on steroids.
Certainly, however, this is
much
different. And it's unique to the Ingot Department - unlike any
other
furnace we have."
The furnace's ability to rotate about a horizontal axis in
addition to
swiveling on a vertical axis gives
great flexibility and allows molten metal to
be poured from various stations along its perimeter. It is
designed to process
coated scrap created during our production process and dross, the
material that
is skimmed
off the surface of molten metal before it can be cast into ingots.
Composed of inpurities
and oxides, dross is currently sent to outside processors to recover
aluminum. With the new
furnace,
however, Warrick will be able to save money,
conserve significant energy and reduce environmental
effects by handling that
material internally.
When dross is sent to outside processors, it must first cool.
Then,
after it's
cooled, the secondary
processor must remelt it to extract the aluminum. They
also have to heat it higher than necessary so
the metal will remain molten for
its drive back to Warrick - this overheating causes additional melt
loss and
uses energy. With this furnace, we'll be able to process dross while it
is
still hot, rather
than letting that energy be wasted.
In addition to the furnace, the project also includes a
lime-injected bag
house, a salt silo, a liquid oxygen
tank, and a weighing system. The Warrick County Council gave
support to
the
project in August 2006
when they approved a tax phase-in of the assets over the
coming years.
As part of the project, Bargeloh consulted with engineers at
Tennessee
Operations, which has its own
rotary furnace in operation. By that knowledge
sharing process, Warrick will be able to have a shorter
learning curve with the
new asset.
Bargeloh is also working to make sure we get the new equipment
installed safely
and in a quality manner.
"We're spending the time to make sure it's done
right," he said, "because this is certainly much more
important than
just any old cement mixer, no
matter how beefed-up it looks."
An Alcoa employee helps direct the drum for Warrick's new Rotary Furnace into the
Ingot Department for final assembly.
Rotary Furnace "SuperMelt" as featured in Light Metal Age Magazine
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