OREANDA-NEWS. January 16, 2008.  A new streamline was officially launched in the cold-drawing shop №2 at Centravis Production Ukraine's mill, the company's press service reported.

Installation of a new streamline in the cold-drawing shop is a part of the long term development program for Centravis Production Ukraine manufacture facilities that consists of both a technical upgrade and service level improvement phases. The streamline consists of a set of manufacturing units for consequent production of high-quality tubes. This project has been estimated in $15 million. The total investment in manufacture facility development program will make up $115 million by 2008 end.

The new line product range comprises austenitic steel tubes from 10 to 60 mm of outer full diameter with wall thickness of 1 to 4 mm and the maximum ready product length of 26 m. Working non-stop, the streamline mill be able of producing up to 8 000 tones tube annually. Preference will be given to producing heat exchanger tubing for nuclear power engineering, as it is this tubing that special quality requirements are set forth for.

A new streamline processing technology being introduced and the new equipment will ensure performance growth (more than twice), improvement of tube quality and decrease of unit metal consumption, and will allow skipping pickling operations and dramatic deducing transport time and costs.

The methods of liquid lubricant cold-drawing of tubes, water detergent solution cleaning, bright annealing and conveying constitute the working principle of the streamline. The up-to-date line equipment consists of clod-drawing mills, a hydrogen annealing furnace, a 10 skew roll reeler, a 12 section grinding and polishing unit, nondestructive tube testing units with simultaneous detection of diameter and wall thickness dimensions, a non-abrasive tube cutting machine with precise required length shaping.

Mr. Vitaliy Lyutyk, CEO of CJSC Centravis Production Ukraine: “Many employees of the international holding Centravis participated in developing concept and implementing of this project at its different phases. Each of us made a useful contribution. At present all the equipment has been fully installed, and adjustment of the integrated complex is taking place. A new production culture will plant its roots at the shop and at the mill after launching the new equipment.”