OREANDA-NEWS. January 30, 2009. The pipe-rolling plant of Belarusian Steel Works (BMZ) now operates at its full capacity of 20,800 tonnes of seamless hot-rolled pipes per month, BMZ Technical Director, Chief Engineer Viktor Matochkin said.

In his words, the entire complex of actions relating to the equipment operation in various modes, optimisation of manufacturing processes, testing and certification of ready-made products was completed on schedule. The facility now operates according to production orders set by contracts.

Raising the output of the pipe-rolling plant up to the designed capacity in 2008, Belarusian Steel Works mastered the production of 246 items of pipe grades, including 122 items of different standard sizes. Last year over 73,000 tonnes of pipes were manufactured for mechanical engineering industry, gas, oil and construction industry. More than 80% of the output was exported to 15 countries.

The Chief Engineer remarked, in 2008 the compliance of the company’s Quality Management System (including pipe production) with international standards ISO 9001:2000 (TUV, CERT, Germany), the national standard STB ISO 9001-2001 (the certificate validity was extended onto the production of seamless pipes) was confirmed. The company’s quality management system used in pipe-rolling production was certified for compliance with ISO 9001:2000, ISO/TS 29001, API Spec Q1 by the American Petroleum Institute.

In 2008 certificates of compliance of the production of hot-rolled profiled iron and seamless pipes made of ferrite materials in line with requirements of AD 2000 Merkblatt W0 and Directive 97/23/EU Addendum 1, Clause 4.3. (TUV NORD System, Germany), production of pipes out of steel Е 235, Е 275, Е 315, Е355  21.3-168.3 mm in line with DIN EN 10297-1:2003-06 (TUV NORD System, Germany) and other standards were acquired.

All in all, around 20 documents (certificates, examination reports) were received. They confirm the compliance with international standards, which allow selling BMZ pipes to virtually all countries. Certification bodies and pipe buyers point out the modern equipment and the technology for manufacturing high-quality hot-rolled pipes in compliance with international standards.

Now the company is reconstructing the steel smelting facility to start manufacturing round cast sections for pipe production. It will cut down costs and raise the output of the electric steel smelting workshop and the profiled iron workshop. A project for setting up the production of specially rigged pipes for the oil extraction industry is under consideration. It is a project for the future. It will be carried out step by step within the next five years, said Viktor Matochkin.