In total, there are 5 main stages that raw materials have to go through before a roll of strip mill can be completed. The first stage is the blast furnace. The interesting fact about the blast furnaces in the factory is that it was built by the local people themselves and the blast furnaces were further improvised to produce about 20% more than what had been poduced before. Each blast furnace cost up to a few billion RMB but it can be recovered within 2 years if business is doing well. The blast furnace is actually being controlled by a computer system whereby it will ensure that the raw materials is being heated to a certain temperate before it turns to steel and is being taken out for processing. From the picture, you can see that a lot of water is being used to cool the machines at each process. At first, I thought that the procedure of spraying water was a waste water but after that I was told that the engineers came up with a drainage system to collect the drained water to be recycled to cool the machines. How innovative! ^_^
So this is how the hot metal will look like after being taken out from the blast furnace!
So after coming out from the blast furnace, the guide told us that it will take about 1 minute to process the metal into one roll of mill. At the second stage, the steel is brought under pressure and impurities are being washed away as it is flatten to become thinner and longer. I find this similar to rolling a chewed chewing gum. ^_^ After being flatten, most of the time the front and back of the steel plate are not straight which causes it to have a slight curve at the front as well as the back. The rollers that are being used to flatten the steel has to be changed after some time. I was told thatthe rollers used to flatten the steel has to be changed every 24 hours. The good thing is it takes 40 minutes to change such a huge and heavy roller each time. ^_^
The third stage is somewhat similar to the second stage but different. Instead of rollers, flatteners are used to further flatten the steel to ensure good quality surface of the steel. These flatteners has to be changed every 4 hours every time which takes about 40 minutes as well. For these flatteners, they are flattening the steel from both sides, smoothing the surface of the steel as much as posible.
The forth stage is the cutter and the polishing of the metal surface. There are three wheels which are used to measure the speed and length of the steel which is to be cut. This actually allows the cuttur to cut off the curves a both ends of the steel and also allows the cutter to choose how much of the steel to cut. After which, the hardness of the steel will be determined how much water is used on the steel plate.
At the final stage, the cooled steel plates are being rolled and secured by a wire using machines that reel the steel plates at a rapid speed. The weight of each roll is suppose to be about 30 tons. Random checks will be done to ensure that the quality of steel made is up to standard.
So after a tired day at the factory, we head back to school, rested and had our first IS lesson on the Overview of China's History, Politics and Economy! The lesson was rather interesting because it was the first time I am learning something about China! So basically the main things I learned were the dynastic overview of China, the map of China, China's political system and China's economy. There was so much infomation covered during the class that it was impossible to remember everything! It was harder for me because I am not used to all the Chinese names of the places and people, so it was hard for me to pronounce or even remember everything.
So after class, I bought a lot of sushi for dinner! In sigapore, one box of 10 sushi cost at least $3.00. In Wuhan, I bought boxes and boxes of more than 60 sushi and it costs 42RMB, only about $5 ! The dinner was really satisfying as no place in Singapore sells sushi at such a cheap price! ^_^
Reflection
In Singapore, I do not think that there are any steel manufacturing company. Even if there are steel manufacturing companies, it will be a smal scale company and not as big as WISCO. It was really something amazing to see metal being made in front of my eyes. Being able to see such a huge piece of red hot metal and feeling the heat from such a distance got me thinking of hot larva in the volcanoes. It was really an exerience. Although the guide talked in mandarin, I was lucky enough to have my Chinese friends to translate for me so that I will at least learn something from the trip. ^_^
Another thing is that I think it is hard to communicate with the local teachers who are teaching the IS lessons. Although they can speak english very well, but sometimes they cannot understand the questions that are being asked. So in order to get the answer, I will have to ask my friends to translate the questions for me in Chinese so that the teacher can get a better understanding of the question. However I think that having a local to teach the IS module is good because the local teacher should know most about China more compared to any other teachers. No worries, I am going to improve my Chinese and do well for this IS module! ^_^
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