Method for enhancing the heating efficiency of continuous slab reheating furnaces

Abstract From the Canadian patent

Significant energy savings are acheived in the operation or reheat furnaces when the preheat zone temperatures are maintained as low as possible consistent with the demands of the hot strip mill. While the benefits of this invention may be realized through manual adjustment further energy, savings are achieved through the utilization of automatic controls and proper scheduling in which slabs of approximately the same thickness are placed into groupings so that a first grouping of tandum slabs enters the furnace followed by a, second grouping of different thickness.