Compañía Valenciana de Aluminio Baux, part of Jupiter Aluminum Group, installed a new 4-high cold rolling mill in Segorbe, Spain. The new mill increases production of cold rolled aluminum, which will be used as a raw material in the company’s nearby Bancolor plant in Elche de la Sierra, Spain, where it will be processed into aluminum coils for the window shutter and sun protection industries.
“Our existing equipment had reached maximum capacity and could no longer meet the growing demands,” said Gerardo Caniego, executive vice president at Compañía Valenciana de Aluminio Baux. “We expect the new technology to significantly enhance our performance, allowing us to exceed an annual output of 60,000 tonnes of high-quality aluminum coils.”
Fives was responsible for the design, manufacture, and commissioning of the new cold rolling mill, which is capable of rolling strips from 6 mm down to 0.15 mm thickness, with a maximum rolling speed of 600 m per minute. Premium product quality is ensured by automatic gauge and flatness control systems. In addition, the mill is equipped with side-shifting cars, reducing the time needed to change working rolls to less than 5 minutes.
This achievement is the result of the close collaboration between the engineering, project management, and commissioning teams of both companies. “Compañía Valenciana de Aluminio Baux needed to install the new technology extremely close to the existing cold rolling mill, in a limited space, while avoiding production downtime and maintaining quality during installation and commissioning of the new mill,” explained Sergio Arevalillo, chief operating officer and project manager at Fives Steel Spain, a Fives subsidiary specialized in steel and aluminum process technology. “Successful project delivery required precise engineering and close coordination with the customer, especially during execution, which involved frequent on-site visits and joint decision-making on technical and operational aspects.”