Gerdau awards Russula drives upgrade

In December 2015, the Gerdau plant in Jacksonville, FL, USA awarded Russula a contract to revamp the bar and wire rod mill drives. The goal of the upgrade is to streamline the mill funcionality and improve the safety of the drives.

Divided by areas within the plant, the electrical upgrade will occur in three phases in order to reduce the downtime and impact on production. Phase 1 included the main mill processing area, in particular the stands and cold shear DC drives and auxiliary equipment AC drives. Phase 2 consists of upgrading the existing drives for the bar mill exit area and Phae 3 the wire rod mill exit area. Downtime will be reduced as Phase 2 and Phase 3 will be implemented alternating uptime. For example, the bar mill exit area drives will be revamped while the mill rolls wire rod and vice versa.

• Phase 1 - Mill processing area
• Phase 2 - Bar mill exit area
• Phase 3 - Wire rod mill exit area

The commissioning of each phase is scheduled to occur during planned shutdowns in 2017.