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    Steel 101 Conference a Success with Help from SSAB

    Written by John Packard


    On Wednesday and Thursday of this past week, a sold-out group of attendees and six Steel Market Update instructors, one event coordinator and a potential future instructor traveled to Mobile, Ala., to participate in the first Steel 101 workshop of 2018. The workshop was a success, aided by the generosity of the SSAB plate mill that we toured on Wednesday afternoon.

    Each workshop begins with instruction about the steelmaking and rolling process. We introduced a new instructor, Chuck McDaniels, a former metallurgist with Sparrows Point, who discussed how an integrated steel mill makes steel from iron ore. Complementing Chuck was Steve Murphy, another process expert but from the minimill side of the industry. Combined, they described in detail blast furnace/basic oxygen furnace and electric arc furnace operations, as well as ladle metallurgy and vacuum degassing stations and how they impact the ultimate product being rolled.

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