Developing and mastering a technology for making steel with a sulfur content no greater than 15 ppm

The converter shop at the Azovstal’ combine has developed and successfully introduced a technology for making steel that contains no more than 15 ppm sulfur. The combine has already produced commercial batches of tube steel with a maximum sulfur content of 6–15 ppm. Reducing carbon content from 0.10–0.12 to 0.07–0.08% and lowering sulfur content from 40–70 ppm to 6–15 ppm have improved the quality of the metal of the slabs and rolled products made by the combine. Among these improvements: a decrease in axial porosity and axial segregation in the slabs, an improvement in the ductility characteristics of the rolled metal, a reduction in the degree of contamination of plate metal by nonmetallic inclusions, and a decrease in the incidence of plate rejection in ultrasonic tests. __________ Translated from Metallurg, No. 3, pp. 46–49, March, 2006.