Arcelor Dunkirk Chooses Thermo’s Metal Analysis Solutions to Launch its Steelworks Modernization Program

Thermo Electron Corporation (NYSE:TMO) announces that Arcelor Dunkirk, the leading global producer of flat carbon steel, long carbon steel and stainless steel, has chosen Thermo’s ARL 4460 optical emission spectrometer as part of its steelworks modernization program.

The program has been launched with the objective of progressively increasing the company’s capacity from 6.7 million tones to 7.2 million tones by 2010. With the ARL SMS-2000 automation system, the ARL 4460 metals analyzer provides fully automatic sample preparation and analysis. It allows for increased productivity and shorter response times while keeping steel quality in specification even for the most demanding applications, including automotive.

Arcelor Dunkirk’s steelworks modernization program will require a much greater number of analyses than were previously performed, with the analytical control laboratory needing to work 7 days a week and 24 hours a day, requiring 250,000 analyses per year or around 700 per day. It was therefore necessary for the company to invest in market leading solutions to increase the laboratory’s capacity, reduce delays in analyses and improve measuring uncertainties.

The need to increase precision and reliability of analyses has grown as car body makers’ requirements increase: strong reduction of delays, significant increase of the percentage of vacuum-degassed metal, growth in the demand for very low carbon metal and fast, reliable analyses.

Arcelor Dunkirk has planned three phases of investment as part of the modernization program. The first phase was concluded at the end of September 2005 with the replacement of the first automatic steel measuring line with an ARL 4460 robotized with SMS-2000 and a vision system linked to an Herzog sample preparation machine.

“Several reasons led to this choice: the convincing results from the equipment evaluation assessment tests; the standard and proven product concept and the system modularity,” explains Jean-Claude Lopez, Head of Analysis and Testing Laboratory for Arcelor Dunkirk. “Thermo is well-known in the area of spectrometers and fully automated systems, in particular in the world of iron and steel making and has developed an efficient relationship with our laboratory over several years. The automatic line has been in operation since September 2005 and we haven’t encountered any major problems. The first awaited results in production have been spot on, both in uncertainty and technological reliability”.

Phase 2, installation of the second steel automatic line with Thermo, is now under way and is scheduled for completion in September 2006.