FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The invention relates to generate surface cooling profile of wire rods in the production line of wire and rod mills. The disclosure further relates to get the surface cooling profile of the wire rods while moving on Stelmor conveyor of wire rod mill. As the wire rods remain in a moving state, no thermocouple or temperature sensors can be attached.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

In known WRM (Wire rod mill) forced air-cooling processes such as the Stelmor cooling conveyor are generally used as cooling methods of hot rolled wire rods. The strength and ductility of the wire rods can be controlled in the rolling line with these processes. Because forced cooling is performed with an air blast, the cooling capacity of the forced air-cooling process is often inadequate. The air flow from the plenum chamber cannot be accurately controlled for the required cooling rate of wire rods because of the lack of an accurate temperature measurement. The wire rod coils are arranged to pass over several zones in order to obtain the desired microstructure and corresponding material properties. Each zone is equipped with fans to provide the forced air for cooling through designed baffles and chamber.
The wire rod coils pass over the cooling nozzles on the Stelmor conveyor and are not in a static state, but always move forward with the rotation of the cooling conveyor equipment. Accordingly, a surface temperature profile of the wire rods gives an information of actual cooling effectiveness which is not possible with a contact thermocouple in Stelmor air-cooling process.
By attaching the wire rod coils to a pre-welded thermocouple the performance of Stelmor conveyor cooling performance can be assessed. Although this measurement method can be applied to offline experimental laboratory furnace heating chamber and then static cooling, however this

cannot be applied to the temperature measurements of an actual on-line Stelmor air-cooling production process.
At present there is no method for obtaining the cooling profile on the stelmor conveyor of the wire rod mill. Due to the high speed motion of the coil, no conventional thermocouple can be attached.
A work has been done in China (China Steel Technical Report no 25 pp 66-72, 2012) on the same subject. Though the work is on the same pyrometer principle, the pyrometer has been installed on a platform and a quite big arrangement is needed.
OBJECTS OF THE INVENTION
In view of the foregoing limitations inherent in the prior-art, it is an object of the invention to develop a cost effective and online real-time surface cooling profile measurement for the wire rods on Stelmor conveyor.
Another object of the invention is to capture the Recalescence effect which is an increase in temperature that occurs while cooling metal when a change in structure with an increase in entropy occurs.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Accordingly, there is provided a device to obtain the surface cooling profile of the wire rods while moving on Stelmor conveyor of wire rod mill. As it is moving, no thermocouple can be attached.
The designed system consists of a single color Infrared pyrometer with a small USB data logger and a battery all interfaced as per the circuit and clubbed in a tube with inclined enclosure which is dropped at the start of the Stelmor conveyor and the whole setup travels along with the section of the wire rods and the radiation coming out of the wire rods is being captured and recorded in the system. At the end of the conveyor it is picked up.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE ACCOMPANYING DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 Schematic circuit diagram of a real time temperature profiler
Fig. 2 The actual hardware setup of the real time temperature profiler for the
field trial
Fig. 3 The schematic of the actual hardware real time temperature profiler
FIG. 4 The result captured by the instrument after drop and lift
FIG. 5 The field trial after drop on the moving wire rod over stelmor
conveyor.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
For obtaining the cooling profile it is essential to know the online surface temperature of the wire rods in moving condition which is not possible by the conventional static temperature measurement systems.
A real time temperature profiler (100) for wire rods over stelmor conveyor in wire rod mill is shown in FIGS. 1, 2 & 3. The profiler (100) comprises of a ceramic base plate (5). The ceramic base plate (5) having a hole (H), the ceramic base plate (5) is configured to be placed over moving wire rod on stelmor conveyor.
The profiler (100) comprises of a holding tube (1) fixed to the hole. The holding tube (1) is inclined to the ceramic base plate (5) with help of a stand (7).
Rim of one end of the holding tube (1) where it gets fixed is in a matching plane of the ceramic base plate (5). The other end of the holding tube (1) comprises an infra-red pyrometer (2) configured to capture infra-red radiation from the hot wire rod over stelmor conveyor.

In accordance with an embodiment of the invention the holding tube can be made up of mild steel.
A data logger (4) is coupled to the infra-red pyrometer (2) to store data received, the data logger (4) is positioned over the holding tube (1).
A battery (3) is also being coupled to the infra-red pyrometer (2) and positioned over the holding tube (1). The battery (3) is being configured to give power the radiation pyrometer (2).
A handle (6) is positioned over the ceramic base plate (5) to place and collect the temperature profiler over the stelmor conveyor for capturing data.
The infra-red radiation from the wire rod over stelmor conveyor is responsible for the change in temperature is due to the change in entropy. During a structure transformation, the Gibbs free energy of both structures is more or less the same. Therefore the process will be exothermic. The heat provided is the latent heat. Recalescence also occurs after super cooling when the super cooled liquid suddenly crystallizes, forming a solid but releasing heat in the process.
Again shown in FIG. 1, a radiation pyrometer of 0-1000 deg C with 4 -20 mA output signal is being powered by 24V DC Battery power supply. The current output signal is interfaced with the data logger. After trial on the Stelmor conveyor the data can be downloaded to Laptop.
An infrared thermometer is made up primarily of the following components :-a. A lens which collects the emitted thermal radiation from a defined surface.
b. A detector which converts this energy into an electronic signal.
c. An emissivity correction feature, so that the instrument can be adjusted
according to properties of the target material.

d. A compensation feature for ambient temperature which prevents the detector from factoring the instrument’s own temperature into the output signal.
The radiated heat coming out from the wire is being captured by the radiation pyrometer which converts it in the form of measurable current signal 4-20 mA DC which is in series loop connected with the data logger.
In accordance with one of the embodiment of the invention Lascar USB data logger can be employed. This data logger is an embedded microprocessor based battery powered low energy consuming devices run on EL-WIN-USB Windows Control Software (V7.4) EL-WIN-USB is the software platform for stand-alone operation.. It is compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows 7, 8 and 10. This standalone data logger measures more than 32,000 readings over a 4-20mA d.c. measurement range. The data logger is supplied with a cap featuring a pair of screw terminals and measurement leads terminating in crocodile clips. Easily set up the logger and view downloaded data by plugging the unit into a PC’s USB port and using the free EasyLog software provided. Data can then be graphed, printed and exported to other applications for detailed analysis.
The total arrangement is fabricated in a pipe along with the radiation
pyrometer is installed on a alumina ceramic plate of size 45cm.X25cm.& thickness of 8mm at an inclined angle of 135 deg. anticlockwise in the direction of the moving conveyor. The inclination angle given to protect it from no toppling in the whole journey of the devices on the Stelmor conveyor. The electronic component of the IR pyrometer, battery and data logger can be covered with glass wool jacket to protect from the environment heat (FIG. 2). The handle is attached with the plate to drop the whole system on the Stelmor conveyor. There are many holes has been made on the plate

so that there is least resistance to the flow of air coming from plenum chamber.
The data captured can be plotted with time stamp which shows the sudden rise of temperature and the Recalescence effect (FIG. 4).
The field trial exercise is shown in the FIG. 5. It can be clearly seen that the profiler is positioned over the hot wire rods over the stelmor conveyor.
With this drop type equipment repetitive trial can be done to know the cooling profile and there by air flow can be adjusted to get the exact cooling rate.

WE CLAIM:

1. A real time temperature profiler (100) for wire rods over stelmor
conveyor in wire rod mill, comprising:
a ceramic base plate (5) having a hole, the ceramic base plate (5) being configured to be placed over moving wire rod on stelmor conveyor;
a holding tube (1) being fixed to the hole, the holding tube (1) being inclined to the ceramic base plate (5) with help of a stand (7), rim of one end of the holding tube (1) where it gets fixed is in a matching plane of the ceramic base plate (5), other end of the holding tube (1) comprises an infra-red pyrometer (2), the infra-red pyrometer (2) being configured to capture infra-red radiation from hot wire rod over stelmor conveyor;
a data logger (4) coupled to the infra-red pyrometer (2) is being configured to store data received, the data logger (4) is being positioned over the holding tube (1);
a battery (3) being coupled to the infra-red pyrometer (2) and positioned over the holding tube (1), the battery (3) being configured to give power the radiation pyrometer (2); and
a handle (6) positioned over the ceramic base plate (5) to position and collect the temperature profiler over wire rod of stelmor conveyor for capturing data.
2. The real time temperature profiler (100) as claimed in claim 1, wherein
the holding tube (1) is being made up of mild steel.

3. The real time temperature profiler (100) as claimed in claim 1, wherein angle of inclination for the holding tube (1) over the ceramic base plate (5) is 135 deg anticlockwise in the direction of the moving conveyor.
4. The real time temperature profiler (100) as claimed in claim 1, wherein the Pyrometer, Battery and the Data Logger are covered by steel glass wool.