The conveyor drive on one of the heat treating furnaces at the North Vernon, IN plant needed to be duplicated to assist with conveyor loading.  The existing drive needed to remain in place and operational while the duplication was being performed.

Company Profile

GERDAU MACSTEEL ATMOSPHERE ANNEALING (GMAA) provides metal heat treating, phosphate coating, bar shearing and sawing services to the steel, cold forming, stamping, forging and casting industries. As the 5th largest heat-treat company in the United States, GMAA specializes in high volume, ferrous heat-treating using large furnaces.

Technical Situation

Duplicating a machine requires detailed measuring and fabrication.  The owner had many of the parts on hand, but Maddox was required to “fill in the gaps.”  The existing machine structure was far more complex and cumbersome than it needed to be.  This made working on the machine difficult and time consuming.

Trades Required

Pipefitters, Welders, Millwrights, Carpenters, Concrete Carpenters and finishers.

Solution

Maddox simplified the machine structure to reduce overall cost and complexity.  Working with local machine shops and suppliers, Maddox was able to get all of the parts assembled and mounted on time to meet the customer’s schedule requirements.

Maddox fabricated and assembled the drive in our fabrication shop.

Benefits

There is a difference between literal duplication and function duplication.  Anybody can copy something and get the same results.  Using creativity, ingenuity, and our experience, we were able to make minor changes so that the equipment would not only perform the correct function, but would better meet the customer’s long term goals.