I am pleased to announce that we are increasing the number of issues of Ironmaking and Steelmaking to 10 per year (up from 8). The journal is performing well and over recent years has shown a significant increase in its usage and the number of good quality submissions received. The extra issues will provide our readers with more content and allow us to reduce the time from acceptance to publication in an issue for authors. We continue to publish accepted articles online within a few weeks of acceptance.
We are currently evaluating the journal's scope and coverage to make sure we cover all relevant aspects of processing, products and applications of iron and steelmaking and give space to emerging subjects and developments of practical interest.
This issue of Ironmaking and Steelmaking also incorporates Steel World. We have some interesting topics starting with a paper by Professor Ken Mills and colleagues entitled ‘Looking into the continuous casting mould’. Ken was the winner of the 2013 Bessemer medal and this paper is based on his award presentation lecture in London last year.
When you look into the continuous casting mould you can see very little. However, in recent years mathematical modelling has advanced to the stage where models can allows us to ‘see’ into the mould and provide us with a way of deducing the mechanisms responsible for defects and process problems. For example, if it was decided to increase the casting speed to counter star cracking, this would result in increased heat flux density, more turbulence in the metal flow, lower powder consumption and lower negative strip time.
Each of these actions will have repercussions for the process but current models do not tell us what is happening in the mould but predict the theoretical actions and reactions which can occur as a result of the casting conditions. The major challenge for modellers in the future will be in modifying these theoretical models so that they can represent the actual mould in real time.
The second article, ‘The Proving Factory’ by Mike Woodcock and Caroline Holmes of Tata Steel Automotive is based on a presentation at Tata Steel Scunthorpe last summer as part of the very successful Steel Strategy series of conferences organised by IOM3.
Despite huge strides forward, the development of low-carbon vehicle technologies is still hindered by a gap between the technology developers and the requirements of vehicle manufacturers for ‘proving’ volume supply.
Launched in February 2013 The Proving Factory is a collaborative project which aims to develop a unique manufacturing, assembly and validation solution for the UK automotive industry, credibly bridging the current market gap between the technology developers making innovative, low-carbon vehicle technology prototypes and the needs of vehicle manufacturers for volume supply. In short it will take advanced technologies and turn them into products, manufacturing and assembling them in appropriate volumes to enter the automotive market.
The final article by James Hunt, Fatos Derguti and Iain Todd of the Innovative Metals Processing Centre, The University of Sheffield, deals with additive layer manufacturing or ALM; sometimes called 3D printing. The majority of ALM processes utilise metallic powder and there is an increased demand for specialist metallic powders. Currently there are only a few steel grades available for these processes, but this interesting article outlines a methodology for the selection of suitable steel alloys and provides guidance on which steels would be worthy of further investigation as potential candidates for powder production.
Dr David Price
Executive Editor