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T. Sendzimir, Inc. is best known for its cold reversing steel
mills designed to roll stainless and other hard to roll or
exotic materials. We market our designs and equipment worldwide
through a network of licensees and agents. Our Waterbury,
Connecticut office is committed to improving the quality of our
machines through innovations in design and content to improve
production efficiency and lower maintenance costs.
- In the late 1940s, the company accelerated
development of the stainless steel industry through its invention of the
Sendzimir cluster mill. Among other accomplishments, the Sendzimir Z-Mill now
processes more than 90 percent of the world’s stainless steel.
- In the 1970s, introduction of the Z-High® Mill
permitted 4-High owners to realize many of the benefits of the cluster mill by
retrofitting their existing reversing 4-Highs. Inclusion of Z-Highs within a
processing line also promises to make possible the truly continuous production
of stainless steel from strip casting through finish rolling.
Sendzimir has been in business for over 55 years; starting
with hot dipped galvanizing lines and later moving to cluster
mill technology. In recent years, we have developed the Z-High
Insert which has also led to a development in high reduction
Z-High Inserts at the entry end of hot A&P Process Lines.
Founded in the earl 1950's by the Polish inventor,
Tadeusz Sendzimir (born
1894), the business started in association with ARMCO as the "Armzen"
company; later changing its name to T. Sendzimir, Inc. The
first product lines were for hot-dipped galvanizing lines, for
which the company's founder was the inventor and patent holder.
The company then moved into cluster mill technology, eventually
becoming known worldwide for its cold reversing steel mills
designed to roll stainless and other hard-to-roll exotic
materials. In recent years, the development of the Z-High®
mill has led to the use of high-reduction Z-High inserts at the
entry end of A/P process lines.
In total, Sendzimir now has over 265 cluster mills to our credit as
well as 55 Z-High Mills and 16 Planetary mills in over 43
countries. The
company's engineers have been awarded over 100 patents.
Our company has been chaired by
Michael Sendzimir since
1975 who still remains active in the company and the Board of
Directors and who has traveled to almost every country in the
world to promote the cluster mill technology.
The name is not of common use like
brands advertised on television or in the newspaper, yet every
one of us, ever single day, uses a product rolled on the
Sendzimir mill. Every automobile is trimmed with 17 CR stainless
and new cars are equipped with stainless catalytic converters
and exhaust systems. Every Macdonald's has 18 tons of stainless
equipment installed in its kitchen. Railroad cars, buses,
highway tankers and household appliances use stainless. We eat
with stainless flatware. Modern architecture uses stainless in
and outside of the buildings. Large chemical vats are made from
the noble steel. Before the stainless sheet or strip is so
utilized, it is precision rolled to exact thickness in a
Sendzimir mill no matter whether is is produced in the USA,
Japan, Taiwan, Korea, Thailand, Europe, India, Australia, or
South Africa. In fact, Sendzimir Mills are installed in over 43
countries!
When you turn lights on it is quite possible that the
electricity used had its generator's stator laminations rolled
on a Sendzimir mill. Transformers that step down the voltage use
high quality oriented grain silicon steel; half of which in the
world is rolled on Sendzimir mills.
Should you be using a computer, an electronic calculator, or
a television set, you'll find some ultra high accuracy strip
used in their construction. Brass, copper, or carbon steel for
these various applications is rolled to gauges thinner than by
conventional equipment. Your car's radiator used 0.0015" thin
copper foil - one day soon, they'll be only 0.00075"! Your watch
casing, compact cover, lipstick holder may have brass, copper,
silver, or a gold cover rolled on Sendzimir mills.
Half of India's thin gauge and wide low carbon steel used for
galvanizing, tinplate or blackplate is rolled on Sendzimir
mills. There are similar such units in the USA, Europe, and the
Far East. And, when galvanized strip is painted, then a
Sendzimir Skinpass mill will elongate it (stretch it), flatten
it and render its surface smooth before the paint is applied.
Such products can then be used directly for stamping or
household appliances, autobodies, or for house and building
construction.
Let's not forget special and critical components - Bimetal
strip for thermostats or circuit breakers, Invar, Kovar, Monel
and Inconel for special applications like, for instance,
electric resistance elements for toasters or for big industrial
furnaces. And how about the nose cone of the rockets, or the
supersonic B-70 outer skin designed for Mach 3 speeds? Next
generation Hypersonic aircraft will require ultra-thin titanium
aluminide honeycomb skin to operate at elevated temperatures;
rolled on a small work roll Sendzimir mill!
There are also Sendzimir mills to cold roll heavy plates or
sheets in stainless, stellite, and for armored car protection in
13% manganese steels. An interesting usage is for vessels to
make yogurt - the inner surface has to be of the highest finish
devoid of any minute pinholes - available on a Sendzimir cluster
mill!
Within the last few years a new and unique application of
Sendzimir Z-High mills for very heavy reduction on hot strip
directly in the front section of stainless A&P lines has been
developed as a totally new concept. The Z-High mill uses the
same concept as the 20-High cluster mill - a small diameter work
roll imparting a high specific pressure on a small area of the
strip. The fully processed stainless coils can then be sold
directly off-the-line; they can be slit and used for welded
pipes or can be further cold rolled. The capacity of the
existing cold mills can thusly be increased very substantially -
and the cost per ton reduced accordingly.
Sendzimir also produces planetary hot strip mills that can
roll slabs in hot rolled coils. Such heavy single reduction
mills are ideal for coupling directly in tandem to a thin slab
caster and can roll non-stop incoming coils just before the
coiler at the end of the line. Indeed, this will be the next
generation of the true mini-mills and recent agreements with
mill builders in Europe intend to re-introduce the one-pass
one-way hot rolling concept.
Sendzimir has also been known for its continuous galvanizing
lines invented and developed by
Dr. Tadeusz Sendzimir in
the early 1930's. A total of 86 have been built and produce over
6 million tons/year. all of today's lines have been developed on
the basis of the original Sendzimir pioneer work.
Tomorrow may bring other ideas, and Sendzimir will keep
abreast of technology and develop for you the equipment to
achieve future breakthroughs.
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