Seamless tube manufacturing process- know about all process in brief

In this article, you will learn about the manufacturing of seamless tube manufacturing. The introduction of the advance rolling mill technology and its growth during the first 19th century also placed in the tube manufacturing industries. Toward the end of the century, different types of process are available for manufacturing of seamless tubes, hence the production process became available for the manufacturers. The production volume of tubes has increased due to its vast demand in the industrial and engineering sectors.

Below are some manufacturing processes of seamless tubes:

1# mandrel mill process

In this type of manufacturing process, a steel billet is heated and pushed to a forging process in the rotary furnace. It is induced in the cylindrical hollow which is also known as mother hollow. this is produced from the help of rotary piercer. The set of roller arrangement keeps piercer at the center of the steel billet. The OD is same approx that of the inside diameter of the finished tube. Due to the secondary roller arrangements outside diameters and thickness are achieved. In order to maintain temperatures, tubes are processed for reheating furnace that increases the temperature of the tubes.

2# forging process to manufacture seamless tube manufacturing:

In a Forging operation, a billet is heated and placed in forging die that has a somewhat larger diameter than a finished tube.  The hydraulic press has a forging hammer have the same inside diameter of the tube that is used to create cylindrical forging. After the forging operation, it is machined to achieve the desired dimension. Generally, the forging operation is used to produce large diameter stainless steel 304 seamless tubes that cannot be manufactured using standard operations. The forged tubes are used for high heating applications.

3# Extrusion operation for seamless tube manufacturing process:

It is the same as the forging operation, the heated billet is placed between the die. The hydraulic ram pushes the steel billet against the piercing mandrel. Hence, the billet passed from the cylindrical cavity between die and mandrel. This operation produces the billet to the tube. In some cases, tubes manufactured with a high thickness which is known as mother hollow cavity. Many manufacturers used the mother hollow to manufacture tube with the different dimension with extrusion operations.

4# Plug mill process:

This process was invented by German engineer Mannesmann. The main difference between a mandrel and plug mill process is that in mandrel process used to achieve the inside diameters. On the other hand, by plug mill process multi-stage reduction is possible. So the greater thickness reduction is achieved. In this process, the heat treatment process is performed.

The manufacturing material is processed from different heat treatment process such as normalizing, quenching, tempering, solution Annealing, stress relieving, and other combination of the heat treatment process. The finished tubes are processed from various quality test stages for quality assurance. Those tests include a hardness test, leakage test, compression test, mechanical test, PMI test, radiographic test, and IGC test. Other tests are pitting corrosion test, destructive test, ultrasonic test and more.

This is all about the manufacturing of seamless tubes.