The change of work roll surface topography during skin pass rolling of steel sheets

Abstract

Purpose – This paper aims to analyze changes in the surface topography of the work rolls during skin passing. Cold rolled steel sheets are additionally subject to skin pass rolling to form an appropriate surface topography. This operation should facilitate the process of further metal forming of steel sheets, such as deep drawing, painting, etc. The surface topography of steel sheets is determined by the surface topography of the work rolls as well as the skin pass rolling parameters (rolling speed, elongation, roll force, etc.). Suitable preparation and selection of roll surface topography influences the degree of rolls wear and the surface topography of steel sheets as well. Design/methodology/approach – Two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) roughness measurements of work roll surface before, during and after finishing of skin pass rolling of steel sheets are presented in the paper. The measurements were performed on four sets of work rolls with different surface topography. Findings – The appearance of the surface of rolls obtained from the analysis of 3D roughness, the values of selected parameters of the 3D roughness and relative changes of the roughness parameter Ra/Sa depending on the length of the skin passed steel sheets are presented. Practical implications – The wear of rolls is different depending on work surface topography. Originality/value – The aim of this paper is to analyze changes in the surface topography of the work rolls during skin passing. It was expected that the surface of work rolls with more summits at similar average roughness Ra will change much faster than the surface with fewer summits. For this purpose, preliminary tests were performed in an industrial environment on four pairs of work rolls, including two pairs of rolls that were hard chromium-plated.