Grupo Acerero starts operations on their fifth plant

Grupo Acerero will be manufacturing 1,000,000 tons at third fifth sheet plate manufacturing plant.

On a property land of 25 hectares, the steel company built the fifth plant of the group in 30 months, investing about 60 million dollars in the technological package and on infrastructure about 25 million dollars.

“Sheet plate will be manufactured there, some of this product is for the construction and the other percentage for the metal mechanic industry, specialized steelworking, machinery, and equipment. It will add 400,000 tons more of product for us, we are thinking in reaching 1,000,000 tons soon, it is one of our goals and with this new plant is how we will do it,” said Humberto Abaroa, general director of Grupo Acerero.

On a first stage, a 20,000 square meters industrial building was built, the project is to manufacture sheet as of hot rolling, the capability will have about 400,000 tons in annualized volume and it is anticipated to manufacture sheets in thickness of 3/8 to 4 inches, thickness mainly in 6, 8 and 10 feet, and in 20 and 40 feet long.

“As challenges for the group is that it is a new project, in Mexico we will be the second company in manufacturing it. We begin from a project that involves new technology, new equipment, but we also include some mills that were already operating,” said Gilberto Santa Cruz, plant manager.

The entire steelworking installed was made in the other plants of the Group, and the industrial building characterizes for being big and strong since it is required due to the dimension of the equipment installed from Italy. Owed to that, Fernando Abaroa, responsible of the Technical Direction & Manufacturing, explained that they settled the mill on iron, at a height of more than 7 meters, which makes the entire facility as water piping, oil, strength feed cable, and control are below the iron.

“It is a very modern layout that allows us saving money in future operation, besides in water pumping, all water used to cool this plant returns by gravity to our water plant,” he said.

The installed furnace is of last generation technology, which will contribute to having very low emissions and good energy efficiency, they will also have flexibility regarding production and programming thanks to the design.

“This will allow us working from 100 to 120 tons per hour. Two lamination boxes were installed that in fact can work at the same time, those are reversible mills and inside the furnace, we can have three product lines, of raw material,” said Gilberto Santa Cruz.

About 180 people are joining the first stage of the project, which officially starts operations in November, after making the first cold and hot testing for two months, and in October the furnace was heated, a process that lasted 10 days.

The new plant manager of Grupo Acerero said that the product that will be manufactured is for the area of structure, machinery, construction, even for the aerospace industry, military and automotive.

“For the manufacturing, we begin on slabs, it is the raw material we will be using, the purchase of the raw material will be mainly from South America, Europe, Asia, and National,” he said.

FIVE PLANTS INTEGRATE THE GROUP

The steel industry of 100 % Mexican capital, annually manufactures more than 690,000 tons of steel, which represents about 50,000 tons of all kinds of steel per month: corrugated rod, welded mesh, annealed wire, armed castle, among others.

The Group is integrated by five plants:

Two lamination plants: dedicated to manufacturing corrugated rod for the construction of thin gauges.

The steel and lamination plant, in which the entire scrap is transformed in raw material to be supplied to other plants, besides there thick caliber rods and wire rod is manufactured there.

Wire Products Plant: it is manufactured as of wire rod, wire products which are welded mesh, armed castle, armor, nail, annealed wire, among others.

Plate plant: plate will be manufactured in sheet for the metal mechanic industry, specialized ironwork, machinery, and equipment.

RECYCLING COMPANY

Grupo Acerero is committed to the environment, therefore, since its foundation, more than 20 years ago, they recycle scrap to transform it into steel products. 

For its environmental responsibility, last year they received the distinction “Corporate Responsible Company” and they are currently members of the US Green Building Council, an international organism that supports the entities that contribute with products, services, and sustainable ideas.

“90 % of our scrap is national and 10 % is brought from the southern U.S.,” said Humberto Abaroa, general director of Grupo Acerero.

Steel is one of the most used metals around the world, no industry does not use it and it is one of the most recycled metals; regardless of how many times it is processed, it always preserves its properties such as resistance, hardness, and malleability.

Grupo Acerero takes care of the environment by supporting these processes: 

Fumes control: they have a fumes plant in which dust generated by the electric fusion furnace and refining furnace is processed and concentrated.

Supply and oxygen regulation: they have an oxygen plant that supplies and regulates the oxygen necessary to fulfill the operations of the different production areas.

Wastewaters treatments: to dispose of metal and oil wastes, they treat wastewaters from steel for its reuse and the laminating process from wastewaters treatment plants.

Sludge thickening: during primary and secondary cooling detaches from the billets a husk that falls into water and pollutants it. To reuse it, water recovers in the flakes’ pit where husks are extracted with the help of a machine. Water then flows to sand filters and then passes through a sludge thickener in which it finishes being cleaned through a sedimentation process.

Used oil Control and impregnated textile: to guarantee the manufacturing process will not cause environmental damage, they have a process for control and recollection of used oil and textile wastes. 

ACHIEVING TOTAL QUALITY 

Jose Armando Morquecho, Quality manager of Grupo Acerero, said that the company is focused not only on its process quality and its products but also on quality, service and customer service.

They are distinguished from other companies in the area for having their laboratory credited under the Standard ISO 17025, it is a standard oriented to assay or gauging laboratories, to guarantee its customers (internal and external) their trust and technical capability to fulfill analysis.

Moreover, for its new export plants toward Central and South America, beginning by Colombia, during 2019 they were credited internationally in the Instituto Colombiano de Normas Tecnicas y Certificacion (ICONTEC,) National Standardization Organism in Colombia.

“We are also working for the ISO 9001-2015 certification and we currently have challenges such as recertification audits, credit audits for the laboratories area as well as for the quality area of ISO-9001, it is a challenge to end this year with these achievements and, mainly, start them in order for the first quarter of 2020 these credits can be shown to customers,” noted Jose Armando Morquecho.