Numerical Simulation of Adaptability of Roll Pass of Full-floating Mandrel Pipe Mill to Steel Grade Variation

Based on the site-used manufacturing processes, the finite element (FE) simulation software MSC SuperForm is used to simulate the continuous rolling process for steel pipes by the Φ140 mm full-floating mandrel mill with the Φ195 mm roll pass. Also analyzed with the method are the regularities of metal flow and rolling force, etc. of the C22 steel and the super 13Cr steel. The result reveals that compared with the C22 steel, the super 13Cr steel spreads more easily, and has a bigger tendency of transverse metal flow. So, great attention should be paid to roll pass design for high alloy pipe rolling so as to avoid groove overfilling. Likely, compared with the C22 steel, the rolling force of the super 13Cr steel is 60% bigger than that of the C22 steel, resulting in bigger elastic deformations of the stand and the roll. Therefore in case of rolling the super 13Cr steel, it is necessary to increase the amount of pre-pressure when pre-adjusting roll gaps, and also to determine the elastic deformation when designing the roll pass in order to offset the influence by big elastic deformation amounts of the stand and the roll as caused by the big rolling force in case of rolling high alloy tubes.