Kawakami-West
（factory）
（wires・bars）

Aluminium melting furnace

2

Aluminum wire production process

Wire materials are produced mainly at the Misumi Plant.
The production lines there can be roughly divided into two processes, wire rod and drawing wire.
The main facilities include melting furnaces, continuous casting and rolling mill, continuous winding machines, drawing wire, winding machines, cutters, heat treatment furnaces, and inspection and research equipment.

Aluminium sheet production process

All sheet products are fabricated at the Kawakami East Plant. The main facilities there include a melting furnace, continuous casting machine, 6 Hi cold rolling mill, washing device, tension leveler, cutters/slitters, die-set shear, and heat-treatment furnaces.
ALMINE also produces the hot coil we use for making aluminium sheets. The molten aluminium from the melting furnace ① automatically flows to the continuous casting machine ② and the hot coil is slowly taken up. While the hot coil is being taken up, test pieces are sampled and arranged in chronological order to undergo a series of tests. The hot coil thus produced is fed to the 6 Hi cold rolling mill ③, where it is rolled to a thickness of 0.1-4 mm. Our technical staff made significant improvements on the 6 Hi cold rolling mill to achieve high-speed, high-productivity operations. As a part of our thorough quality assurance system, the AFC* and AGC** systems help to maintain the high quality of our products.
Completely flat rollers are needed to produce perfectly flat sheets, there fore the 6 HI cold rolling mill rolls are ground and polished with newest technology grinding machine for mill rolls ④. The equipment is entirely surrounded by a 5-meter-deep groove to shut out vibration, as extremely high precision measured in microns is required.
The rolled sheets are washed with organic solvents to remove dirt and aluminium powder deposited during rolling. They are then sent to the tension leveler, where the degree of the sheet flatness is even further improved. After that, the sheet, which has been rolled to the specified thickness, is cut to the required length by the die-set shear (traveling cutting machine) if it is for sheet products (meter size). If the sheet is intended for bar products, it is cut to the required width with the slitter (width cutting machine) ⑥ and taken up in bar form. Depending on the material and product type, heat treatment is applied during the production process by injecting DX gas for anoxic treatment. Following a strict quality inspection, the products are shipped.

Aluminum bar production process

All bar products are fabricated at the Kawakami West Plant.
Opened in 1993, this plant has a line that can continuously produce aluminium bars up to 77 mm in diameter, the world's largest, and aluminium alloys either in coils or fixed-length lots.
This innovative production line is the realization of ALMINE's many years of experience and impressive production record concerning continuous cast rolling techniques.
It represents the aluminium materials production process elevated to the height of perfection.
Production efficiency has been greatly improved thereby making it possible to produce and ship aluminium bar in coils.
As aluminium continues to replace other metals, the possibilities for new technologies are limitless.