Koproma engineering AB is a technology company that designs turnkey plants in the foremost steel industry. Part of Koproma's product range includes cutting machines, mainly abrasive cut-off machines. These machines are used to cut super duplex stainless steel materials. The machine owner of one of these cutting machines intends to cut larger materials than the current plants capacity.

The purpose of this work is to investigate the power requirement when cutting duplex stainless steel materials with an abrasive cutting disc. The result should be used to redesign the current cutting plant, in order to meet the demand for the increase in production capacity. The purpose is also to see how the redesign affects resource utilization, efficiency, and plant utilization.

By analyzing the process data for the current plant, the necessary data were established to validate the mathematical models, which were identified in a literature study on abrasive cutting. Product development methods such as morphological matrix and evaluation matrix VDI 2225 were used for concept generation and concept evaluation, respectively. This resulted in two definitive concept proposals.

The desired increase in production capacity requires a nominal power of about 225 kW. By using super-thin cutting discs, the material removal rate is kept down, which also leads to reduced cutting power. The proposed electric motor has a rated power of 200 kW, which during instantaneous overload can withstand the power peaks the cutting process requires. This provides a design that is better utilized regarding engine power, without reducing accessibility or plant efficiency.

Rotating the workpiece during cutting increases the effective cutting diameter of the disc. This means that number of cuts per disc increase by about 45 percent, which increases the lifespan of the disc. This means that the cutting machine increases its utilization of available resources. Based on the expected consumption of cutting discs, as well as the increased lifespan, an annual cost savings of over one and a half million SEK can be made.