Power requirements of rolling mills

The increasing use of electric motors for driving the main rolls in modern steel works, makes the question of the power requirements of rolling mills of considerable importance to the industrial engineer engaged in designing such installations. An error in judgment due either to inexperience or to lack of accurate information, may involve the loss of a large sum of money in the installation itself, but what is of still greater importance, is the loss that is incurred indirectly, due to the time lost before the error can be remedied. The subject is one of great complexity due to the various factors controlling the power requirements and also to the variation in operating conditions in different works. The subject of rolling mills is one on which it is hardly possible to obtain reliable information from published data and the whole rolling mill practise is based upon empirical knowledge gained by experience. During the last few years an attempt has been made in Europe to reduce the subject of rolling mill practise to some scientific basis but without very great success up to the present time.