Industries

Ceramics in the steel and metal processing industry

A strong mid-sized sector with a great need for innovation

Almost 20 million tons of steel – around 40 percent of the total production in Germany – are ordered every year by the German steel and metal processing industry. It’s used primarily to manufacture supplier parts as well as preliminary and end products for the global market of a variety of industries including automotive, electrical and electronics, mechanical and plant engineering, and construction.

The steel and metal processing industry in Germany is traditionally made up of mainly medium-sized companies: The approximately 5,000 companies – most of them owner-managed – employ nearly 500,000 people and have achieved sales of around 80 billion euros in recent years. Almost half the German companies in this sector are based in North Rhine-Westphalia.

Strong competition has intensified specialization in this branch of industry. Technical ceramics are used in highly developed production processes in a wide variety of forms and applications: as a ‘side dam’ for thin-strip casting of steel and non-ferrous alloys or as a detachment ring for horizontal continuous casting, as pouring nozzles for molten metals or as a suspension or spray for release agents and lubricants in the high-temperature range. The material boron nitride, in particular, is often used in steel and metal processing in the high-temperature range, for example as an application-specific sintered molded part or as a release agent and lubricant in the form of a powder, spray or suspension.

Sources:
www.gesamtmetall.de
www.bmwi.de
de.statista.com

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