Page 6: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (May 1984)

U.S. shipyard officials tour NKS plant.

New $27.9-Million NKS Plant

In Mexico Will Supply Heavy Steel

Forgings And Castings To Shipyards And Industry

Full Color Facilities Brochure Available

Shipbuilding executives from 14 major North American shipyards recently toured the site of the

NKS steel forging and casting plant in Puerto Lazaro Cardenas on Mexico's West Coast. With an accumulated investment of 50 bil- lion pesos (about $27.9 million),

Mexico will next year place in op- eration its first heavy manufactur- ing plant located in that munici- pality. Trial runs will begin in

November of this year with the first tapping of steel, and produc- tion is scheduled for the first quarter of 1985.

Located on Cayacal Island, oc- cupying an area of 52,600 square meters, the NKS plant is a result of a joint venture of Nacional Fin- anciera (NAFINSA), the Mexican

Development Bank; SIDERMEX, the official steel consortium of

Mexico; and Kobe Steel, a leading

Japanese steel producer.

Major equipment at the new

NKS facility will include:

The steelmaking shop will be equipped with a 40-ton electric arc furnace, a 60-ton ladle furnace, and a vacuum degassing system.

The steel casting shop will have a 130 ton maximum pouring weight and will be equipped with heat treatment furnaces (100/300). The steel forging shop will boast a 400/ 600-ton forging press and a 1,500- ton forging press. The machine shop will be equipped with hori- zontal lathes up to 300/2,200 (mm) x 15,000 (mm) N.C., vertical lathes up to 8,500/500 (mm) x 5,000 (mm)

N.C., and horizontal milling ma- chines up to 180 (mm x 4,500 (mm) x 1.200 (mm) N.C. A 3,500-ton ca- pacity hydraulic press and a 2,000- ton bending roll as well as a flame cutting machine will be installed in the heavy steel fabricating shop.

Annual Capacities

Steel making shop 90,000 tons (maximum pour 150 tons)

Steel casting shop 20,000 tons as cast

Steel forging shop 22,000 tons as forged (maximum single forging 130 tons)

Machining shop 165,000 hours

Heavy steel 10,000 tons fabrication shop

Guests from U.S. shipyards and other firms who recently toured the new plant included Louis Mi- nett, senior vice president, Amer- ican Bureau of Shipping; Ing. Lu- ciano Derchi, ABS representative in Mexico; Lawrence Brown, ex- ecutive vice president, Jackson- ville Shipyards, Inc., Paul Glaske, president and Bob Wallace, vice president, Marathon LeTourneau

Company; Carlos Agnese, vice president-contract administration,

Norfolk Shipbuilding and Drydock

Corp.; Robert Kiefer, assistant to the president, Georpe G. Sharp,

Inc.; Frank Cruze, director of purchasing, Tampa Shipyards, Inc.;

Paul O'Keefe, vice president, Todd

Shipyard Corp.

Representatives of NKS attend- ing the tour included Lie. Pablo

Padilla Ramirez, general direc- tor, Lie. Alfredo Marquez Lo- pez, deputy general director, and

Sr. Jose Carrasco Riojas, com- mercial sub-director.

Lexington International Trad- ing was represented by Henry

Engelbrecht, president and Dar- foon Du, North American sales representative.

Mr. Ramirez, general director of the NKS plant, informed the in- dustry leaders that the new facil- ity will provide Mexico with the capability of producing forgings and castings up to 80 tons in weight with an annual capacity of 23,000 tons of forged parts, 20,000 tons of castings and 240,000 ma- chine hours. The plant will offer to shipbuilders heavy castings and forgings for rudders, stocks, tail and line shafting, propellers, and related parts of the highest qual- ity, conforming to the standards of the classification societies.

NKS deputy general director,

Mr. Lopez and commercial sub-di- rector Mr. Riojas reviewed the latest technology and engineering designs that are being incorpo- rated into the new forging and casting complex.

The new plant will serve indus- tries including the marine, naval, mining, petroleum, petrochemical, cement, sugar, electrical, nuclear, rail, iron and steel industries.

Several of the tour guests ex- pressed definite intentions to place orders with the new NKS facility.

A free full-color 16-page bro- chure on the new NKS facility is now available. This book contains full details and drawings on the (continued on page 10)

May 1,1984

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