Non-contact Metallic Coating Gauges

Thermo Scientific™ RM 310 EC and RM 310 EC-LE coating weight gauging systems provide the user with reliable, proven sensor technology configurable for nearly every type of metal-coated product. The unique sensor design of the Thermo Scientific™ RM 315 EC coating weight gauge provides both total zinc coating weight and percent iron content measurements on the difficult-to-measure galvanneal coated sheet. The RM 310 EC, RM 310 EC-LE and RM 315 EC measuring heads use x-ray sources to generate x-ray fluorescence (XRF) radiation in the coated strip. The XRF radiation is detected by ion chamber detectors mounted within the sensor head. For the RM 310 EC and RM 315 EC, the ion chambers include application specific filters to measure total coating weight and alloy percent information. The RM 310 EC-LE operates at a lower energy and uses a single detector arrangement to provide cost effective measurement of total coating weight.

For hot dip galvanizing lines, these coating weight gauges can be connected with the Thermo Scientific™ RM 310 EH hot coating weight gauge. Additionally, the Thermo Scientific™ RM 400 EZ adaptive autocontrol system is available for this application. The RM 400 EZ requires the use of a RM 310 EC, RM 310 EC-LE or RM 315 EC gauge with scanning gauge heads at the cold end of the line. Control can be supplemented by measurement values obtained at the hot end by a Thermo Scientific™ RM 300 EH or RM 310 EH system. When coupled together these systems can provide several profitable benefits related to raw material savings, reduced scrap and world-class uniform quality head to tail.

Even before a new coil reaches the air knife position, the RM 400 EZ autocontrol system can instruct the air knife control to run the best parameter set which has been recorded in a previous production. The product changeover will be exactly at the defined length position, e.g. weld seam. This results in significant reductions in scrap during product changeover. Additionally, fast changeover can provide flexibility in planning production campaigns for the galvanizing line.

The low noise measurement of the total coating allows the target set point to be lowered closer to the product specification. Reducing the over-coating by a few percent results in material savings that can be applied directly to the bottom line. The compact design of the sensor heads, allows for installation in tight locations throughout the production line, including a water cooled version that can be installed at the top of the cooling tower. 

The Thermo Scientific™ RM 115 EL laboratory coating weight gauge provides a precise, fast, offline non-destructive coating weight measurement of metal coatings applied to sheet steel. Designed to use the same sensor head as its online counterparts, the RM 115 EL provides accurate offline sample measurement without costly and lengthy chemical analysis. Due to the non-destructive radiometric measurement, the samples can be stored for quality assurance purposes. The compact sensor head is designed to be easily removed from the laboratory system and installed on to the online scanner should a catastrophic event occur with the online sensor head.

The user-friendly operator interface can be provided in any language and the screen layout can be customized to display numeric readings, charts or bar graphs depending on operator preference. All Thermo Scientific gauges include the possibility for remote diagnostics using the customer’s access to the internet.