The First Mini Mill

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Badische Stahlwerke Electric Arc furnace

in Germany was  Badische Stahlwerke in Kehl  founded in 1968 by  industrial pioneer Willy Korf. The mill was built next to Korf’s already existing bar rolling mill on the banks of the river Rhein.
Only one year later Korf founded another steel mill in Hamburg (Hamburger Stahlwerke) and the first U.S. Mini Mill in Georgetown, S.C.

Willy Korf died in an airplane crash in 1980 and soon after his first mill went bancrupt. The Seizinger und Weizmann families took over in 1984 and made the mill into one of the most efficient steel mills worldwide.
With it’s yearly output of more than 2 mio. tons of steel it is hardly a mini mill anymore.
Today BSW runs two 100 ton electric arc furnaces, two continuous casters and a bar- and wire rolling mill.

More images at Stahlseite.

369 Ton Steel Casting

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369 Ton Casting
Casting the lower beam of a forging press from four ladles at Industeel in Le Creusot, France.
Further images.

The first iron works the „Royal Foundry“ started production in Le Creusot, France in 1782.
In 1836 Adolphe und Eugène Schneider took over the foundry and made it into the “French Krupp”, a factory producing speciality steels, locomotives, large weapons and machinery.
In 1876 the largest steam hammer worldwide (100 ton) was installed at Schneider & Cie .The first hydraulik press starts production in 1890.
In 1920 more than 20000 people are employed in the mill’s blast furnaces, open hearth shops, rolling mills, forges, foundries and mechanical shops.
Iron production is closed down in 1940.
From 1949 on the mills in Le Creusot are named “Société des Forges et Ateliers du Creusot (SFAC)”.
In 1952 a 7500-ton hydraulic press (a reparation from Germany) was installed.
The first nuclear power plant equipment is produced in 1954.
In 1970 the SFAC joins the “Cie. des Ateliers et Forges de la Loire” to form “Creusot-Loire Industries“.
In 1984 Creusot Loire filed bancruptcy and the steel and rolling mills were taken over by USINOR.In 1998 the Creusot steel activities were merged with the Belgian Fabrique de Fer de Charleroi to form Industeel.
Industeel Le Creusot today runs a 100 ton electric arc furnace, a 4 meter heavy plate mill and a steel foundry.
Industeel is part of ArcelorMittal since 2006.

No More Steel From Gustave Boël

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85 ton eaf

Last night the steel workers at the DUFERCO, La Louviere plant in Belgium accepted the closure of their plant and a redundancy package offered by the company.
The electric arc steel making shop and the wire rolling mill will be closed and eventually mothballed.
Only the strip rolling mill, owned by the Russian NLMK group will survive.
The mill in La Louviere was founded in 1853 as “Fonderies et Laminoirs Ernest Boucquéau”.
When Ernest Boucquéau died in 1880 he inherited his steel mill to his plant manager Gustave Boël.
Based on local coal deposits a large integrated mill grew on the banks of the Charleroi-Bruxelles shipping canal.
A Thomas-converter melt shop was installed in 1903 and in 1912 the construction of two modern blast furnaces began.
After destruction in the first world war the mill was restarted in 1924 with two blast furnaces, a coke plant, a Thomas-converter steel making shop, an open hearth shop, several rolling mills a foundry and a forge.
Two new blast furnaces were built in between 1930 and 1937.
In 1967 a new BOF shop containing two 85 ton LD-AC converters was completed.
A third converter was installed in 1969.

Usine Gustave Boel

Blast furnace no. 6 was built in 1972.
The coking plant, built in the 1930ies, was closed in the 1980ies and than dismantled.
In 1993 new 85 ton electric arc melt shop was installed.
The Usines Gustave Boël (UGB) were partly taken over by the Hoogovens steel group from the Netherlands in 1997. In the same year the last blast furnace and the BOF shop are closed down.
In 1999 the DUFERCO steel group acquires the plant.
In 2003 the unique row of blast furnaces from four generations (1912, 1930,1958,1972) was demolished.
In 2011 the Russian NLMK group took over the flat rolling activities from DUFERCO who kept the steel making and wire rolling part.
Further images at Stahlseite.

Gustave Boel

© Uwe Niggemeier

Stahl- und Hartgusswerk Bösdorf

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Stahl- HartgussWerk Bösdorf


The SHB steel foundry in Leipzig, Germany was founded in 1894 by Max Heller.It moved from Leipzig to Bösdorf in 1917.
After the second world war the mill was nationalized under the new name VEB Stahl- und Hartgusswerk Bösdorf. The first electric arc furnace in the DDR was installed here in the 1950ies.
The mill supplied abrasive resistent steel castings to the east German mining industry.
In the early 1980ies the city of Bösdorf was torn down to make way for the neighbouring lignite open pit mine. The foundry moved to its new site in Leipzig-Knautnaundorf.
One of the largest foundries in eastern Germany was built here in between 1980 and 1984.
In 1993 the plant was privatized and became a shareholders company.
In 1997 the DIHAG group from Essen took over.
Further viewing: Stahlseite .

Le Creusot

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Le Creusot Forge

The steel industry produced a few mythical places in it’s about 200 years of history.
Sheffield, Essen, Bethlehem and Terni belong to those and certainly Le Creusot in France.
The first iron works the „Royal Foundry“ started production in Le Creusot in 1782.
In 1836 Adolphe und Eugène Schneider took over the foundry and made it into the “French Krupp”, a factory producing speciality steels, locomotives, large weapons and machinery.
In 1876 the largest steam hammer worldwide (100 ton) was installed at Schneider & Cie .The first hydraulik press starts production in 1890.
In 1920 more than 20000 people are employed in the mill’s  blast furnaces, open hearth shops, rolling mills, forges, foundries and mechanical shops.
Iron production is closed down in 1940.
From 1949 on the mills in Le Creusot are named “Société des Forges et Ateliers du Creusot (SFAC)”.
In 1952 a 7500-ton hydraulic press (a reparation from Germany) is installed.
The first nuclear power plant equipment is produced in 1954.
In 1970 the SFAC joins the “Cie. des Ateliers et Forges de la Loire” to form “Creusot-Loire“.
A new 11300-ton press was commissioned in 1979.
In 1984 Creusot Loire filed bancruptcy and the steel and rolling mills were taken over by USINOR to become part of Industeel later. The forge and mechanical shops became part of SFAR Steel and were taken over by AREVA, world’s largest manufacturer for nuclear power plant equipment, in 2006.
Today two forging presses, 7500-ton and 11300-ton, and two huge mechanical shops are in operation.
The old 7500-ton press will be replaced soon by a new 9000-ton press.
Further images at stahlseite.de

Schupp & Kremmer III

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© Deutsches Bergbaumuseum

The German Mining Museum in Bochum published the third part of it’s great series of books about the work and the assets of the famous German industrial architects Fritz Schupp (1896-1974) and Martin Kremmer (1895-1945). It is named “Bauten für die Industrie”.
The Bergbaumuseum shop offers it again as a real bargain. Unfortunatly only in German.