Turkish steel giant Kardemir begins producing train wheels
ISTANBUL
Turkish iron and steel giant Kardemir has started producing locally-made train wheels to prevent the need for imports, the head of the company said.
“Turkey will stop imports of railway wheels in a short period. We will produce 150,000 wheels and become an exporter within two years,” Hüseyin Soykan, the general manager of the firm, told Anadolu Agency.
Only 15 companies produce railway wheels globally, which need high technology and engineering. Kardemir became the 16th, he noted.
“A train wheel, which is manufactured from a half-ton of special steel, weighs 370 kilograms. Before we started to produce, its cost was around 1,000 euros ($1,112). Currently, its costs is around 600 euros,” Soykan said.
He also stressed that the firm will be able to produce 200,000 wheels annually.
Kardemir aims to manufacture imported products to boost the country’s industry and economy, he said.
The company’s production range also includes billets, wire rods, hard profiles, rebar and round bars.
It employs more than 4,000 people.
In the first half of 2019, Kardemir produced a total of 1.16 million tons of liquid steel, while primary product sales amounted to 1.19 million tons.
The steelmaker’s first-half sales stood at 3.3 billion Turkish Liras, up from 2.6 million liras a year earlier.
Kardemir posted a net income of 170 million liras for the first half of 2019 versus 439 million liras in profit in the same period of 2018.
In September, the company announced that its board of directors decided to establish a new blast furnace with an annual production capacity of 1 million tons within the scope of reaching annual output capacity of 3.5 million tons.
