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The Latest Innovative Technology for Vertical Roller Mills: Modular Mill with
Modular Drive System and Swing Mill Solutions
Caroline Woywadt
Head of Process Engineering
Gebr. Pfeiffer SE
Barbarossastrasse 50 - 54
67655 Kaiserslautern, Germany
caroline.woywadt@gpse.de

Abstract -- Currently in the cement industry, the trend is toward ever increasing grinding capacities of individual grinding plants.
As a result, plant availability and optimized maintenance concepts are becoming more and more important. A modular mill concept
allows the continuation of mill operation even if one roller is not available and provides plant availability. The newly developed
modular roller mill for grinding cement raw material, cement clinker, and additives with an installed power of up to 12,000 kW was
specifically designed to meet those needs. Large cement plants can now be designed with the one-mill concept for both raw material
and cement grinding.

Investors plan to install small plants and therefore need to keep their initial investment costs at a minimum. This can be achieved
by purchasing just one mill. For this intended use the swing mill with its capability to grind different types of raw materials and
clinker, interchangeably, depending on market needs is the appropriate solution.

Index Terms -- cement grinding, modular drive, redundancy, swing mill, vertical roller mill

I. INTRODUCTION
The modular design of the roller mill comprising 4 to 6 grinding rollers allows the continuation of mill operation even if one
roller module is not available. The same applies to the new modular design of the mill drive consisting of up to 6 identical
drive units in the range of 2,000 kW each. These features considerably reduce downtimes by allowing the mill to continue
operation while maintenance work is being performed on a drive unit. Results from the installation of a modular roller mill
with a table diameter of 5.6 m with modular drive will be featured. This paper will also detail how the swing mill solution
allowed a newly established Colombian cement company to keep their initial investment costs at a minimum by purchasing
just one mill. The benefit of the swing mill is its capability to grind different types of raw materials and clinker,
interchangeably, depending on changing needs. This allows the plant to later expand capacity by investing in a second mill, but
only when the market demands will support that investment. Results from the installation of a clinker swing mill will be
featured.

II. MODULAR ROLLER MILL AND MODULAR DRIVE SYSTEM DESIGN FEATURES
The modular roller mill is characterized by four or six grinding rollers and the use of flat grinding table liners. A roller
module consists of the roller with cylindrical roller tire, roller axle, roller arm, support pedestal and the hydraulic power input.
In conjunction with the flat table liner geometry, this type of roller suspension system achieves a parallel grinding gap between
roller and table liner at any time. This has a positive effect on the vibration level of the mill and the energy input into the
grinding bed. Fig. 1 shows the 3-D sectional view of an modular roller mill with six rollers. The geometry of the grinding parts
is illustrated in Fig. 2. The weight of one roller unit with wear parts is about 46 tons.

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Fig. 1. modular vertical roller mill 3-D sectional view

Every two adjacent roller modules are connected to the foundation through a single or twin support. This gives benefits on
accessibility while improving the arrangement of hot gas ducts, the implementation of external material recirculation and the
installation of auxiliary equipment. The roller modules can be swung out individually for maintenance purposes using the same
hydraulic system that applies the grinding force during operation. When the table is driven through a planetary gear unit the
production can only be maintained at reduced throughput after two opposing rollers have been swung out or lifted up. Several
drive modules allow continuous operation after only one grinding roller has been swung out or lifted up.

Fig. 2. Geometry of grinding parts

All machine parts relevant in terms of fluid dynamics, such as hot gas channel, nozzle ring, high-efficiency classifier and
material feed have the same design as in normal vertical roller mills.
Conventional drives using planetary gear units fulfill two functions in one unit converting the torque and diverting the
grinding forces through the casing into the foundation. The trend for larger mills is linked with the demand for larger gear units
combined with decreased mill rotational speeds. This requires higher gear ratios and mill performance is then determined more
by the size of the torque. The problems include not only the manufacturing limits for large bevel gears but also the gear units
become even more voluminous. This means the gear unit casing becomes weaker in relationship, which can lead to meshing
faults because the grinding forces diverted through the gear unit casing body can cause increased elastic deformation.
Operators of large vertical roller mills have asked for suitable solutions.

Fig. 3. Unit of modular drive system

A solution was developed for large vertical roller mills utilizing the modular drive concept. Two to six drive modules drive
the grinding table through a girth gear located under the table. Each module consists of an electric motor, a coupling, a
bevel/spur gear positioned on a base frame to form a transport unit (refer to Fig. 3). Load distribution of the individual electric
motors is performed by controlling the frequency converter for each drive module. As a result the grinding table speed can be
adapted as a parameter for process optimization.
A power range from 2,200 kW to 12,000 kW is covered by only three standardized gear module sizes. The girth gear is
driven by a self-aligning pinion from a girth gear unit for ball mill drives. The grinding table thrust bearing is provided by an
axial bearing with the proven bearing segments of the type used in conventional planetary gear units and by a radial bearing as
constructed as a plain bearing.

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The new mill arrangement can reach capacities that are not possible with conventional planetary gear drives. When the table
is driven through a planetary gear unit, the production can only be maintained at a reduced throughput of about 60% after two
opposing rollers have been swung out or lifted up. When using a mill design with several drive modules operation can be
continued after only one grinding roller has been lifted up or swung out. With this principle of active redundancy the modular
roller mill [1], [2] is able to maintain production at about 85% of the rated capacity even when maintenance is needed on a
roller or drive system.

III. MODULAR ROLLER MILL- OPERATIONAL EXPERIENCES

Extensive test series with a semi-industrial mill with a table diameter of 400 mm and the new modular design have been
conducted. Materials such as cement raw material, cement clinker, blastfurnace slags and other additives have been ground to
determine the basic rating data. Additional to two existing test mills, a pilot plant with a modular mill is available for operation
mode very similar to that of industrial plants. Such pilot plants can be used for the determination of raw material characteristics
and project-related data as specific power consumption, gas volume requirements, specific wear rate, etc.
The first industrial modular vertical roller mill (table diameter of 1800 mm) has been installed at a plant in South-West
Germany. In this plant phonolitic rock and cementitious binders are ground to different fineness of up to 6,000 cm/g Blaine.
The performance of conventional roller mills and modular mills is at the same level for throughput and specific energy
consumption.
For grinding cement raw material a modular roller mill was installed in Eastern Europe in 2008. The installed drive power
is 1,600 kW, the throughput of this mill is 160 t/h with a specific power requirement of 8.7 kWh/t for the mill drive at a
fineness of 12% residue on 90 micron. This mill was erected in the short time of 75 days.
Another modular mill example is an installation in France producing Portland cement and ground granulated blast-furnace
slag (GGBS). The modular mill has three modules each of 1,450 kW installed. The plant produces 120 t/h of Portland cement
Type I at 5,000 Blaine and 130 t/h of GGBS at 5,000 Blaine. The differences in load distribution measured at the gear unit
input shafts of +- 2% can be considered as very low and are actually in the range of measuring inaccuracy. The mill was
operated with one unit taken out of mesh for testing the operational behavior. Extent and direction of the recorded
displacement of the center due to the impact of radial forces were as expected.
A modular mill is in operation since May 2012 for grinding of Portland cement and Portland-pozzolan cement. This mill is
equipped with 4 rollers and a table diameter of 5.6 m. The technical details for this mill are given in Table 1.

Table 1. Technical details of a modular vertical roller mill

Modular roller mill (table dia = 5.6 m)
Number of rollers 4
Roller diameter 2,830 mm
Roller weight 46 ton per roller incl. tyre
Roller wear part material High chromium alloy cast iron
Installed drive power modular drive system with 4 gear units of 1,650 kW each
Classifier High-efficiency classifier
Bag filter 2 x 500,000 m/h (operation)
370 g/m (raw dust content)
<= 30 mg/nm (dust load outlet)
System fan 1,200,000 m/h at 95C, 90 mbar
4,100 kW installed power

Feed material as clinker, gypsum and wet fly ash is fed through a heated rotary air lock to the mill. The heated air lock
avoids clogging when feeding a combination of dry and wet components. Separately from the other components the dry fly ash
is fed through a rotary valve towards a flanged feeding point into the mill. The feeding point is located at the upper part of the
separator housing.
The mill is equipped with an external material recirculation circuit as well with a grinding aid injection system. The
grinding aid can be mixed with water to be injected into the mill for stabilizing the grinding bed. The finish product is
collected in a jet pulse filter and transported via air slides and a bucket elevator to the product silos. Fig. 4 shows the complete
grinding plant and a view of the mill.

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Fig. 4. View of grinding plant (left side) and modular vertical mill with four rollers (right side)

For Portland-pozzolan cement with a dry fly ash content of up to 31% a throughput rate of 350 t/h at about 4,300 cm/g
Blaine was achieved during optimization of the plant. In Table 2 operational data for grinding of Portland flyash cement is
given. The proportion of 23 % wet fly ash is not the limit of wet fly ash for the grinding-drying system of the mill; the capacity
is limited by the feed equipment for wet fly ash. It is planned by the client to upgrade the feeding equipment for operating the
mill with higher wet fly ash content.

Table 2. Operational data for Portland Flyash Cement

Modular Roller Mill Portland-pozzolan Portland-pozzolan
Table dia 5.6 m, 4 Rollers cement with a mix of dry cement with dry fly ash
and wet fly ash
Clinker 63 % 65 %
Gypsum 5% 5%
Fly ash, dry 10 % 31 %
Fly ash, wet 23 % -
Feed rate 290 t/h 350 t/h
Fineness 4,150 Blaine 4,300 Blaine
Specific energy consumption (Mill, 27.6 kWh/t 18.1 kWh/t
Classifier, Fan) at shaft

IV. MODULAR ROLLER MILLS - ONGOING PROJECTS

A modular mill is being supplied for a plant in Brazil with output rates of up to 450 t/h for grinding of different Portland
blast-furnace slag cements with specific surface areas of up to 4,500 Blaine. This mill represents a single mill solution that can
achieve the lowest specific investment cost per ton of cement. The decision for a single mill avoids the installation for a second
line of feed bins and two sets of peripheral systems. The operational reliability is expected to be higher than that of a single
large planetary gear unit. The total installed power is 11,700 kW comprising six drive modules of 1,920 kW each.
Several modular mills have been ordered recently and will be located in Australia and India. The mill in Australia is
designated for grinding of granulated blast-furnace slag and Portland cement. The planned annual production capacity is 1.1
million tons. The mill is equipped with three modules of 1,840 kW each. The mill will be set into operation in first quarter of
2014.
For India several modular mills for cement grinding and cement raw material grinding are ordered. The raw material mill is
designed for a cement raw material throughput of 500 t/h at less than 15% residue on 90 m equivalent to less than 2% residue
on 212 m. The specific power consumption for mill main drive and classifier drive at shaft is warranted with 12.4 kWh/t. The
grindability of the raw material mix has been rated as very poor compared to other raw materials. The cement modular mills
are designed for grinding of Portland cement, Portland-pozzolan cements as wells as granulated blast-furnace slag. Fig. 5
shows a modular roller mill with six rollers under erection.

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Fig. 5. Modular mill with six rollers under erection

V. SWING MILL SOLUTION

The benefits of the swing mill are its capability to grind different types of raw materials and clinker, interchangeably,
depending on their changing needs. This allows a plant to later expand capacity by investing in a second mill. This solution
allowed a newly established Colombian cement company to keep their initial investment costs at a minimum by purchasing
just one mill.
The rollers of the roller mill are hydro-pneumatically pressed against the material on the table. The hydro-pneumatic tension
system allows the roller force to be adapted to the material to be ground and to keep the grinding bed thickness constant within
narrow tolerances. Each hydraulic tension cylinder is fitted with a bag-type pressure accumulator filled with nitrogen gas in
order to absorb the shocks which occur during mill operation. The characteristics of suspension can be selected by adapting the
ratio of the hydraulic working pressure to the nitrogen-pressure of the accumulator.
A vertical roller mill for alternative grinding of cement raw material and cement has the following characteristics: the
grinding pressure can be adjusted to material hardness remotely controlled from the PLC by default; the nitrogen pressure can
be adjusted to material hardness remotely controlled from the PLC as a special design; and the accumulator automatically
adjusts to the changing pressure through a valve and refill system.
When grinding cement and raw material in swing mode in one mill, the following details have to be discussed/considered:
for cement grinding the dam ring height is higher than that for raw material grinding. The dam ring cannot be modified when
swinging from cement to raw grinding and the other way around. The dam ring height will be determined by cement quality,
therefore the requirements for raw grinding are less important. A compromised dam ring height needs to be defined during
commissioning for both materials. The optimized dam ring height will be higher than that required for pure raw material
grinding; this leads to a higher power consumption when grinding raw material on the swing mill than grinding the same
material on a dedicated raw mill. The difference between grindability of raw material and power consumption has to be taken
into consideration.
In Table 3 the technical and operational data of the mill installed at a Colombian company are shown. Both the raw material
and clinker have higher than expected power consumption based on hard material from the quarry. However, the mill is still
achieving warranties in performance. The built in safety factors have allowed the client to operate the mill at the required
performance even with harder to grind material.

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Table 3. Technical and operational data of swing mill for raw material and cement grinding
Mill Vertical mill with table dia of 2,500 mm and 900 kW
mill drive
Roller diameter 1,360 mm
Roller wear parts Chromium cast alloy
Classifier High-efficiency classifier
Cyclone system for finish product separation

Cement raw material Cement clinker

Capacity 60.4 t/h 37.6 t/h
Fineness 12% R 90m 4,200 cm/g acc. Blaine
Spec. power consumption mill shaft 14.8 kWh/t 23.9 kWh/t
Airflow classifier outlet ~87,500 nm/h ~ 93,000 nm/h
Specific grinding pressure 80 % 100 %
Classifier rotor speed 51 % 92 %

The swing mill concept is ideal for clients with the need to greatly reduce the investment cost for a grinding plant. Today,
power consumption is a key concern for most investors, therefore the swing mill is not only considered an excellent technical
solution but an ideal, tailor-made solution to reduce investment costs. As a result, this solution is a good option for a certain
client group with the requirement for smaller capacities.

Fig. 6. Mill building with Swing Mill

VI. CONCLUSION
This paper shows the ability of two technical solutions for vertical roller mill design to serve very different needs and
requirements of clients. On the one hand the cement industry demands very high capacities for kiln lines; on the other hand a
client group with the requirement for smaller capacities is interested in low investment cost.
Many years of operating experience have been incorporated into the overall modular roller mill concept with modular
drives. The active redundancy of rollers and drive modules is a revolutionary advance for vertical roller mill technology. Large
cement facilities can be designed with the single-mill concept for both raw material and cement grinding as a result of this
innovation.
The swing mill is a tailor-made solution to reduce investment costs and allows alternative grinding of cement raw material
and cement in one mill without mechanical adjustments.

REFERENCES
[1] D. Hoffmann, T. Hoster, O. Jung, H. Lessmeister and K.H. Schuette, Roller Grinding Mill, European Patent EP 2 252 403, Mar. 20, 2008
[2] D. Hoffmann, O. Jung and K.H. Schuette, Safety System for Roller Mill, European Patent EP 2 086 685, Oct. 25, 2006

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