Process and apparatus for producing metallurgical products, in particular of the merchant type, in particular in an endless mode

A process for producing merchant bars or beams, wherein there are provided the steps of:

• a) producing a billet or bloom by means of a continuous casting machine, the billet or bloom having square cross section, or rectangular cross section with ratio between wide side and narrow side less than 4, or octagonal cross section or oval cross section or round cross section;
• b) rolling said billet or bloom by means of a rolling mill comprising a plurality of rolling stand groups;
• wherein said rolling mill rolls the same billet or bloom while such billet or bloom is linked with the continuous casting machine;
• wherein during step b), said billet or bloom is heated by first heating means exclusively arranged between one pair of consecutive rolling stand groups of said plurality of rolling stand groups;
• wherein said first heating means are the only heating means between the rolling stand groups of the rolling mill;
• wherein after step b) there is provided a step wherein said merchant bars or beams are produced by means of at least one finishing line arranged downstream said rolling mill, and wherein after the aforesaid step b), there is provided a step of c) cooling and/or thermally treating said rolled billet or bloom by cooling and/or thermal treatment means;
• and wherein after the aforesaid step b) and, after step c), there are provided the steps of:
• d) cutting said rolled billet or bloom to produce said merchant bars or beams;
• and
• e) cooling said merchant bars or beams.