Machine for removing burrs from slabs

A machine for removing burrs from an edge of a side of a slab or bloom which issues from a continuous casting plant and is cut to length by oxygen cutting, the slab having a head and a foot end, said machine comprising a frame, a rotor rotatively mounted in horizontal position on the frame and having a periphery and an axis of rotation, burr removing means carried on the periphery of the rotor, the burr removing means comprising self-retractable hammers each having a head which, upon rotation of the rotor, is capable of describing an envelope, the rotor being movable in vertical translation relative to the frame to a given position in which said envelope described by the heads is substantially tangent to said side of the slab, means carried by the frame for shifting the rotor in vertical translation to said given position, a driving shaft drivingly connected to the rotor, means for detecting the passage of the head end and foot end of the slab through the machine, and a control device connected to the driving shaft for causing the shaft to rotate in selected ones of two directions of rotation as a function of the detection of the passage of the head end or foot end of the slab by said detecting means.