Patent ID: 6837301

Claim:
In an apparatus for continuously casting metal strip where a pair of positioned casting rolls form a nip therebetween, a metal delivery system delivers molten metal into the nip between the casting rolls to form a casting pool of molten metal supported on casting roll surfaces above the nip confined against outflow adjacent the ends of the casting rolls, and a casting roll drive system drives the casting rolls in counter-rotational directions to produce a solidified strip of metal delivered downwardly from the nip, the improvement of controlling thickness of the strip against variation during casting comprising: a. sensors positioned downstream of the nip capable of sensing the strip thickness at a plurality of locations along the strip width; b. said sensors capable of producing electrical signals indicative of the strip thickness sensed at the sensor positions; c. at least one of said casting rolls mounted on more than one roll carriers alone the strip width movable independently of another roll carrier and capable of allowing one of the casting rolls to move laterally toward and away from the other casting roll; d. carrier drives capable of moving said roll carriers independently to enable the nip to be varied in a wedge-like shape and in turn varying the strip thickness across the strip width at the nip; and e. a control system capable of controlling the carrier drives responsive to electrical signals from the sensors to vary the nip across the strip width to at least partially correct for variations in the strip thickness along the strip width sensed by the sensors.