At construction sites, besides towering cranes, rumbling excavators, and other construction machinery, large sheds are also eye-catching, housing rebar processing equipment such as cold-bending machines and butt-welding machines. Workers use these machines to shape rebar for use on the construction site.
Currently, with the exception of major cities like Beijing and Shanghai, and some key projects that utilize preformed rebar, construction sites in my country generally use manual, automated, or semi-automated equipment to process rebar on-site. This method not only makes it difficult to maintain standards, resulting in large errors, but also poses a series of safety risks. Consequently, calls for improving rebar processing and distribution have grown increasingly louder in recent years.
Steel bar processing and distribution progress slowly
As the “skeleton” of buildings, rebar is widely used in both conventional reinforced concrete and prestressed reinforced concrete structures. Currently, the construction industry (housing and civil engineering) is the largest consumer of steel in my country, accounting for 56% of total steel consumption annually (compared to approximately 51% globally). Despite this enormous demand, rebar processing in my country is still primarily performed on-site, relying on manual labor or simple equipment.
According to experts from the China Academy of Building Research, as early as the 1980s, the development of computer production management software significantly improved the efficiency of foreign rebar forming and processing machinery, significantly reducing production costs. For example, rebar cutters adopted electronic measurement and cut-to-length technology; rebar benders used dual-bending machines with computer-controlled bend angles; and stirrup forming was performed by CNC-controlled stirrup bending machines, which continuously performed the processes of coil opening, straightening, bending, cutting, and stirrup collection. Precisely due to the use of electronic technology, rebar processing companies have experienced significant growth in Western Europe and other developed countries, resulting in a diverse market with a concentration and specialization of processing companies.
In my country, while advanced processing technologies and quality standards from abroad were introduced to the Chinese market at the beginning of the new century, and specialized rebar processing and distribution centers were established in Beijing, Kunming, Shandong, and Anhui, progress was slow. In April 2003, the National Construction Engineering Technology Research Center issued a call at a conference to “learn from advanced foreign experience and expand the application of rebar processing and distribution,” attracting attention from the steel, construction, and other related sectors. However, due to lower labor costs in previous years and an incomplete control system for rebar supply, processing, distribution, and inspection, the advancement of specialized rebar processing was slow, and incidents of “slimming rebar” occurred frequently.
The establishment of the system will become a revolution in the construction field
In July 2011, with the formal establishment of the high-strength steel bar promotion and application coordination group by the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, various work to promote high-strength steel bars has been carried out in sequence, and the call for establishing a professional steel bar processing and distribution system has become increasingly stronger.
According to the Standard and Norms Research Institute of the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, the yield rate of traditional steel bar processing in my country is about 4% to 5% lower than that of specialized steel bar processing and distribution abroad. The annual waste of steel bar materials due to this factor reaches 2.4 million tons, equivalent to RMB 12 billion.
From the perspective of the field, concrete engineering mainly consists of three parts: reinforcement construction, formwork construction and concrete construction. my country’s construction industry has basically realized or is gradually realizing the professionalization and outsourcing of formwork engineering and concrete engineering, but the professionalization and factory processing and distribution of formed steel products are still in the initial stage.
“If the specialization of concrete construction is the first revolution in the field of construction, then the establishment of a steel bar processing and distribution system will become a new revolution in the field of construction.” Liu Wei, consultant of the China Construction Machinery Industry Association, said that to establish this new model, we should first start with design and structure, and establish a new structural system, including steel structure system, prefabricated assembly structure system, etc. Most building components, including finished products and semi-finished products, should be factory-produced to reduce construction site operations and improve the product’s assembly and mechanized construction capabilities.
It is also to guide and promote the development of the steel bar processing and distribution industry that the drafting group of the “Technical Code for the Application of Formed Steel Bars in Concrete Structures” was established in Beijing in April this year. The purpose is to establish application technical codes for steel bar raw material supply, steel bar processing, formed steel bar distribution, formed steel bar inspection, and formed steel bar construction quality control and acceptance through the construction of relevant standards, so as to avoid the occurrence of “slimming problem steel bars” incidents.
In recent years, the development of rebar processing equipment and technology in my country has driven the advancement of rebar construction technology. In particular, the increasing shortage of human resources has led to a gradual shift in the rebar processing industry towards a specialized factory-based model. This has made it possible to establish a specialized, factory-based processing and distribution system for shaped rebar products.
Steel bar processing and distribution also need to pass the information and talent level
“Based on our current foundation, if we want to make steel bar processing and distribution take the path of factory-based, professional and modern development, we must also pass the levels of ‘process management informatization’ and ‘professional talent systematization’,” said Yao Yuansheng, head of a metal processing company in Beijing.
Currently, most domestic rebar processing and distribution centers focus more on hardware than software. While the equipment produced by domestic rebar processing equipment manufacturers can generally meet the requirements of commercial rebar distribution, there is still a significant gap in information management.
A qualified rebar processing and distribution management information system can integrate all data from the construction company’s reinforcement sheet to the rebar processing plant’s production order, from the material label on the formed rebar packaging to the inbound and outbound management of raw materials, semi-finished products, and finished products, from factory acceptance to sales settlement, thereby fully realizing process management and flow control. In fact, the informatization of process management is a key means to achieve management upgrades and optimize production management processes.
At the same time, new entrants into the formed rebar processing industry often focus heavily on advanced equipment and infrastructure in their early stages, only to shift their focus to project marketing after establishing their plants. This leads to insufficient investment in information technology and human resources, leading to insufficient attention paid to talent development. Consequently, developing a strong talent pipeline is a challenge facing rebar processing and distribution companies.
Yao Yuansheng stated that the level of specialized technical and management personnel represents a company’s level of specialization, and thus determines its core competitiveness within its industry. Therefore, companies need to comprehensively staff strategic decision-makers, production organizers, market developers, customer service personnel, technical managers, and support staff. This requires a comprehensive staffing system from senior to mid-level management, from specialized technicians to operational managers, and from factory technicians to construction site support personnel, thus achieving a team-like professional presence.
Although the specialized, factory-based processing and distribution of formed rebar products is still in its infancy, with the improvement of rebar quality and the development of management information technology and equipment automation, the factory-based, specialized, and modernized processing and distribution of rebar has become an inevitable trend. What we need to do is continuously improve the efficiency, speed, precision, and quality of rebar construction, thereby shortening construction periods, reducing rebar processing losses, and lowering material and labor costs.