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Atlas Copco’s first oil-free screw compressor in China

Jiuquan Iron & Steel (Group) Co., Ltd. (referred to as JiuSteel), one of the largest modern steel enterprise groups in Northwest China, was established in 1958.

Time:

2026-05-29

Atlas Copco’s first oil-free screw compressor in China

Jiuquan Iron & Steel (Group) Co., Ltd. (referred to as Jiuquan Steel), one of the largest modern steel enterprise groups in Northwest China, was established in 1958. It is the fourth major steel production base planned and built in New China, following Ansteel, Wusteel, and Baosteel. In its early years of development, Jiuquan Steel received dedicated foreign‑exchange funding and imported a batch of advanced equipment from Europe.

Among these imported pieces of equipment are four oil-free screw-type air compressors supplied by Sweden’s Atlas Copco. This marks the first time Atlas Copco has introduced oil-free screw compressors to China. Jiuquan Iron & Steel Company has deployed these oil-free screw compressors to provide clean compressed air for pneumatic equipment and instrumentation in its modern steel plant.

These air compressor units are U-series oil-free screw compressors manufactured in Stockholm, Sweden, in 1956, and were officially commissioned in 1958.

The components are arranged in two tiers. The first tier comprises the cooling and lubrication systems, with a shell-and-tube intercooler and an aftercooler mounted separately in a stacked configuration. The independent lubrication system includes an oil reservoir, an electric motor, an oil pump, an oil cooler, and an oil filter. This advanced design philosophy continues to be adopted by numerous compressor manufacturers today.

The second level comprises the engine assembly, consisting of the low-pressure compressor head, the high-pressure compressor head, and the main motor. The low-pressure compressor head is located on the left side, while the high-pressure compressor head is on the right. Both are driven by a renowned Swedish ASEA dual-shaft‑driven electric motor (ASEA motors were the predecessor of ABB Motors; in 1988, they merged with Switzerland’s BBC Brown Boveri to form ABB Motors).

These compressors were housed in the compressor room of the Jiuguan Steel Group, located at an elevation of 2,640 meters, and remained in operation until 2005. After more than four decades of continuous, reliable service, they were forced to retire ahead of schedule due to the discontinuation of spare parts, having honorably fulfilled their historical mission.

During this period, Atlas Copco’s oil-free screw compressors underwent continuous iterative upgrades. As successors to these models, in 2002, Jiuquan Iron & Steel procured four state-of-the-art oil-free screw compressors from Atlas Copco. In 2013, another next-generation ZR750 oil-free screw compressor was introduced. In addition to the oil-free screw compressors, more than twenty centrifugal compressors from Atlas Copco also serve the various production sites under Jiuquan Iron & Steel. In virtually every process requiring compressed air, Atlas Copco equipment can be found at work.

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Differences between oil-free screw air compressors and oil-injected screw compressors, along with their operating principles and structural diagrams.

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Differences between oil-free screw air compressors and oil-injected screw compressors, along with their operating principles and structural diagrams.