ROLL COOLING EQUIPMENT

PURPOSE:To shorten the purge time of an in-furnace atmosphere and to prevent lowering of an equipment operating efficiency at the time of the roll exchange by providing between-the- furnace clamping devices between-the-furnace tunnel parts which connect roll cooling equipment and the equipment before and behind said equipment. CONSTITUTION:A steel strip 6 is un-coiled from a recoiler 100 of a continuous annealing furnace and is passed through a preheating zone 104, a direct fire zone 105, a radiant tube heating zone 106, likewise a holding zone 107, a gas jet zone 108, 1st, 2nd overaging treatment zones 109, 110, a rapid cooling zone 111, a drying zone 112, an outlet side looper 113, a temper mill 114, and an oiler 115 via a cleaning device 101 and an inlet side looper 103 and is thereby subjected to continuous annealing; thereafter, the steel strip is coiled on a coiler 116. The roll cooling equipment 1 is provided between the gas jet zone 108 and 1st overaging treatment zone 109 of this equipment and the between-the-furnace tunnel parts 2, 3 are disposed on both sides thereof. The between-the-furnace clamping devices 4, 5 are mounted to the two tunnel parts 2, 3. The steel strip is clamped by the above-mentioned clamping devices 4, 5 at the time of exchanging the cooling rolls in the roll cooling equipment 1, by which the shorter purge time of the in-furnace atmosphere is necessitated and the degradation in the operating efficiency of the continuous annealing equipment is prevented.