Billet Tracking AI
Count billets at the caster and cooling bed, read heat numbers and ID markings, track bundles and stacks through the yard, and confirm the right billets feed the rolling mill.
Billet Tracking AI for the Toughest Billet Casters, Cooling Beds, and Bar and Rod Mills
Deploy Anywhere, Run Everywhere
Run billet tracking on caster runout, cooling bed, yard crane, and furnace charging cameras on the edge, on-prem, in your VPC, or via API.
One Platform, Full Adoption
Tools every steel mill team can adopt, no separate ML team required.
Secure, Compliant, and Audit-Ready
Data stays safe with SOC 2 Type II compliance, encrypted data, HIPAA compliance, and an uptime SLA.
- Billet Counting at the Caster & Cooling Bed
- Heat Number & ID Marking Reads
- Billet Count Per Heat & Per Bundle
- Stack & Yard Location Tracking
- Right Heat at the Furnace Charging Table
- Bent, Cracked & Rhomboid Billets
“Roboflow has been instrumental in accelerating our deployment of innovative AI solutions.”
Travis Turnbull
Vice President & CIO, Pella Corporation
Talk to a Vision AI engineer who's shipped in steel and metals.
Bring us your toughest billet tracking problem and we'll map a working solution.
Ask us about:
- Solution architecture that fits ISO 9001, EN 10204, and your level 2 and yard systems
- A live demo on your own caster, cooling bed, or charging footage
- Deployment options: edge, on-prem, air-gapped, VPC, or on heat-shielded cameras along the billet path
- ROI modeling against mixed heats, count discrepancies, yard search time, and rolling mill delays
Over 16,000 organizations build with Roboflow.
- Rivian
- Pella
- Chobani
- USG Corporation
- BNSF Railway
- American Woodmark
Vision AI is transforming businesses
Customers across the board are solving complex challenges and driving meaningful impact.
- Automotive customer
$10 million
Saved by automatically detecting defects on the production line
- Logistics & freight company
90%
Less time spent manually tracking shipping inventory
- Building materials supplier
60%
Lower customer return rate with improved product quality
Count and Trace Every Billet, from the Caster Strand to the Rolling Mill
Bring real-time intelligence to every billet in the shop with Roboflow Vision AI for billet tracking. Built for mini mills and long product mills where billets from several strands and heats move fast across cooling beds and into stacks, and where a mixed heat at the rolling mill means the wrong chemistry in finished bar.
Count and identify:
- Count billets per strand and per heat at the caster runout and cooling bed, with a model trained on your own billets.
- Read heat numbers and ID markings on billet ends, stamped or painted.
- Match each count and read to the heat record in the level 2 system, next to count and quantity verification.
Track through the yard:
- Record crane and transfer moves with billet or bundle IDs and locations.
- Keep a live count of billets by heat, stack, and bay.
- Flag billets from different heats placed in the same stack.
Feed the mill right:
- Confirm billets on the charging table belong to the heat on the rolling schedule, and hold a mismatch.
- Detect bent, cracked, and rhomboid billets before they are charged.
- Keep an image and ID record per heat for mill test certificates and customer traceability.
Bring intelligence to every billet today. Stop mixed heats and miscounts from becoming wrong chemistry, delays, and customer claims.
Frequently asked questions
What is billet tracking with Vision AI?
Billet tracking with Vision AI uses cameras along the caster runout, cooling bed, yard, and charging table and a trained computer vision model with OCR to count billets, read heat and ID markings, track stacks and bundles, and confirm the right heat is charged to the rolling mill. It pairs with steel coil identification and tracking, industrial OCR, and overhead crane monitoring.
Can Vision AI count billets moving quickly across a cooling bed?
Yes. A detector finds each billet, and a tracker follows it across the cooling bed so every billet is counted once per strand and heat, even when billets sit close together. Counts are matched to the caster's heat and strand data, so the yard and mill know exactly how many billets each heat produced.
Does billet tracking support ISO 9001 and EN 10204?
Billet tracking supports the identification and traceability requirements of ISO 9001 (the quality management system standard) and EN 10204 (the standard for metallic product inspection documents, including mill test certificates), and the heat traceability expected by ASTM and EN product standards for bar and rod, with an image and count record per heat.
Roboflow serves as the counting and reading engine, and your quality and production teams own the traceability rules and certificates.
Can it integrate with our level 2, MES, and mill controls?
Yes. Roboflow sends counts, IDs, and locations over OPC UA, MQTT, or REST, or writes them to a database, so they update level 2 and MES systems, yard management, and charging controls through a PLC. Charging checks can hold the furnace until the heat matches the schedule.