Many people still hold to the idea that there are many mysteries connected with steel, and that many unaccountable breaks occur which make it an unreliable material. It is hoped that what has been set down in these pages will go far to dissipate these supposed mysteries, and to give confidence to steel-users.
Many breaks are unaccounted for, but it is not within the author’s experience that any fracture ever occurred that could not have been explained if it had been examined thoroughly in the light of what we know now. There is much to be learned, but there are no mysteries.
GLOSSARY.
There are many shop terms used in this book which may not be familiar to all steel-users.
They are in common use in steel-manufactories, and definitions of them will enable a steel-user to understand more clearly the common talk he will hear in the shops.
Blow-holes.—Blow-holes are the small cavities, usually spherical, which are formed in ingots as the steel congeals by bubbles of gas which cannot escape through the already frozen surface.
Burned.—Burned steel is steel that is reduced to oxide in part by excessive heating.
Check.—A check is a small rupture caused by water; it may run in any direction; it is usually not visible until steel is ruptured.
Chemical Numeration.—Chemical quantities are almost universally expressed in hundredths of one per cent, as explained in the body of the work. It is a very convenient numeration; any steel-worker, melter, hammerman, etc., will talk of 20, or 50, or 130 carbon; or 8 phosphorus; or 10, 15, or 25 silicon, etc.; and will talk intelligently, although he may not know the exact mathematical value of these points.
Dead-melting; synonym, killing.—Dead-melting—killing—means melting steel in the crucible or open hearth until it ceases to boil or evolve gases; it is then dead, it lies quiet in the furnace, and killed properly it will set in the moulds without rising or boiling.