iron has been a difficult point up to the present time, because it Mr. Stuetz. has been hard for the foundry to have necessary furnaces for the nickel. Dr. Goldsmith has made nickel thermit like iron thermit, which by reducing the action of the aluminum produces a nickel in a fluid state at a high temperature. We had an opportunity the other day of showing the application of this addition, or treatment of nickel and cast iron, at Harrison, N. Y. The operation is simple. The nickel thermit is ignited in a well-lined ladle, and all of the liquid nickel with the slag is poured into cast iron. What difficulty there is lies in the fact that nickel is as hard to distribute evenly through the metal as carbon. For that reason we use Titanium Thermit, which causes an automatic poling action, whereby the liquid nickel and slag introduced into the liquid cast iron are distributed throughout the metal. The Titanium Thermit can be fastened to the end of a shank and any man can stick it into the metal and hold it there, putting the whole bath into seething motion and effecting the even distribution of the nickel through the metal, the slag being driven out at the same time. THE PRESIDENT.-It may not be amiss to call attention to The President. the fact that the thermit reaction seems to offer a means of studying what up to the present time is practically an unsolved problem, namely, the influence of each of the constituents affecting iron and steel, on its physical properties. Mr. Metcalf can give us some very interesting history of an attempt made some years ago to make several series of steels, differing from each other in one constituent alone, so that the influence of that constituent could be determined. This subject has likewise been studied a good deal by Professor Arnold at Mr. Hadfield's foundry in Sheffield, and it is a query whether several series of steels obtained by the thermit reaction could not well be made the subject of further study. MR. WILLIAM METCALF. When the Government appointed Mr. Metcalf. a Commission, many years ago, to make a series of experiments at the Watertown Arsenal-I have forgotten the names of some of the men; but I remember Admiral Beardsley, Alexander Holley and Prof. R. H. Thurston-we undertook to make a series of steels which would be uniform in all elements but one, in which case that one element should be increased from a trifling amount to a very large percentage. We had no difficulty in making the Mr. Metcalf. carbon series running from about 20 to 150, with phosphorus, silicon and manganese practically uniform and very low. We also succeeded in making a fairly good silicon series and phosphorus series. I have forgotten whether we got to the sulphur. I think not. We tried to make a manganese series, but found it utterly impossible to do so in the carbon pot, for the reason that no matter how we melted it, or how we tried, we always got high carbon with manganese. We would start with low carbon and change that slowly-and in this case, I think, we used a uniform quality of Swedish iron carefully analysed-and then added the elements we wanted. We could get, of course, the first sample of low carbon with low manganese, but as we added a little bit of manganese-just as surely as we added any at all-we added carbon, no matter how we began. Professor Langley decided it would be impossible to do this except in the open-hearth furnace where there would be an entire absence of any sort of carbon except that which might be produced purposely. That we intended to carry out, but, unfortunately, at that point Congress refused to make any further appropriation and the matter was dropped. The fact remains, if you want a manganese series you have got to do it in some medium where you can keep the carbon away, or the manganese will take the carbon in spite of anything you can do. That can be had in the thermit process very easily and economically, and, in that way you would get what would be valuable for all of us to have, a real series varying in the percentage of manganese only, so that we could know the different results. MR. STUETZ.-It may be interesting to state that we have made, on a small scale, some experiments with varying additions of manganese, but it may be that the tests were not elaborate enough. We found that even using carbonless manganese, no definite results could be arrived at. We could get the carbonless manganese to alloy with the steel but about one-half the manganese would disappear. These experiments, however, were by no means conclusive. Mr. Stuetz. PIG IRON GRADING BY ANALYSIS. BY HAMBDEN BUEL. A year or more ago the writer received from the American Foundrymen's Association a reprint from its "Journal" on "Methods of Determining the Constituents of Cast Iron." It was the result of long and very careful deliberation to arrive at a system of uniform methods for pig iron analysis. Needless to say the object was one deserving of the highest consideration and the support of all interested. However, I must say that I was at the time very forcibly impressed with one point-Would the adoption of such standard methods of pig iron analysis eradicate the differences met with among pig iron makers and consumers? While I do not criticise the adoption of standard methods of pig iron analysis, I believe the case should be thoroughly diagnosed before treating and then the proper remedy applied. The error into which so many fall is in believing that some road is better than no road. I believe that no road would be better, as then one would be inclined to be more careful. With the foregoing points in mind, the writer a few months ago undertook some investigations relative to differences in pig iron analysis. Our company decided about the first of the year to abolish fracture grading and grade all iron by analysis, virtually accepting the basis of grading as recommended by the American Society for Testing Materials. The handling of iron at the plant of the Central Iron and Coal Company with which the writer is connected, is somewhat different from the practice at most furnaces. In the first place, our iron yard is practically a continuation of the cast house and is traversed by a traveling crane with a span of about 60 feet. The columns supporting the runway of this crane are 25 feet from center to center. As soon as a cast has cooled somewhat the beds are carried out bodily and placed upon the iron yard, each cast being placed separately and marked with the cast number and date. The next day the cast is laid out upon the ground and broken by means of sledge hammers. The pigs are picked up by hand into TABLE I.-ANALYSIS OF SHOT, PIG AND CAR LOT SAMPLES-Continued. steel boxes holding about 2 tons and dumped by means of a crane into blocks, according to analysis. These blocks are located between the columns of the runway and hold when complete 300 to 350 tons of iron. When a block is completed it is opened for shipment and the analysis computed from the analyses of the several casts entering into it. The procedure in the investigation consisted of three steps: First, sampling each cast by the shot method, taking nine dips uniformly throughout the cast; second, taking a sample of six pigs from the same cast, and, third, sampling each car loaded from the respective mixtures. The nature of the investigation was such as to necessitate its extending over a considerable period, as a few isolated instances would be practically worthless. A complete record was kept of the cast analyses, both shot and pig samples, from January 25, when the furnace was blown in, to May 15, when it became necessary to suspend the investigations on account of the burning of our machine shop, where our pig samples were drilled. Table 1 is a record of the mixtures of iron, showing the average upon both the shot and pig sample basis, together with the average of the cars loaded out of the respective mixtures, and embraces a total of over 16,000 tons of iron of all grades. |