Shepherdstown register. [volume] (Shepherdstown, Va. [W. Va.]) 1849-1955, 1886-11-26

The Possibilities of Aluminium.

We have no authentic history of the
gradual introduction of iron into the
uses of civilized naaE; but given the
rough brown or grey stone that we have
in our ores, it is evident that the whole
was -ot transformed in an hour or day
'~'c {, exquisite temper of the Danias-
!'sfc. 1t is also probable that while
vas still a rare and expensive metal,
available only to those who were high in
wealth and rank. that the possibilities of
its varied structure were well known.
But to bring all OF these varied uses to
which it has attained within the grasp of
the ordinary man has taken untold CEN
turies Of pains and labor, and discovery
upo1 :sCcvery has been required TO de-
velop il.
Now new metal is coming upon the
field, which some claim will soon he all
its own. and iron, the metal heretofore
without a peer, and the greatest fsctor
of human progress, must step pdown and
out. Aluminium, they say, can be hard
ened till the diamond is its only rival; it
can be drawn into wire so fine or ham,
mered into sheets so thin that the gold
beater alone can do the work the tensile
strength of It's wire rises to 100000
pounds TO the square inch of section;
water and the atmosphere cannot corrode
it; it will burnish like polished silver,
blows cannot crystalize 1t, and its con-
ductivity of heat surpasses that of cop
per. Then its alloys make an anti'fric-
ton metal that goes beyond the power Of
brass or babbitt to produce.
Before such qualities as these, iron
pales into the merest insigDiicance.
But before We throw away our hammer
and chisel or break our locomotives up
let us look at what has made iron the
metal of the world. 1t is easily summed
up in two words, Its cheapness." With
iron at cent pound all things seem
possible for it to accomplish, but multi
ply it by ten and all OF our cOmmonest
conveEiences will vanish like breath.
Sixty years ago a Crop of aluminium
was produced in German laboratory
after a research for fifty years with the
best appliances of the time, and twenty
years more were necessay TO produce Il
larger bead. Then in ten years more
the metal was on the market at $50 per
pound.
Since then chemistry has been strug-
Cling with the task, and by its constant
efforts the price has dropped to sl6 fora
pound, ard now new discoveier tells
thar it can be put upon the market at 81
to the pound. Weknow the metal well,
and the chemist has tried it in his lab
oratOry; he has hammered and drawn,
and melted aud hardened, until every
quality is known, but still the price
must make it rare. It costs one eight
the price of thirty years ago, and still it
is 400 times the cost of iron. So it mat
tiers little that it sands third in guam
tity of all the substances of which the
earth is formed, that it lies about us in
every bed of clay, or shale, and that
nearly every rock is but an re-bed with
wondrous possibilities; so long as
nature holds the secret key by which It.
can be unlocked and freed from the
combinations in which we find il, it can
not take the place Of iron. That this
may come in time is not beyond the
range Of what can be regarded as pos
sibilily, but it must come by slow and
labored steps; meanwhile our iron will
hold its own and be used as heretofore,
while aluminium must be Il laboratory
metal for while, and get occasional
application in the more expensive i'm
plement of science.