New Britain herald., 1918-02-07
Steel and Pig
 Iron Markets
The Iron Age says:

The pig-iron statistics for January give measure of what the steel ln- dustry has suffered from the unparal- leled weather and transportation con- dltions of the past month. Output fell to 2,411,76S tons, or 77,799 tons day. January production was thus the smallest since May, 1915.
 On Feb. 1 the number of active fur naces was 31O, while on Jan. it was 32l and on Dec. 1, 345. How repeat ed bankings have crippled operations appears from the fact that in May, 1915, only 200 furnaces were at work to produce 73,o15 tons a day, whereas last month it took an average of 315 furnaces to produce 77,799 tons a day. Todays situation is much more dis couraging than the January figures show. Severe cold suddenly swept down this week on the Middle West, the heart of the iron and steel produc- ing section of the country, and for the first six days of February pig iron production has probably been at less than 50 per cent of capacity. In Jan uary it was at the yearly rate of 28,- 100000 tons, while the total for 1917 was about 3S,600,0O0. tons. Today the rate is probably under 22, 2,000,000 tons a year.
 It is quite certain that more fur naces in the Pittsburgh and Youngs- town districts will bank this week. No cars were loaded with Connellsville coke on Tuesday and the movement of bituminous coal to manufacturing plants in hte week has been not far from 40 per cent of normal.
 The steel industry of the country, according to the best data obtalnable, is operating on a 50 per cent. basis, and some plants at no more than 25 per cent. No decided improvement IS to be expected for several weeks, so serious is the derangement of every part of the machinery of transporta- ton both in raw and finished mater ials Producers will be many days working out of the glut of their own output which now prevents any meas urabIc increase in rolling mill opera tions At some plants the situation is simply chaotic.
 Costs have advanced prodigiously under the cumulative handicaps in every part of the industry, and the showing in this respect when iron and steel prices are officially con- sidered in March will argue even more strongly against downward re- vision than the cost figures canvassed at Washington in December. Predlc- tons of smaller pig iron and steel production in 1918 than in 1917 have already appeared.
 Operations have so absorbed the entire trade that buying and selling have become almost negligible, so far as finished steel is concerned With the downward revision of shipbuild- ing expectations for the year. the abil- ity of plate mills to supply all the steel needed is no longer in question. Plates should be available for any program of car building likely to receive government backing.
 The government figures largely in all current estimates in structural steel. The number of portable hang ars bid on for France is about 2,OOO and the Allies may contract for l. o50 in addition. In tin plate inter est attaches to a meeting held at Pittsburgh Ian. 31 which arranged for a full exhibit of orders on the books as well as of tin plate bars contracted for by the rolling mills.
 A development affecting the busi- ness of export houses is causing them some concern. Foreign purchases not for government account have been unrestricted as to price, but thev have been hard to place owing to scarcity of vessel space. Now ap- parently at the suggestion of Wash ington, considerable general French and possibly British buying may be put through as defense material by the foreign commissions at the cap ital. While bottoms may thus be insured the so-called government prices will undoubtedly obtain. Steel and equipment for a French railroad may be placed in this way.
 The scarcity of low-phosphorus pig iron in it's bearing on war work is one of the chief factors in the entire situation Makers of ordnance have been obliged to cut down prodUc- tion of acid steel needed for gun carriages and unusual measures l have been taken to increase the SUD- ply of ore for blast furnaces oper- ating on low-phosphorus iron.
 Chicago has led in pig iron buying, i transactions in basic alone amount 1 ing to 75,00O tons, and the leading | merchant interest there has sold ] about half it's expected output for the last six months of the year.
 CAPT. ROBINSON DEAD.