Evening star., 1940-08-20
Increased Production
Of Electric Furnace
Stee|s Sought
Higher Alloy Types
Are Needed for
Armor Plate
BY J. G. DONLEY.
Special Dispatch to The Star.

Special Dispatch to The Star.
NEW YORK, Aug. 20-Intensive
efforts are being made to increase
our production of electric furnace
steels. Such steels of the higher
alloy types. among them armor
plate, are essential to the defense
program.
Since the United States has no
armament industry comparable to
Krupps or Skoda or the great
French and British works, the be-
ginning of the preparedness plan
found us with only two or three
steel plants, in addition to Govern
ment armories, equipped to make
armor plate. And armor plate is
more important to land and air
warfare than ever before. because
bullets of various calibers made
from alloy steel and fired at high
muzzle velocities have made it
necessary to give airplanes, tanks,
troop lorries and even stationary
land forces greater protective COW
ering.
The result of the rapidly expand
ing demand for armor plate and
other special steels seems likely to
be the greatest acceleration to the
manufacture Of alloy steels since
the World War and later the mush-
rooming automobile industry first
sent the production indexes for such
products into an upward spiral.
The higher type alloys are electric
furnace products primarily, because
heat controls are more reliable and
accurate in such MEETINGS, and also
because more accurate adherence to
formulas is possible with smaller
patches than ordinarily are fed into
the open hearth furnaces, which
make most of our steel Moreover,
electric furnace steel is purer than
any other steel product.
Not all alloy steels. of course. are
electric furnace steels. but the arc
method produces high-speed tool
steel, most of the stainless steels.
roller and ball bearing steels and
armor plate steel. 1t is estimated
that in 1899 about % per cent Of the
total of all alloy steels was made in
electric furnaces.
Cheap Power Necessary.
Great amounts of electric power
are required for making electric
furnace products, which include
aluminium and magnesium metals
as well as steel alloys of the higher
types. That is why such plants
are being planned for erection where
power is plentiful and cheap, as in
the T. V. A. region. Plants for
the manufacture of alloys and the
lighter metals are being projected
also for the Pacific Northwest ad-
jacent to the Bonneville and Coulee
Dam power projects.
On the average for recent years
production of special alloy steels
has averaged around per cent Of
total steel production tonnage, but
because of their higher prices their
proportion of dollar sales volume
has been somewhat higher. Ordi-
nary carbon steels are alloyed with
about a dozen different methods.
but the most common are chromi-
um, nickel. manganese. silicon, cop
per, cobalt, vanadium, tungsten and
molybdenum.
In the decade 1909 to 1919 pro-
duction of alloy steels rose from
1872 900 tons to nearly 100000 tons
BY 1928 the output had more than
doubled to reach 3,214 900 tons. and
the peak Of the pre-depression years
was set in 1929 with a total of nearly
100000 tons. Although the total
of all alloy steels produced has not
exceeded the 1929 record in recent
years, the proportion of electric
furnace steels to total alloy produc-
ton has increased considerably
from the 13 per ceent estimated
for 1929.
Capacity Boosted.
At the end of 1899, according to
some estimates, the country had
capacity for annual production of
nearly 100000 tons of electric steel
ingots. There was also capacity
for nearly 100000 tons of electric
steel castings. With but little new
casting capacity it is expected that
expansion of electric melting facili-
ties during 1910 will lift capacity
by the beginning of 1941 to a new
nigh record of 100000 tons or more.
1t is said that some light armor
plate can be produced by either the
electric or open-hearth furnaces,
but that is matter of specifica-
tionS not yet entirely clarified.
High-speed tool steel is particularly
important to defense work involv-
ing the working of hard and tough
alloys. Stainless steel is going in
creasingly into aircraft construction
in addition to Navy work. Airplane
motors, which a.e precision prod
ucts and must stay so in use, re-
quire electric furnace steels. as also
do some gun forgings and high
temperature boiler tubes.