Browning chief. [volume] (Browning, Mont.) 1941-1953, 1941-07-18
MONTANA METAL
Is LITTLE KNOWN
BUT WIDELY USED
CADMIUM Is SOFT. HEAVY AND
is VALUABLE IN MANY
WAYS
BY CARL J. TRAUERMAN

When milady uses her lipStick or
when the modern Beau Brummel flicks
a cigaret lighter, both of them probably
are consuming cadmium or salts of
cadmium, a metal which is little known
to people in the ordinary walks of life.
Cadmium is a soft, heavy metal
about as heavy as nickel and a little
harder than tin. 1t looks like zinc but
is softer and has great ductility While
1t Is used in cigaret lighter in the
shape of a spark-emitting alloy and
as color pigment in lipstick, the
quantity of cadmium used for such
purposes Is very small indeed. However.
it is widely used in industry, especially
during the defense period and it Is
another one of those metals listed as
strategic or critical.
Associated With Zinc
Most of the cadmium in nature is
associated with the zinc ores, such as
zinc sulfide and zinc carbonate. 1t Is
not definitely known in what form the
cadmium is associated with the zinc
ores but it usually comes in mineral
known as greenockite, which is a cad
MUM sulfide and this is found as a
coating on or as an impurity of zinc
ore.
1t is recovered from the zinc ores,
or products, through an electrolytic
process at 4 refineries in Pennsylvania
in Colorado, 2 in Illinois, in Mary
land, 2 in Ohio, 2 in Oklahoma, in
Idaho, in New Jersey, / in Utah.
and the Great Falls plant of the Ana
conda Copper Mining Co. at Great
Falls. In 1910 these refineries produced
6,l0l 900 pounds compared with 4,441,-
$50 pounds in 1899, an increase of 80
percent. Imports of metallic cadmium
in the first IL months of 1910 were
27,49l pounds against 309,874 pounds
/ for the full year OF 1899. Before World
war No. most of the foreign imports
came from Belgium, Netherlands, Italy,
Norway, Poland, Danzig and Germany
Quite a lot of cadmium flue dust for
merly was imported from Mexico but
this amounted to only 38l tons in the
first II months of 1910 against Sic
tons for the same period in 1889. Pre-
vious to 1906 no cadmium was pro-
duced in the United States and at
that time Germany supplied $4,000
pounds annually. Even during the first
World war, world production never eX-
ceeded 100000 pounds per year.
Consumption Increases
| When it was found that cadmium
/ could be used for bearing material the
worlds consumption of this metal in
creased by leaps and bounds. Cadmium
has been used as a substitute for tin
in soldiers when tin was scarce. Ac-
cording to the United States bureau
/ Of mines the main value for cadmium
is an alloy of copper for the production
of Geographic, telephone and power
transmission wires, as cadmium gives
the wires great durability and good
tensile strength, hardness, high an
healing temperature, and high con-
ductivity. 1t possesses the virtues Of
both hard. drawn copper and bronzes
and gives long life to trolley wires.
When used in bearings it gives a very
low coefficient of friction. 1t is alloyed
in bearings with both lead and mag
nesium. Cadmium when alloyed with
bismuth and other metals such as lead
and tin can be made into fuSible al
/ Logged products used in fire eXtinguish-
ers, safety devices. electric fuse wires
and fuse plugs for many purposes.
Cadmium is used as a deoXidizer in
| the manufacture of alloys OF aluminium.
silver and nickel. 1t is extensively used
in electroplating and galvanizing in
the steel industry and in hardware