"IMPROVED PROCESSES AND COMPOUNDS FOR
Year: 1877

page_text: PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by William Robert Lake at the Office
of the Commissioners of Patents on the 24th May 1877. A communication
from abroad by John Edwin Sherman, of Boston, Massachusetts, United States
of America, Metallurgist.
WILLIAM ROBERT LAKE, of the Firm of Haseltine, Lake, & Co., Patent Agents,
Southampton Buildings, London. "IMPROVED PROCESSES AND COMPOUNDS FOR
[A communication from abroad by John Edwin
REFINING IRON AND STEEL.”
Sherman, of Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America, Metallurgist.]
The principal defects inherent in iron as ordinarily produced are two, and they
are known to iron workers as "cold short," and "red short;" the latter term is
used to indicate that the metal is brittle and rotten when hot; the former, that it
is brittle and rotten when cold. Certain mechanical defects produced by the imper-
fect union of contiguous portions of the iron, and known to iron workers as
"cold shuts," are also very common.
An ingot or other mass of iron practically free from these defects ranks very high
as to quality among practical iron workers, and the main object of this Invention
is to produce such metal cheaply and with as little departure from the ordinary
methods of manufacture as is practicable. I will first give a concrete illustration of
the working in the "Martin-Siemens" furnace, so called; the "charge" (or the
metal used, usually several tons) consists of pig iron or cast-iron scrap and wrought
iron, and the quality of the product has heretofore depended wholly upon the quality
of the iron making up the charge.
Old iron railway rails, for instance, by reason of their cheapness, might be used
very profitably but for the fact that they are made up of a mixture of "cold
short and "red short" iron, and consequently the use of old iron rails, even as
a small part of the wrought iron of the charge, will produce an inferior product, and
this product cannot practically be rolled if as much as one-tenth of the whole
charge be old iron rails, while if the iron be treated by my improved process, sixty
per cent. (and even more) of the charge may be old iron rails, and yet the quality
of the product be excellent.
In practising my Invention the charge is inserted in the usual manner, but when
the metal commences to expand to a boil, or when it is ready to receive the

page_text: speigel," I add the following mixture, namely, for each ton of metal in the charge,
iodide of sodium, four hundred grains; bromide of sodium, four hundred grains;
chloride of ammonia, eight hundred grains; and sulphuret of antimony, two hundred
grains; the immediate effect of inserting this mixture is to greatly increase the
Hluidity of the molten metal, and it will be found that the metal is no longer either
"cold short" or "red short," and that the ingots produced are almost wholly if
not entirely free from cold shuts, and moreover that the metal is very uniform.
The best mode of applying the chemicals above named is to mix the ingredients
with about the same amount of common salt, and make the whole mixture into a
package, using a paper or other wrapper for convenience of handling; this package
is then put into a sheet-iron box or other like receptacle, which box is secured upon
the end of a long iron rod whereby the said box and its contents are forced down
into and to the bottom of the molten metal. The purpose of this procedure is to
allow the ingredients to get well into the molten metal before they are decomposed,
and the only purpose of the salt. (apart from the chlorine evolved) is to make the
action of the heat slower.
My Invention, as will be understood from the above description, relates to the
improvement of the quality of the metal; and consequently, in practising the said
Invention in the manufacture of steel, the steps subsequent to the addition of my
mixture are the same as if the said Invention was not practised; for although the
quality of the steel produced is much superior, this is solely because the quality of
iron converted into steel has been greatly improved.
The essential feature of my, Invention is the treatment of iron with iodine in
connection with chlorine to prevent its being cold short; and with bromine in con-
nection with chlorine to prevent its being red short; and when irou is both cold
short and red short in treating it with all three of these substances; other iodides,
bromides, and chlorides may be used, and free iodine may also be with good results,
but I prefer the iodide and bromide of sodium, and to use the chlorine in the form
of chloride of ammonia, or chloride of sodium, or botli.