iron & steel archives
TRANSCRIPT
Laval University
From the SelectedWorks of Fathi Habashi
June, 2018
Iron & steel archivesFathi Habashi
Available at: https://works.bepress.com/fathi_habashi/379/
Iron and Steel. Archives and Historians
Fathi Habashi
Department of Mining, Metallurgical, and Materials Engineering Laval University, Quebec City, Canada
ABSTRACT
The Hittites in Asia Minor are known to be the first to produce iron. The first ferrous material known from ancient times was the iron pillar of Delhi in the 4th century AD. In the Roman Empire iron was produced at Noricum the ancient name for southern Austria. Damascus steel became known at the time of Crusades in the 12th century. Understanding the nature of steel was the aim of many researchers of the 18th and 19th centuries when another mysterious ferrous material became available: iron meteorites. The role of Torbern Bergman in Uppsala in 1781 opened the way to understanding the nature of steel. Books were written afterwards on steelmaking by researchers and educators in Germany, Russia, USA, and England. The Eisen Bibliothek in Switzerland has a collection of iron and steel books.
INTRODUCTION
Although important books on nonferrous metallurgy were written in the 16th century by Georgius Agricola (1494-1555) and others yet those on ferrous metallurgy started more than a century and half later. There is no explanation for this fact except that the nature of steel and the role of carbon in iron were not known till the work of Torbern Bergman (1735-1784) in Uppsala in 1781. It is believed that iron was first produced by the Hittites in Anatolia around 2000 BC since then it became known all over the world.
ANCIENT IRON AND STEEL
Iron pillar of Delhi Kutub Minar (Figures 1,2) 15 km south of Delhi contains several ancient and medieval structures and ruins including tombs of the Moguls and Delhi Pillar. The pillar (Figure 3) dates back to the 4th century AD. Its has the Sanskrit inscriptions, “The triumphal pillar of Rajah Dhava, AD 310 who wrote his immortal fame with his sword” (Figure 4). The inscriptions on the pillar indicate that it was made during the time of Samandragupta (330 to 380 AD). The Guptas united and ruled northern India from 320 to 480 A.D. and gave India a glorious period of civilization. Their dynasty was a golden age of arts, literature, chemistry, and metallurgy. Students from all over Asia went to India to study; China and India maintained good relations.
Figure 1- Kutub Minar and Iron Pillar
Figure 2 - Kutub Minar Figure 3 - Another view of the Delhi Pillar
Figure 4 - Delhi Pillar
Figure 5 - Inscriptions on the pillar
The pillar weighs seven tons, has a total height of 7.5 m of which one meter is underground; its largest diameter is 40 cm. It is nearly pure iron, containing 0.08% C, 0.11% P, 0.006% S, and traces of manganese and silicon). A committee from the Iron and Steel Institute of Britain inspected the pillar in 1872 and came to the conclusion that it was made by welding together lumps of iron about 36 kg each; these were heated to high temperature and forged by hammering manually as the water-driven hammer was not yet known in India. The weld lines can be clearly seen. The pillar was meant to be a pillar of victory and was first erected on Mount Vishnupada (probably at Mathura) as given in inscription. The place where the pillar stands today was a Hindu temple until the Arabs occupied it in the eighth century. It was King Anangapala II who removed the pillar to its present site around 1050 A.D. when he rebuilt the city of Delhi. Many of the ruins around the pillar also date back to Moslem Turks who invaded India in the twelfth century and built many mosques. The ruins also include tombs of the Moguls who invaded India from central Asia in sixteenth century. The Delhi pillar presents an indisputable and permanent record of the marvellous metallurgical skill and engineering ability of the ancient Indian workers. A stamp commemorating the pillar was issued by India in 1989 on the occasion of the World Philatelic Exhibition (Figure 6). According to Johannsen, the German historian of iron metallurgy, that "The Indians were the only non-European people who manufactured heavy forged pieces [of iron], and the pieces were of a size that the European smith did not learn to make until more than one thousand years later".
Figure 6 - A stamp commemorating the Delhi pillar
The Delhi pillar is not the only pillar of its type in India but it is believed to be the oldest, although it has resisted rusting unusually well and is still standing in good shape. The Dhar pillar which also weighs about seven tons was constructed in the twelfth century and is presently broken into three pieces. There is also the Achaleswar pillar built in the fourteenth century.
ROMAN EMPIRE
During the Roman Empire Noricum in the present Slovenia was the centre of iron making (Figure 7).
Figure 7 - Noricum in the present Slovenia was the centre of iron making during the Roman Empire
INDIAN WOOTZ AND DAMASCUS STEEL
Swords that were exceptionally hard enough to retain a sharp cutting edge but also tough enough to absorb blows in combat without breaking became known to Europeans during the Christian Crusaders in the Orient in the 12th century. They became known as Damascus steels. Their name derives not from their place of origin but from the place where Europeans first encountered them during the Crusades. They may have been in use during the time of Alexander the Great about 323 BC when he invaded India where they were known as Wootz. They were widely traded by the Arabs in the form of cakes that were about the size of a hockey puck. The Arab Al-Edrisi in the 12th century commented that: “The Hindus excelled in the manufacture of iron and it is impossible to find anything to surpass the edge from Hinduwani or Indian steel”. The term Wootz was coined, when European travellers from the 17th century onwards came across the making of steel by crucible processes in Southern India in the present day states of Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, and Karnataka. It was exported to the Arabs in Damascus where they made swords. They were also known in medieval Russia where they were called Bulat. They had characteristic wavy surface markings (Figure 8) and for centuries they remained objects of fascination for European smiths and scientists. The manufacture of the ancient Indian Wootz involved heating a mixture of iron ore and charcoal in a stone hearth, the product wrought iron, has a low carbon content. Small pieces of the metal were
then mixed with charcoal in a sealed clay crucible about 7 cm in diameter and 15 cm tall and the crucible heated to a high temperature.
Figure 8 - A pattern of Damascus steel
RENÉ DE REAUMUR The first important books on the metallurgy of iron were written by the French scientist René Antoine Ferchault, Sieur de Réaumur (1683–1757) (Figure 9). These were L’art de convertir le fer forgé en acier et l’art d’adoucir le fer (Figure 10) which may be translated as the “Art of Converting Forged Iron into Steel and the Art of Rendering Cast Iron Ductile” and Nouvel Art d’adoucir le fer fondu (Figure 11).
Figure 9 - René Antoine
Ferchault, Sieur de Réaumur (1683–1757)
Figure 10 - The first book published by Reaumur in
1722
Figure 11 - The second book published by Reaumur in 1762
The first book was published in Paris in 1722 and was translated in English in 1956. The other, was published by the French Academy of Sciences in 1762 few years after his death. De Réaumur came from a wealthy family so that he was able to devote himself to research. At 24 years old, he was chosen a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences. He made many observations over a wide range of sciences. Nearly a century passed when other books on iron and steel became available.
Réaumur was the first to suggest that cast iron contained carbon. This was confirmed by the Swedish chemist Torbern Olof Bergman (1735-1784) (Figure 12) in a thesis submitted by his student Johannes Gadolin (1760-1852) in 1781 at the University of Uppsala (Figure 13). In 1786 the French scientists C.A. Vandermonde, C.L. Berthollet, and G. Monge confirmed these findings.
Figure 12 - Torbern Olof
Bergman (1735-1784)
Figure 13 - Johannes Gadolin
(1760-1852)
Figure 14 - Gadolin’s thesis Bergman was born in Katrineberg, Sweden became professor of chemistry at that University in 1767, then rector a few years later. He published about 50 memoirs and dissertations, all in Latin, on a variety of subjects dealing mainly with topics in inorganic chemistry and metallurgy. He had a number of distinguished students who contributed to the discovery or isolation of new metals. Gadolin was born in Abo in Finland which, at that time belonged to Sweden. He studied at the University of Abo and at Uppsala under Bergman. There he investigated steels, wrought iron, and cast irons and stated that their characteristic properties were related to their content of a black combustible material that remained after dissolving the metals in acid. The residue was called plumbago (the chief constituent of charcoal). The work was published in Latin as "Dissertio Chemica de Analysi Ferri" by Bergman and Gadolin in 1781 and was an important contribution to the understanding of steel (Figure 14). A French translation was published in Paris in 1783 and an English translation was made by Cyril S. Smith in 1968. Gadolin was professor of chemistry at the University of Abo from 1797 to 1822.
KARSTEN
At the start of the 19th century, the German metallurgist Carl Johann Karsten (1782-1853) (Figure 15) succeeded in separating an acid insoluble residue from cast iron and establishing its chemical composition as an iron-carbon compound containing 6.7% carbon. It lasted however decades before it was generally agreed that its composition was indeed Fe3C. This is because understanding the nature of steel required knowledge not only of its chemical composition but also its phase analysis and this was only possible after the development of a number of analytical tools. This had to wait the beginning of the 20th century. Hence, the influence of carbon content of steel upon hardness was realized.
Figure 15 - Carl Karsten
(1782-1853)
Karsten was born in Butzow, Mecklenburg, studied in Rostock then moved in 1801 to Berlin to various jobs in the mining industry. From 1820 he taught at the Mining Academy in Berlin. There he produced
a large number of metallurgy books the most important was Handbuch der Eisenhüttenkunde published in 1816.
FARADAY
The deliberate addition of certain elements to steel to obtain enhanced properties began in 1819 when Michael Faraday (1791-1867) (Figure 16) investigated the properties of alloys of iron with a large number of other elements including nickel. He was inspired by the fact that meteorites which do not rust contained about 8% Ni. He did not, however, pursue the matter, being occupied by his research in electromagnetic induction. He left records of his work and a large number of specimens which were analysed in 1931 by Robert Hadfield, who pointed out that had Faraday continued his investigation, the Alloy Steel Age would probably have started fifty years earlier.
Figure 16- Michael Faraday
(1791-1867)
ANOSOFF Jean Robert Bréant (1775-1850) at the Paris Mint undertook a series of experiments from which he realized in 1821 that the strength and toughness of Damascus steels arise from their high carbon content. This was followed by a two-volume monograph titled On the Bulat published in 1841 by the Russian engineer Pavel Petrovich Anosoff (1799–1851) (Figures 17,18).
Figure 17- Pavel Petrovich Anosoff
(1799–1851)
Figure 18 - Statue in honour of Anosoff erected
in Zlatoust, Urals Military District, Russia
Anosoff dedicated his life to the study of Damascus steel and believed that the re-discovery of its secret would reveal new aspects in steel technology. His goal, however, was not realized. The basis for a scientific understanding of these steels, however, was not established until the turn of the 20th century, when a number of investigators worked out the phase transitions that steels undergo as a function of temperature and carbon content. Damascus steel is carbon steel which contains 1.5- 2 % carbon. The literature on this type of steel is extensive. Anosov graduated from Saint Petersburg Mining Cadet Corps in 1817, worked in the Russian ferrous industry and in 1847 he became the chief of the Altai Works. He was the first to study the crystalline
structure of metals and to establish the influence of macrostructure on mechanical properties using the microscope. He did extensive experiments on alloying iron with silicon, manganese, chromium, titanium, and other metals. He authored: - Description of a New Method of Tempering Steel in Compressed Air, 1827 - The Production of Ingot Steel, 1837 - On Damascus Steel, 1841. Translated into French and German.
OVERMAN Frederick Overman (1803-1852), was born in Elberfeld near Cologne in Germany, studied at the Royal Polytechnic Institute in Berlin, emigrated in 1842 to USA and wrote a number of books on iron and steel during his short life, some of them were published after his death (Figure 19): - The manufacture of Steel: Containing the Practice and Principles of Working and Making Steel. 1851 (second edition 1894) - A Treatise on Metallurgy; Comprising Mining, and General and Particular Metallurgical Operations, with a Description of Charcoal, Coke, and Anthracite Furnaces, Blast Machines, Hot Blast, Forge Hammers, Rolling Mills, etc., etc. 1852 - The Manufacture of Iron, in All Its Various Branches, 1854
Figure 19 - Front page of The Manufacture of Iron by Frederick Overman
Figure 20 - John Percy
(1817–1889)
Figure 21 - Bruno Kerl
(1824-1905)
PERCY John Percy (1817–1889) (Figure 20) was born in Nottingham where he studied chemistry in Paris under Gay-Lussac, Thénard, and Jussieu then medicine in Edinburgh. After graduation in 1838 he practised medicine in Birmingham. In 1851 he was named professor of metallurgy at the newly-founded Royal School of Mines in London. He is most famous for his book Metallurgy. The Art of Extracting Metals from Their Ores and Adopting them to Various Purposes of Manufacture, in 4 volumes, published between 1861and 1880 of which the volume Metallurgy of Iron and Steel appeared in 1864.
KERL Georg Heinrich Bruno Kerl (1824-1905) (Figure 21) studied in Clausthal at the Mining Academy, and in Göttingen. After a brief stay in 1846 at the Oker Smelter in Goslar, he joined the faculty at Clausthal. In 1867 he moved to the Mining Academy in Berlin. He published extensively, and among his most important works are the 4 volumes Handbuch der metallurgischen Hüttenkunde published between 1861 and 1865, and Grundriss der Eisenhûttenkunst published in 1875 (second edition in 1881).
OSBORN
Henry Stafford Osborn (1823-1894) graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1841 and from Union Theological seminary in New York City in 1845. He studied at the University of Bonn in Germany, and at the Polytechnic Institution of London, and was ordained by the Presbytery of Hanover, Virginia in 1846 while serving as professor of natural science at Roanoke College in Salem, Virginia (1858-59). He then served as professor of mining and metallurgy at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania (1866-70), and professor of chemistry at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio (1870-73). He wrote books on the history and geography of Palestine and Egypt beside two books on metallurgy: - The Metallurgy of Iron and Steel: Theoretical and Practical: In All Its Branches; with Special
Reference to American Materials and Processes, 1869 - Scientific Metallurgy of Iron and Steel in the United States, 1870
Figure 22-
Hermann Wedding (1834–1908)
Figure 23 - Carl
Heinrich Ledebur (1837–1906)
Figure 24-
Ludwig Beck (1841–1918)
Figure 25 - Henry
Marion Howe (1848–1922)
Figure 26 - Joseph William Mellor
(1869-1938)
WEDDING Hermann Wedding (1834–1908) (Figure 22) was born in Berlin and studied in Berlin and Freiberg where he got his doctorate in 1859. He worked for a short time in the iron and steel industry but most of his career was teaching for 44 years at the Mining Academy and then the Technische Hochschule in Berlin. He received the Bessemer Gold Medal as well as other awards. Among his numerous publications are: - Ausführliches Handbuch der Eisenhüttenkunde in 3 volumes (1864–1874), second edition 1896–1904 - Grundriß der Eisenhüttenkunde (1871, fifth edition 1907) - Darstellung des schmiedbaren Eisens (1884) - Berechnungen für Entwurf und Betrieb der Eisenhochöfen (1887–1888) - Aufgaben der Gegenwart in Gebiet der Eisenhüttenkunde (1888) - Der Eisenprobierkunst (1894) - Das Eisenhüttenwesen, 8 volumes (1904)
LEDEBUR Carl Heinrich Adolf Ledebur (1837–1906) (Figure 23) was the first professor of the newly founded chair of Ferrous Metallurgy in 1875 at the Mining Academy in Freiberg and rector from 1899 to 1901. He authored: - Hand- und Lehrbuch der Eisenhüttenkunde - Lehrbuch der mechanisch–metallurgischen Technologie
BECK
Ludwig Beck (1841–1918) (Figure 24) was born in Darmstadt in a military family, studied chemistry in Heidelberg under Bunsen, then metallurgy in the Mining Academy in Freiberg and Leoben, became assistant to Percy in London in 1864–1865. Since 1869, he owned and operated Rheinhütte at Biebrich, a small blast furnace plant and a foundry. He is best known for his 5-volume work Geschichte des Eisens published between 1890 and 1903. - Handbuch der Eisen- und Stahlgießerei
HOWE Henry Marion Howe (1848–1922) (Figure 25) was educated at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1871), and Harvard (1879). He was appointed in 1872 superintendent of Bessemer Steel Works at Joliet, Illinois. From 1873 to 1897, he had a consulting firm in Boston and was lecturing at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1897 he was appointed professor of metallurgy at the Columbia School of Mines in New York. He authored Metallurgy of Steel in 1890 - - a massive volume that contained extensive data and drawings of steelmaking equipment. Howe was president of the American Institute of Mining Engineers in 1893.
MELLOR Joseph William Mellor (1869-1938) (Figure 26), was born at Lindley, Huddersfield. When he was ten years old, the family emigrated to New Zealand. His father’s working-class background ruled out any thoughts of higher education, and at the age of thirteen he left school to take employment in boot manufacturing. In the evenings, however, by light of a kerosene lamp, he read second-hand or borrowed books and performed some chemical experiments. Mellor's remarkable efforts at self-education eventually came to the attention of the director of the local technical school, who arranged for him to attend classes. In 1892 he became a part-time student at the University of Otago in Dunedin. In 1898 he graduated with first-class honours and then got a scholarship to study in England. In 1902 Mellor obtained the degree of DSc from the Victoria University in Manchester. He then accepted a teaching position at Newcastle under Lyme, Staffordshire. In 1904, the local pottery industry started a pottery school which soon became part of the North Staffordshire Technical College. Mellor lectured there and later became the principal. He published five books on Inorganic Chemistry (1912-30), and pioneering texts on Mathematics for Chemists (1902) and Chemical Kinetics (1904), as well as on Quantitative Chemical Analysis (1914), Clay and Pottery (1914), and Metallography (1916). His major work, however, is a monumental sixteen-volume book on inorganic chemistry entitled Comprehensive Treatise on Theoretical and Inorganic Chemistry published between 1927 and 1937 in 15,320 pages, complete with extensive references to the original literature. The volume on iron contains
a comprehensive list of references on the history of iron and steel. It is difficult to believe that a work of this scale was produced by one person working alone.
GUILLET
Leon Guillet (1873-1946) (Figure 27) was professor at the Conservatory of Arts and Crafts in Paris then at the Central School of Manufacturing in 1911, becoming its director in 1923. He authored Les aciers speciaux in 2 Volumes, published in Paris in 1905.
Figure 27 - Leon
Guillet (1873-1946)
Figure 28 - Robert
Durrer (1890–1978)
DURRER
Robert Durrer (1890–1978) (Figure 28) was born in Switzerland, studied ferrous metallurgy at the Technische Hochschule in Aachen. After graduation in 1915 he worked in industry till 1928 when he was named Professor of Ferrous Metallurgy at the Technische Hochschule in Berlin. In 1943 he returned to Zurich where he held the chair of metallurgy at the Eidgenössischen Technischen Hochschule. He is most famous for his volumes Metallurgie des Eisens published as parts of Gmelins Handbuch der anorganischen Chemie - - an important source of information for iron and steel. He also wrote Verhüttung von Eisenerzen und Grundlagen der Eisengewinnung, which was translated in many languages.
OTHER ITEMS
• Isaac Lowthian Bell, Principles of the Metallurgy of Iron and Steel. Newcastle, UK 1884 • H.H. Campbell, The Manufacture and Properties of Structural Steel. Scientific Publishing Co., New York 1896 • James M. Swank, The Manufacture of Iron in New England, Boston, Massachusetts 1897 • Thomas Turner, The Metallurgy of Iron, Griffin &Co., London 1900 • Edward Russell Markham, The American Steel Worker. Derry-Collard Company, New York 1903 • P. Longmuir, Practical Metallurgy: Iron and Steel. London 1905 • H.H. Campbell, The Manufacture and Properties of Iron and Steel. Hill Publishing, New York 1907 • Frank William Harbord, The Metallurgy of Steel, Griffin & Co., London 1918 • J.M. Camp and C.B. Francis, editors, The Making, Shaping, and Treating of Steel, US Steel Corporation, 1919. Since then the volume went through numerous editions and became an excellent reference manual • Otto Johannsen, Geschichte des Eisens, Verlag Stahleisen, Düsseldorf 1924 (third edition1953)
• D. K. Bullens, Steel and Its Treatment, 2 volumes, Wiley, New York 1938-39
IRON LIBRARY In 1802 the 29-year old Johann Conrad Fischer (1773-1854) (Figure 29) bought a water driven mill near Schaffhausen, Switzerland and used the mill as a copper smelting plant and works for developing new alloys. In 1805 he was probably the first person in continental Europe to manufacture cast steel successfully in crucibles. The quality of the ensuring product was equal to that of Huntsman steel in England. His son Georg Fischer I (1804-1888) (Figure 30) founded the Hainfeld steelworks in Austria. His grand son Georg Fischer II (1834-1887) (Figure 31) studied at the Technische Hochschule in Vienna and later turned the company into an industrial corporation when he took over in 1864. He started production of malleable cast iron fittings. It became a great success thanks to the advent of public gas and water supplies. As a result, by the end of the 19th century, the iron and steel works of Georg Fischer had became a leading manufacturer of malleable cast iron fittings.
Johann Conrad
Fischer (1773-1854)
Georg Fischer I
(1804-1888)
Georg Fischer II
(1834-1887)
Georg Fischer III
(1864-1955)
On the death of Georg Fischer II, the firm was taken over by his son Georg Fischer III (1864-1955) (Figure 32) who was in Dresden studying mechanical engineering at the Royal Saxon Polytechnic. However, he had to discontinue his studies because of his father’s death. In 1888, he expanded the company into the manufacture of fittings and in 1890 installed a Siemens-Martin open hearth furnace in the new foundry. He expanded the plant to meet the growing demand for cast steel for the electrical industry and for the new internal combustion engine business, as well as business for airways. In 1907, he introduced the Heroult electric furnace for making cast steel to Switzerland and founded the Electric Steel Works. In 1918 the firm took possession of the nearby Paradise Monastery founded in 1253 by the Clarissan Order which was later dissolved in 1837. It was discovered later that the monastery possessed a large library of old books. In 1948, it was decided to modernise the building and create a specialist library developed from this collection and mining and ferrous metallurgical literature (Figure 33). The library became known as the Iron Library with most of the book titles related to these subjects, in addition to a number of 18th and 19th centuries encyclopaedias. It possesses 40 000 books and periodicals on the subject of iron, ranging from historical to modern. Klostergut Paradies is situated on the banks of the river Rhine between Schaffhausen and Lake Constance. Today, it is used as a training centre and venue for conferences and private functions. The library publishes an annual magazine entitled ‘Ferrum. Nachrichten aus der Eisenbibliothek’ which
contains articles on the history of iron. The Iron Library became a Foundation of Georg Fischer and was to provide scientists and engineers world wide access to literature on the history of iron.
Figure 33- Part of Iron Library in Schauffhausen
The Georg Fischer company is Headquartered in Schaffhausen, Switzerland, the corporation employs some 14 000 people worldwide www.georgfischer.com. The Klostergut is 5 km east of Schaffhausen on the road to Stein am Rhein. The nearest train station is Schlatt, which is on the line from Schaffhausen to Stein.
REFERENCES
F. Habashi, “Iron and Steel Archives. A Compendium of Authors.” Part 1 — 1722–1870, Steel Times International 32 (11–12), 59 (2008). Part 2 — Up to 1953, ibid. 33 (1–2), 51 (2009) F. Habashi, Iron & Steel. History & Technology, 2016, 640 pages. Available from Laval University Bookstore”Zone”. www.zone.ul.ca F. Habashi, Schools of Mines. The Beginnings of Mining and Metallurgical Education, Métallurgie Extractive Québec, Québec City, Canada 2003, 602 pages. Available from Laval University Bookstore”Zone”. www.zone.ul.ca