23 Facts About Bessemer process

1.

Bessemer process was the first inexpensive industrial process for the mass production of steel from molten pig iron before the development of the open hearth furnace.

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2.

One such Bessemer process was known in the 11th century in East Asia, where the scholar Shen Kuo of that era described its use in the Chinese iron and steel industry.

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3.

The Bessemer process was said to be independently discovered in 1851 by the American inventor William Kelly though the claim is controversial.

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4.

When Bessemer's patent for the process was reported by Scientific American, Kelly responded by writing a letter to the magazine.

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5.

Sir Henry Bessemer process described the origin of his invention in his autobiography written in 1890.

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6.

Bessemer process's plan had been to offer the licenses to one company in each of several geographic areas, at a royalty price per ton that included a lower rate on a proportion of their output in order to encourage production, but not so large a proportion that they might decide to reduce their selling prices.

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7.

Bessemer process realised that the technical problem was due to impurities in the iron and concluded that the solution lay in knowing when to turn off the flow of air in his process so that the impurities were burned off but just the right amount of carbon remained.

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8.

Bessemer process's method was to first burn off, as far as possible, all the impurities and carbon, then reintroduce carbon and manganese by adding an exact amount of spiegeleisen, an alloy of iron and manganese with trace amounts of carbon and silicon.

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9.

Bessemer process earned over 5 million dollars in royalties from the patents.

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10.

Bessemer process was renamed Sandviken's Ironworks, continued to grow and eventually became Sandvik in the 1970s.

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11.

Bessemer process's A Treatise on Ordnance and Armor is an important work on contemporary weapons manufacturing and steel-making practices.

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12.

Bessemer process built a mill in 1876 using the Bessemer process for steel rails and quadrupled his production.

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13.

Bessemer process steel was used in the United States primarily for railroad rails.

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14.

The conversion Bessemer process, called the "blow", was completed in approximately 20 minutes.

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15.

The Bessemer process allowed steel to be produced without fuel, using the impurities of the iron to create the necessary heat.

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16.

High-quality steel was made by the reverse Bessemer process of adding carbon to carbon-free wrought iron, usually imported from Sweden.

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17.

The manufacturing Bessemer process, called the cementation Bessemer process, consisted of heating bars of wrought iron together with charcoal for periods of up to a week in a long stone box.

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18.

The most difficult and work-intensive part of the Bessemer process was the production of wrought iron done in finery forges in Sweden.

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19.

The Bessemer process reduced the time needed to make steel of this quality to about half an hour while requiring only the coke needed initially to melt the pig iron.

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20.

The earliest Bessemer process converters produced steel for £7 a long ton, although it initially sold for around £40 a ton.

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21.

The Bessemer process was so fast that it allowed little time for chemical analysis or adjustment of the alloying elements in the steel.

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22.

Bessemer process converters did not remove phosphorus efficiently from the molten steel; as low-phosphorus ores became more expensive, conversion costs increased.

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23.

The Bessemer process permitted only limited amount of scrap steel to be charged, further increasing costs, especially when scrap was inexpensive.

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