The melted iron
from the blast-furnaces was tapped into ladles mounted on iron cars, and
provided with mechanism for tipping the ladles. The molten iron of the
cars was next transferred to improved converters in an adjoining
building, constructed entirely of iron. Nearby were the spiegel cupolas.
The greatest possible accuracy was thus attainable in delivering definite
quantities of molten iron into the converter for a given blow, also of
spiegeleisen. This was easily accomplished by standing the ladle cars
upon scales.
The metal was cast into ingot moulds, standing upon cars, and then
transferred to the mould stripper; afterwards the ingots were weighed
and sent to the soaking-pit furnaces. After a "wash heat" the ingots,
or blooms, entered the rolls, and were drawn and sized in shape to fill
orders from every part of the world.
The marvel at the Harris-Ingram Steel Co.'s mills was that electricity,
developed in vast quantities at the coal mines and conveyed on patented
copper tubes, furnished all the power, heat, and light used in the entire
plant. Electricity hoisted and melted all the ores; it worked Sturtevant
fans and blowing engines, which supplied necessary air for cupolas and
converters.
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