Wrought iron?

I'm sure I can't help you with wrought iron, but I've heard that pure iron is much more available in Europe than here in the US. Pure iron is really nice to work with.

Steve Smith Brownfield, Ma>Where to get hold of this? (Preferable in sweden, or other "scrap" sources

They haven't made Wrought Iron in the U.S., since the early 1900's, my nephew recently found an old horseshoe in the river the other day, for the most part it's in great shape, I'm going to make a knife out of it for him. Your best bet is to look at yard sales, estate sales, flea markets....etc., for old horse shoes, and scrap metal for this purpose. Sorry I wasn't more help, good luck. Tom

Here is a place I found on the internet that claims to be the sole producer of wrought iron at this time, while I haver not yet they seem legit.

Now please forgive me ignorance if you can, but what exactly is wrought iron?

markets....etc.,

Iron with slag hammered into it on purpose.

Alvin in AZ

As I said, they haven't made it here in the States, for over a hundred years now. Thanks for the link, my wife is from England, I'm going to see how much it's going to cost to get some of it shipped.

markets....etc.,

Larry, you aren't getting useful answers. Here's one:

The way iron used to be refined from ore, it ended up with *lots* of slag throughout, not a usable product yet. Wrought iron is made from this by repeated hammering out, folding and hammer welding to itself, like strudel dough. As this is done, the slag works its way out. No slag is added intentionally, the purpose is to remove slag. After enough slag is removed, the mass becomes usable iron (all that needs to be done is shape it to bar stock or whatever). This process can be done several times (e.g. triple refined wrought iron).

What you end up with is mostly iron with many very thin layers of slag. This turns out to be good for corrosion resistance. Any rust going on sooner or later meets a layer of slag and is stopped. If you find a piece of wrought iron that is corroded, it will appear fibrous, sort of wood like, due to the way the rust follows the iron but leaves the slag covered parts. This is also why wrought iron has a grain in working it. You can also see the grain by bending a piece until it fatigues.

The folks who until a couple of years ago were selling pure iron (i.e. no slag, modern product) also said that pure iron is much better at resisting rusting away than steel. They said that when steel rusts, it expands a lot, which leaves room for moisture to work its way in. Pure iron doesn't do this. The pieces I have certainly rust is a very different fashion than ordinary mild steel.

I don't have experience forging wrought iron; a friend of mine tried some and he found that you have to work it at a very high temperature, otherwise it falls apart on you. I've worked with the pure iron a bit, and it is really nice to hammer. Much easier to work and it takes detail very well. Too bad the pure iron guys aren't selling (in the US) anymore.

Steve Smith

Larry Hamilt>okay, now what does that do to the metal? give it strength or a special >feature?

In other words, you can etch this stuff and get a pattern similar to damascus........

Puddled iron (the beginning step for wrought iron) was produced commercially in Sheffield (that's in England, where the history comes from) until the '70s, so I doubt if the US was much different. The full-sized industrial hearth and rolling mill used for this production is now in the Blists Hill museum, near Ironbridge, and I understand they still work it occasionally and produce wrought iron by it.

The next step from this puddled iron is to roll it, shear it and re-roll it back together. This re-distributes the slag filaments and thins them out. Hence the old quality grades of "two shear" and "three shear" wrought iron.

The largest commercial soure of wrought iron today is either old bridge girders, or large ship's anchor chains. These can be retrieved from harbour channels by dredging, and the recovered chains have good scrap value for re-use as wrought iron. Chains (until very recently, certainly post-war) were one of the last major uses for wrought iron, as the failure modes are relatively benign and it was easy to hammer weld reliably.

After my answer I looked it up in my new book. :)

ASM's Materials Engineering Dictionary... "wrought iron. A commercial iron consisting of slag (iron silicate) fibers entrained in a ferrite matrix."

Alvin in AZ (ASM's #1 newsgroup-parrot and newest member too;) ps- short questions usually just get short answers ;)

Yes, but remember that Damascus isn't what you think it is.

Pattern welded steels use two metals, welded together in what is hopefully an extremely well-bonded manner. Etch or polish this and you get a smooth surface composed of two metals, of different colours or reflectivities, but both metallic. Wrought iron or Damascus are both mixtures of one metal alloy and a non-metallic inclusion. Etch these and they develop a surface roughness. On a really fine scale, like Damascus, then this is an attractive effect but for wrought iron it's not really a surface you'd want in a hand tool.

Andy Dingley Spaketh Thusly:

Anyone living near a seaport should check local junkyards for anchor chain. A friend of mine down in Massachusetts just got a 7' piece (138 lbs) for $26. He said there was at least 2 tons of it available.

-- Bill H. [my "reply to" address is real]

For the record!

Wrought iron actually was manufactured into the late 30's here in Pittsburgh by the A.M.Byers Co. The had taken this material to state of the art by a unique mfg. process. They first refined molten iron to near zero carbon in Bessemer converters. Then they actually added molten slag to this product. This process allowed much finer control of impurities as compared to the old puddling process. It also increased output immensely. I have worked this stuff in the forge and it was like heaven on earth. It welded, forged, and punched easily as compared to the mild steels available today. Alas, advancements in steel production made genuine wrought iron way to costly to produce. This doomed ornamental blacksmiths to a LOT of extra work.

I recently purchased 2 1x1 inch x 12 inches from this source and it cost me $60 U.S. and it was delivered to London for my wife to bring home.........! It's the real thing, but very spendy.