To return to my comments and the replies.
My friend Ronnie was criticised on occasion about his choice of refractory,
and his general set-up. His reply was on the lines of "you have to start
somewhere". He of course, will be remembered for starting it all.
In the absence of a water cooled, or any other, inserted tuyere slagging
of
the wall does produce problems - blocking of the tuyere hole and the need
to
repair the lining. I know - I have sat and worked the bellows more than
once for Peter Crew, sometimes out in the snow, and I would do it again
tomorrow.
While I have said that it is not, in my view, archaeology that does not
mean
that there are not things to be learned from it. What is missing is the
attempt to make the same slags (of which we have plenty) as the ancients.
If
the slags are different so is the process. Peter Crew's slags are very like
those collected from the archaeological site. This of course does not prove
that the process was the same.
As for the occasional occurance of lime in ancient slags do we know how it
got there? Some Northamptonshire ores were self-fluxing in the blast
furnace.
Whether or not a process is viable depends solely on the market. If you
have
a monolopy of the supply of a desirable commodity, for example iron bar,
then you can ask
anything you like for it. It seems clear that when the Romans came along
with their huge supply of cheaper iron the Romano-British ironmakers (which
Peter Crew was studying) were put out of business . Similarly the African
and
Indian iron smelters when the
Western traders came in with cheap iron/mild steel. There seems to have
been
an exception to this - certain ceremonial objects were not acceptable made
from European scrap.
Peter
Peter Hutchison
Hon. Gen. Secretary
The Historical Metallurgy Society Ltd.
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