86 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



preparing the puddl ing-furnace has been patented by Mr. G. Williams, 

 of Tipton. It consists in reducing the iron ore, or scoria, to a finely 

 pulverized state, mixing the same with water, which is then tempered 

 to the consistency of clay, and moulded into bricks or suitable-shaped 

 pieces. These are used to line the interior of the furnace, cementing 

 them together with a mortar or cement formed by mixing powdered 

 iron ore, or scoria, with water. Tiie paste or clay may also be formed 

 into slabs or plates, and the patentee does not confine himself to sco- 

 ria, but uses other fire-resisting substances to line the puddling fur 

 nace.- London Times. 



IMPROVEMENTS IN MANUFACTURING BAR-IRON. 



A PATENT has recently been taken out in England for an improve- 

 ment in the manufacture of wire-rod and horse-nail-rod iron, by which 

 the rod, before being cut into billets, is submitted to the action of a die 

 or draw-plate, called a cleanser, which removes the scale from the sur- 

 face, obviating the necessity of burning it off. The machine consists 

 of two plates movable in a vertical slide ; in the under edge of the up- 

 per plate and the upper edge of the under one, one or more grooves 

 are made, which correspond in form with the section of those in the last 

 pair of the rolls to which the bar is to be subjected, which are gen- 

 erally rectangular, or of a V form, for this kind of iron. The grooves 

 in the plates are so made that, when the two are brought together, they 

 form apertures corresponding to the sectional form of the bar-iron as 

 it comes from the rolls. The cleanser is placed in front of the last 

 pair of rolls, and its V grooves are caused to stand exactly opposite a 

 corresponding number of grooves at the finishing end of the rolls. 

 The iron is refined, and then hammered in the usual way into a bar 5 

 or 6 inches square in the section ; it next passes through rolls until it 

 becomes 1 inch square, after which it passes the cleanser, which 

 clears it of all scale, and then it goes through finishing-rolls, and may 

 be cut into billets to form bars in the usual way. 



IRON FOR SUSPENSION-BRIDGES. 



MR. THOMAS HOWARD has recently read before the London Society 

 of Civil Engineers a paper on the rolling of bars for suspension-bridges, 

 in which he gives a description of & new mode of manufacturing 

 iron for this purpose. By the usual process the head or end of the 

 link out of which the eye or hole for the connecting-pin is bored, has 

 sometimes been welded on to a parallel rolled bar, and sometimes been 

 hammered into the required form ; but both these methods are objec- 

 tionable, owing, in the former case, to the insecurity, and in the lat- 

 ter to the tediousness and expense. By the new method the bars are 

 rolled at once into the requisite form in the following manner. The 

 shingle or fagot of iron is first passed lengthwise at a welding heat 

 through grooved rollers in the usual way, after which, before being 

 drawn down to the intended thickness, it is carried to rollers which 

 have bosses, or increased diameters, at the places corresponding to the 



