38 Transactions of the Royal Canadian Institute 



The first attempt to solve the problem of smelting these refractory 

 ores along modern scientific lines was that of Dr. Rossi, ' in 1892, 

 With the idea of producing titanates as well as silicates in the slag, that 

 is to say, considering titania to act as an acidic constituent, he made a 

 long series of pot tests to compare the relative fluidity of various slags 

 made of weighed quantities of pure slag-making materials. These were 

 followed by a run in a small experimental blast furnace, where good iron 

 and fluid slags were made in spite of difficulties in the operation of such 

 a small furnace. These results stimulated further work and in 1906 

 Cox and Lennox^ made extensive cone tests with slag-forming mixtures 

 that corroborated and extended Rossi's information. Pyrometers for 

 measuring high temperatures, now available for the first time, were used 

 to check the temperatures at which the cones softened. 



A most refined method of determining the characteristics of rock- 

 and slag-forming materials, is that developed by the Geophysical Labor- 

 atory of the Carnegie Institute in Washington.^ Fluid melts of various 

 compositions are quenched from measured temperatures, and the con- 

 dition of the molten material, stabilized or "frozen" by this means, is 

 examined with the microscope. No mixtures containing titania have 

 yet been examined at the Geophysical laboratory; but in Petrograd, 

 Smolensky has investigated by this means mixtures of the titanates 

 and silicates of calcium, manganese and barium.^ An application of the 

 method to the essential constituents of titania-bearing slags would no 

 doubt yield much information of scientific and practical importance. 



The most extensive and conclusive test to date of the use of titani- 

 ferous iron ore is that conducted by Bachman at Port Henry, New York, 

 in 1914.^ It was found that this ore, mixed with ordinary magnetite 

 up to five sixteenths of the total, did not interfere in any way with the 

 normal working of the furnace, the flux being, as usual limestone. 

 Another extensive large-scale test using titaniferous magnetic sand was 

 made in New Zealand in 1918^ using limestone and a silicious volcanic 

 rock as flux. 



iRossi, A. J., as above. 



^Cox, C. N. Jr., and Lennox, L. C. — "Tests of Titaniferous Slags." Electrochem. 

 and Met. Ind., Vol. IV, 1906. 



^Rankin, G. A — "Portland Cement." Jour. Franklin Inst., June, 1916. 



Bo wen, N. L. — "The Binary System Na2A!2Si208 — CaAl2Si208." Amer Jour. 

 Science, Vol. XXXIII, June, 1912. 



^Smolensky, S. — "Schmelzversuche mit Bisilikaten und Titanaten." Zeitschr, 

 anorg. Chem., Vol. 73, 1912. 



^Cone, E. F. — "Titanium Ores in the Blast Furnace." Iron Age, October 22, 1914. 



^Aubel, V. W.— "Titaniferous Iron Sands of New Zealand." Bull. A.I.M.E., 

 Sept., 1919. 



