182 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1911. 
ing such steel as it can produce. However, even here the combina- 
tion of Bessemer and electric furnace is possibly cheaper than the 
all open-hearth process; the combination of open-hearth and electric- 
furnace processes is quite possible and practicable to produce crucibie- 
quality steel on a large (tonnage) scale, and the combination of the 
open-hearth and electric furnace into one furnace is not only a 
possible combination, but is actually being ‘“‘tried out.”’ The latter 
idea is to take an open-hearth furnace and to place electrodes in the 
roof. The furnace is run as an ordinary open-hearth furnace, with 
the electrodes withdrawn, and at the close of the open-hearth heat 
gas and air are shut off entirely, the electrodes lowered into proximity 
to the bath, and the heat finished as an electric-furnace heat. The 
idea is sound and practicable and will result in the production of 
better steel than can be obtained from any open-hearth furnace at 
but a slight advance on the cost of the open-hearth steel, say $2 to 
$3 per ton. 
As to the capacity for enlargement of electric steel furnaces, they 
started out to duplicate the crucible-steel process, producing 100 
pounds of melted steel at a heat, and in eight years have risen to 15 
tons’ capacity. In Europe an electric calcium-carbide furnace of 
18,000 kilowatts, capable of producing 200 tons of carbide daily, is 
in practical operation. A furnace of like power capacity could be 
built to make steel, and would be a 200-ton steel furnace or larger. 
We can therefore say with assurance that with a little more expe- 
rience and experiment electrometallurgists will be able to furnish 
the steel maker with electric steel furnaces as large as are wanted— 
up to 200 tons’ capacity, if desired. 
