48 report — 1877. 



this direction which appears to have attended the addition of silicon, in combination 

 with iron and manganese, to the steel before casting, in preventing- the formation 

 of so-called llaic-Iiv/es, and in contributing at the same time to the production of 

 the particular character of steel required, bids fair to be of special importance iu 

 connexion with the application of steel to the production of projectiles for use 

 against armour plates, as affording ready and comparatively very economical means 

 of ensuring the production of perfectly sound castings, which, in compactness of struc- 

 ture, will, it is asserted, compete successfully with carefully forged castings, and 

 even with the magnificent material which Whitworth produces by submitting the 

 fluid metal to powerful pressure. 



The part which silicon plays, by its comparatively high susceptibility to oxidation, 

 in promoting the production of sound steel castings is readily intelligible ; but the 

 functions of the manganese compounds, which are an indispensable adjunct to the 

 Bessemer process, and the application of which has become an integral part of 

 steel manufacture, are still far from being thoroughly understood ; and there is 

 ample scope for chemical research, in co-operation with practical experiment, in the 

 further study of the influence not only of manganese in the production and upon 

 the properties of steel, but also of elements such as titanium, tungsten, and boron, 

 and of chromium, which exists, associated in considerable quantities with iron, in a 

 very abundant Tasmanian ore, to which prominent attention has lately been directed. 

 The achievements of the mechanical engineer have so facilitated the handling and 

 perfected the means of production and the mechanical treatment of malleable iron 

 and of steel, that the full advantage may now be reaped of any improvement of a 

 chemical nature which may be effected in the production of those materials; and it 

 must be a source of pride to the chemist to observe with what success the teach- 

 ings of his science are being applied by practical men of the present day in the 

 construction of furnaces capable of withstanding the high temperatures required for 

 the production and working of iron and steel in large masses, and in combining the 

 perfect consumption and consequent great economy of fuel with the attainment of 

 those high temperatures and with a thorough control over the character of the 

 gaseous agents to which the fluid metal is exposed in the furnace. I need not quote 

 the names of those men who have already rendered themselves prominent by their 

 services in this particular direction, but may refer, in special illustration of the residts 

 achieved by purely practical men, to the success in applying very simple furnace- 

 arrangements to the attainment of the above residts which has recently attended 

 the labours of Mr, William Price, a principal Foreman in the Eoyal Gun Factories 

 at Woolwich . 



A few of the experiments made in the early clays of the application of armouring 

 to ships and forts appeared to demonstrate, on the one hand, that steel was quite 

 incapable of competing with malleable iron, of even very moderate quality, as a 

 material for armour plates, and, on the other hand, that'the penetrative power of 

 projectiles made of chilled iron, upon the Palliser system, could not be surpassed, 

 or even attained, with any degree of certainty, by projectiles of steel, produced at 

 comparatively very great cost. But some recent results obtained on the Continent, 

 and especially iu the course of the important experiments instituted by the Italian 

 Government at Spezzia, have afforded decisive indications that steel, the application 

 of which to the construction of ordnance has since that time been very greatly ex- 

 tended, may now be looked to hopefully as capable of affording greater protection 

 against the enormous projectiles of the present day than can be seemed by propor- 

 tionately large additions to the stupendous iron-armouring of the most modern 

 ironclads, and also as applicable, at a cost very moderate when compared with that 

 often years ago, to the production of projectiles of large dimensions superior in 

 point of penetrative power, and of uniformity in this respect, to those of chilled 

 iron, the difficulties hi the production of which are very greatly increased by the 

 formidable increase which has lately been made in their size. Promising results 

 have also_ quite recently been obtained at Shoeburynese with a new system of apply- 

 ing steel in conjunction with malleable iron, by' which a perfect union of masses 

 of the two materials at one of their surfaces is effected by the aid of heat. 



The superiority of soft aud very homogeneous steel over wrought iron of the 



