NIAGARA AT THE BATTLE FRONT 



419 



Niagara's abrasives that have done more 

 than any one other thing to master the 

 ''hot box," that bete noire of the Amer- 

 ican railroad man and the worst enemy 

 of schedule-time train transportation the 

 world around. 



While the processes of carborundum 

 manufacture were being perfected an- 

 other lesson was learned. Quartz, you 

 remember, is the geologist's thermom- 

 eter, for it is formed between narrow 

 ranges of temperature. If the materials 

 from which Nature makes it are sub- 

 jected to more than so much heat, they 

 take on an entirely different character 

 from quartz. The same is true if they 

 are subjected to less than a certain 

 amount of heat. 



So, also, it is with carborundum. In 

 its manufacture a large quantity of a 

 mixture of coke and sand, with a touch 

 of sawdust and a dash of salt, is put into 

 an electric furnace. A heavy current of 

 electricity is passed through this for 48 

 hours, heating it to 1,350 degrees centi- 

 grade. 



If it is properly heated, there forms 

 around the central core of coke a great 

 array of crystals, large and small, almost 

 as hard as diamonds. If too much heat 

 is applied, instead of forming into crys- 

 tals, the material breaks up into fine 

 particles of black dust and you have 

 graphite. 



LEADS FOR PENCILS ; ELECTRODES EOR 

 FURNACES 



Therefore, largely by the same process, 

 the electric furnace produces from the 

 same materials the near-diamond of the 

 artificial grindstone and the microscopic 

 dust that becomes lead for a pencil, color 

 for ink, base for lubricants, electrodes 

 for furnaces and death chairs, or a thou- 

 sand other things, under the manipula- 

 tions of industrial science. 



In making carborundum wheels, whet- 

 stones, and other grinding implements, 

 the crystals are separated, graded, mixed 

 with various binders, pressed into the 

 shapes desired, dried, and then baked in 

 kilns, like porcelain or other ceramic 

 products. In some cases binders are 

 used which do not permit exposure to 

 heat, as in the case of emery cloth. 



Carborundum has a companion, alun- 

 dum, as an abrasive, each having its more 

 advantageous uses. In the manufacture 

 of the latter certain clays are used. One 

 of these is bauxite. This is first purified 

 and then put into a water-jacketed elec- 

 tric furnace, which fuses the aluminum 

 oxide. The fused material is taken out, 

 crushed, and prepared for use much after 

 the manner of carborundum. 



Between the two, Niagara has suc- 

 ceeded in saving American industry from 

 the calamity that would otherwise have 

 ensued as a result of the cutting off of 

 our supply of natural abrasives. For 

 more than two years Niagara's abrasive 

 industry has been mobilized against the 

 Central Powers with an effect that can- 

 not be measured. 



GIVING STEEL A GREATER HARDNESS 



But Niagara's bit in behalf of Ameri- 

 can arms does not end with the storv of 

 abrasives ; indeed, it only well begins. 

 The story of ferro-silicon is another il- 

 lustration of how beauty under the al- 

 chemy of science is transmuted into grim- 

 visaged war. 



Last year this country made more steel 

 than the whole world produced when 

 William McKinley became President of 

 the United States. Nearly three-fourths 

 of that steel was made by the open-hearth 

 process, and ferro-silicon was used as a 

 deoxidizer, to purify it by driving out 

 the oxygen. Furthermore, in the making 

 of big steel castings that alloy is practi- 

 cally indispensable in the elimination of 

 blow-holes. 



The entire ferro-silicon industry, prac- 

 tically, is centered at Niagara, which thus 

 gives pure steel and sound castings as 

 another part of America's contribution to 

 the cause of Allied victory. Every con- 

 tract for shell steel that has been made in 

 two years calls for a content of ferro- 

 silicon. 



There is another alloy of iron indis- 

 pensable in war, and well-nigh so in 

 twentieth century peace — f erro - chro- 

 mium. This is the alloy which gives that 

 peculiar hardness to steel which makes it 

 resistant almost beyond human concep- 

 tion. It has been estimated that a modern 

 14-inch shell, such as our Navy is ever 



