STEEL BURNS LIKE COAL

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 125, 29 May 1930, Page 22

STEEL BURNS LIKE COAL

The common belief that an acetylene torch is able to cut through a sheet of steel by mejting the steel has no basis in fact, according to the. well-known American engineer, Letson Balliet. The process ed up, not melted. And, in fact, iron ed op, not melted. And, in fact iron gives off more heat, weight for weight, in burning than coal does. Describing the action of the torch in "The Mining Review," Mr. Balliet says: "The oxygen blowpipe (often oalled the acetylene torch) has a'central duct from the handle to the tip that carries a jet of oxygen that in no way mixes with the fuel gas. The fuel gas and its oxygen mixture pass around this oxygen duet. It burus as any gas Joes. When directed against the steel plate ; to be cut the gas flame heats the steel red hot. This is all it does. When the steel has become hot a thumb pressure on another valve directs a jet of pure oxygen through the central duct against. the hot steel. The heated steel then burns, and forms an iron oxide. It literally burns a cut through tho steel, exactly as the same ,torch could burn a streak through a pine board. There is no torch temperature necessary that is higher than the required temperature for thu steel to unite with the pure oxygeu wheu it is released through the central duct." Laboratory tests can illustrate this by heating a piece of steel over a Bunsen burner till it is red hot, and then directing a jet of oxyRen against the red spot and see the steel burn. . ■