ELECTRIC SMELTING.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVII, Issue 17267, 7 September 1916, Page 2

ELECTRIC SMELTING.

TREATMENT OF IRON AND STEEL. ADDRESS BY MR E. BARRY.

Mr E. Parry, Dominion Electrical Engineer, at a meeting of the Philosophical Society at Canterbury College last evening, delivered an address on “ Tho Electric Smelting of Iron and Steel.” Mr L. Birks presided, and there was a largo attendance. The lecturer first reviewed the various processes to which electricity is applied in the arts as an electrolytic and elec-tro-thermic agent, and said that it was estimated that the total power used in this way was ,at least half a million horse-power. Very important developments were pending of a process by which zinc was recovered from complex ores by electrolytic means, which would demand immense quantities of power. Tho subject matter of the lecture, however, dealt with the application of electricity in the smelting and refining of iron only. It was shown that under certain circumstances the electric smelting of iron was a payable proposition whero a special grade of pig iron was produced, as in tile caso of the Swedish furnaces, employing charcoal as a reducing and heating agent. At the present day about (jl).OOO horse-power was employed in Sweden in electric smelting, tho reason being that the charcoal forests were getting depleted, and electric smelting enabled two-thirds of the charcoal to be saved. Electricity could not hope to compete with the blast furnace for ordinary qualities of pig iron. The lecturer then proceeded to deal with the application of electricity in steel making, and hero again it was shown that it could not compete with tho converter or tho open hearth furnace for the ordinary steel of commerce, and that its field of application appeared to be that of the production of special qualities of steel, the production of steel alloys, re-lieating and refining. He expressed the opinion that there was a very special held of application. for electricity to converters for foundry purposes. The "lecturer described the different types of converters, in use at the present day for this purpose, and said that the demand for electrical furnaces for foundry purposes was a readily increasing one, the business having already assumed considerable dimensions.