Smelter

“ The smelter, before he can make iron, must have iron ore and fuel, as well as furnace and bellows. The ore he has already dug from the ground and arranged in a little heap near his furnace. It is usually a rather dark-coloured stone, or a soft, red earth. The fuel is charcoal, which the smelter makes by burning wood in a heap more or less covered with earth, in such a way that the wood chars rather than burns away. ”

“ That ton would have to be ’packed,’ as they say here, eighty miles over the roughest of trails to Cody, and there loaded on cars and sent clear to Omaha, our nearest smelter. And I guess you know more than I do about the costly process of crushing ore and extracting gold from it in a smelter. It’s not like mining for ’pay dirt,’ as the men here call 137 placer mining, where you gather up sand and wash it out yourself and find the particles of gold in the bottom of your pan. This quartz digging is the most expensive kind of mining there is. ”

“ These facts were held in mind when, encouraged by the railway, the smelter was placed here, and the expectations of its projectors have been more than gratified. The present capacity of the establishment is 125 tons of ore a day in the fourteen blast furnaces, and 100 tons a day in nine large calcining furnaces. Expensive improvements, and of the most solid character, are being made constantly in all parts of the works. ”

“ The smelter breaks a hole through the furnace, and, poking with his tongs into the ashes, draws out a little red-hot ball of iron, scarcely as large as a cricket ball, which has been formed from the ore, partly by the heat of the fire, and partly by the help of the red-hot charcoal which has acted chemically upon the ore. ”

“ During the early stages of the development of smelter plant, the use of reverberatory fore-hearths received considerable attention, the principle being to build a fire-box in communication with the settler, so as to ensure a sufficient supply of heat in the vessel for efficient settling. Modern furnaces however, usually supply a large enough quantity of very hot and fluid matte and slag as to allow of very efficient separation without the use of extra heating, providing the position and construction of the settler is suitably planned, as will be described in due course. ”

“ In Monterey are a number of smelting works, where the lead and silver ore is reduced to pigs, and here we see the applied difference in wages.
The hardest work in the smelter is to weigh in and deliver to the furnace a thousand pounds of ore every fifteen minutes, and this is not unskilled labor either. The man has a two-wheeled cart into which he must weigh in 600 pounds of ore, and 400 pounds of coke and flux material. ”

“ Its chimney-stacks pour noxious smoke over a nest of cabins down on the bank of the creek, and guide us, by scent as well as sight, through the streets and across the vacant lots. The broad upper floor is divided along one side into a series of bins, opening outwardly into a shed, under which the teams drive that bring the ore. Each owner’s lot is put into a bin and kept separate until sampled and paid for. This sampling is a process akin to homeopathy. Supposing one hundred tons are to be sold at the smelter. Every tenth ton, as fast as delivered, is set aside to be sampled. ”

“ It requires very good judgment to determine just how much foreign material and lime is needed to produce the best results with the constantly varying ores. Luck may find the silver ore but science must extract the bullion. Most profit accrues to the smelter when the ore produces from seventy-five to two hundred ounces of silver, and contains a goodly proportion of iron and lead. ”

“ Among other projects is one to build a smelter to reduce the ores of the Conconully Mines at the north, and another to organize an iron and steel manufacturing company. Limestone, sandstone, pumice, coal, gold, and other minerals, it is said, are only awaiting the action of associated capital to create a great deal of wealth. ”

“ The furnaces are charged eight times per hour with 2 tons of material. The operations are fascinating to observe, and the control over the disposal of the charge is quite complete, whilst the conditions for the operator are not exceptionally arduous. Many other suitable devices are in use at different works.
At the Cananea smelter is operated an ore-bedding system, the store-bins feeding the charge down hoppers through which it falls directly into the furnace. ”

“ Some ores are sent to the smelter with from 5 to 15 per cent. of adherent water. In these cases it is best to spread out the sample, and taking equal portions fairly at regular intervals, weigh into a Berlin dish 20 grams. This should then be dried over a sand-bath, or if the ore is likely to be injured by excess of heat, over a water-bath until the weight is constant. The loss of weight multiplied by 5 gives the percentage of water present.
Example:—
There are other ores which are not apparently wet, but in the state called "air-dried." ”

“ It is what the lead-smelters here call for; and certainly the resources of this country are very ample, not only for supplying the domestic consumption, but for exportation.
Those who dig the ore do not always smelt it. The merchants are generally the smelters, and either employ their own slaves in raising the ore, or pay a stipulated price per cwt. to those who choose to dig. For every hundred pounds of ore, properly cleaned, the digger receives two dollars. He works on his own account, and runs the risk of finding ore. ”

“ The extensive collieries in the locality rendered available an abundant supply of suitable fuel at a low price, and many of the smelters held a financial interest in them. The large coal was profitably used for home consumption or export, and the small, which, though dirty, still gave the long flame required, was very suitable for smelting work, and was reserved for that purpose. ”

“ Nevertheless a large percentage of the world’s output of ores is transported from the countries of origin to others, for reduction near the market and where skilled labor and fuel are more abundant and cheaper.
The countries of largest smelter production are, in order, United States, Spain, Germany and Australia; those of much less importance are Mexico, Belgium, Great Britain, France, Austria-Hungary, Italy, Greece, Canada and, recently, Burma. Other countries are of little importance. ”

“ METAL MINING. The mining industry other than coal is quite rapidly reaching importance among our industries. There are in the state three large smelters, whose annual output of precious metals far surpasses in value the output of our coal mines. The ores for these values, however, do not all come from the mines of this state. Other states, British Columbia, Alaska, and some foreign countries help furnish the ores. ”

“ A gentle warmth is created at first, which is raised very gradually, and kept at this point for about twelve hours, to allow the sulphur to dissipate; the heat is then increased for the purpose of smelting the ore, and, in twelve hours more, the operation is completed, and the lead obtained. Wood is occasionally added as the process goes on, and there is a practical nicety required in keeping the furnace in proper order, regulating the draught of air, &c., so that some smelters are much more expert, and thereby extract a greater quantity of lead from a like body of ore, than others. ”

“ At nearly all the smelting-houses in this district, the practice prevails of smelting the ore from each vein, where the quantity is considerable, by itself, although most smelters admit that a mixture of different kinds of ore has frequently a very beneficial effect in promoting the reduction of each. ”

“ These 11 basic industries are in the process of being set up; copper smelter, phosphate fertilizer, aluminum smelter, heavy equipment industries, integrated steel mills, petrochemical complex, diesel engine manufacturing, cement industry expansion, coconut industry rationalization, alcogas, and integrated pulp and paper. ”

“ Instead of throwing away as a poisonous waste the sulphur dioxide formed in smelting their ores, the smelters are now collecting as large a proportion of this gas as possible for the manufacture of sulphuric acid. This they sell to the manufacturers of phosphate fertilizer. Instruction is leading to improved methods of farming, to the use of the phosphates made from converted smelter waste, the farms are beginning to yield crops which repay tillage, and the woodlands are improving. ”

“ One of these smelters handles 10,000 tons of ore per day, when running to its capacity, and last summer I drove twenty-five miles away from it, passing over the continental divide, before reaching apparently sound uninjured forest. Such has been the widespread damage by one industrial plant in the ten years of its existence. The national forests at the headwaters of the Missouri and the Columbia are dying, and the Attorney General, in compelling their protection by reform in the extraction of copper, has done his duty well. ”

“ At several smelters, lower-grade mattes of from 32 to 40 per cent. copper-contents are converted most profitably, owing to such special circumstances as the profits resulting from the destruction of lining material, or in consequence of the fact that greater operating costs would be involved in concentrating the matte to a higher grade by the ordinary furnace-smelting methods. ”

“ Genevieve, one in Madison, and two in Jefferson. The quantity of lead annually smelted from the crude ore, I have estimated at three million pounds; and the number of hands to whom it furnishes employment, at eleven hundred. A considerable proportion of these are, however, farmers, who only turn their attention to mining a part of the year, when their farms do not require their labor; [Pg 216] the residue are professed smelters and miners, including blacksmiths and others, whose services are constantly required. ”

“ If one would have a clearer view of what the effect of these gases is let him go where they are discharged in greater proportions into the air and note the effect on the native vegetation. Wherever smelters are in operation, treating sulphurous ores of copper, zinc, mercury, plants sooner or later disappear. Forest and farm suffer and finally become almost or quite valueless. ”

“ However, smelters were developed in 1866 for treatment of these sulfides, and gold, silver, lead, and copper were recovered. Gradually, as the gold was worked out, silver and lead became the important products of the mines.
Sluicebox mining was a common sight near the early gold camps, where primary recovery was from placer deposits or decomposed quartz and sulfide veins. ”

“ Thus it is well known that the produce of some mines does not bring the price that its proportion of metal would entitle it to, while that of others, more esteemed by the smelters, always bears a higher relative value. ”

“ The great success of large reverberatory furnaces worked under suitable conditions, has had the tendency to tempt smelters in different parts of the world to erect furnaces of similar size independently of the character of the available fuel, and in several cases results have been unsatisfactory, at least in the earlier stages. ”

“ Very rich ore is likely to be bought by regular purchasers, who either have them smelted in Leadville or forward them to smelting-works at Pueblo, Denver, St. Louis, and Eastern cities. The inferior grades are sold by the ton to some one of the dozen smelters here in town, the price being governed by the market quotations of silver in New York on the day of the sale, less several deductions amounting in all to about twenty-five per cent. as the reducer’s margin for profit, and plus three to five cents per pound for all the lead above twenty-one per cent. which the ore carries. ”

“ Half a million tons of coal are annually produced, 1/10 of which is used by the Company for smelters and their own steamships, the rest being sold.
To visit the mines there is a drop in an electric car of nearly 1⁄4 of a mile. There are streets, shops, offices, restaurants, stalls for horses, black-smiths’ shop, etc., down below; and the workings go far under the deep sea where ships are sailing above. There is good rock and no drip. The Company owns copper mines, smelting works, pottery and brick works, glass and bottle factories, etc., with a fleet of steamers and sailing vessels. ”

“ I should think that twelve hours by a furnace must be worse than eight below ground. The smelters, however, probably do not keep at it during the whole time. The smelters I found had, almost to a man, come from Wales, whereas so many of the miners were Cornish men as to give to Moonta and Wallaroo the air of Cornish towns.
Coal for the smelting is brought from Newcastle, in New South Wales; but the inferior ore is sent to other smelting works at Newcastle,—so that the ships which bring the coal may go back with freights. ”

“ The smelters having thus become possessed of the ore, it is transferred to their own yards, sometimes by means of lighters on the river, but more frequently by the canal which communicates with Swansea and the smelting-works.
Leaving the town, and pursuing our way northwards for two miles towards Neath, we reach the copper-works. The scene is widely different in open day from that which was presented at night. There is no beauty now, and little of the picturesque. The first impression, indeed, the mind is apt to receive, is that of a sense of painful weariness. ”

“ But, curiously enough, the huge organisations utilising immense masses of lower-grade ores, employing thousands of men and most modern machinery, with smelters at the mining camp, are generally stated to be run at a loss. ”

“ Our steel progress is the astonishment of the world! Why, not only are our ultramodern plants, built largely with foreign assistance, working on a twenty-four hour a day basis, but thousands of secondary smelters, some so small as to be operated by a handful of comrade citizens, in backyard establishments, by schoolchildren, working smelters of but a few tons monthly capacity in the schoolyard, by—"
The newly created State Expediter held up a hand dispiritedly. ”