Steel wire

“ Iron seems to be the most desirable material for guard wires because it gives the required mechanical strength and sufficient conductivity at a less cost than copper, aluminum, or bronze, and is easier to handle and less liable to break than steel. It was formerly the practice to staple guard wires to the tops of poles or to the ends of cross-arms, but it was found that the wire was more apt to rust and break at the staple than elsewhere, and in the better class of work such wires are now mounted on small insulators. ”

“ In splicing wire, great care should be taken to prevent kinks getting in the rope or strands.
With steel wire, always before working it, put a stop on at the place to which you intend to unlay, and also put a good whipping of twine at the end of each strand.
Steel wire is six-stranded right-handed, and has a heart of hemp. Flexible wire has a heart of hemp in each strand. ”

“ Steel wire forms the frames of spectacles, and has replaced whalebone in the ribwork of umbrellas. It is also employed for the strings of pianos and other musical instruments, and has found a more recent application in the spokes of cycle wheels. Copper wire forms the coils round the magnets of dynamo machines for generating electricity, and it transmits the electric current to a distance after its production, for the purposes of illumination. ”

“ There are no cylinders to be shaved; all that is needed to use the wire again is to pass a magnet over it, automatically erasing any previous record that you do not wish to preserve. You can dictate into it, or, with this plug in, you can record a telephone conversation on it. Even rust or other deterioration of the steel wire by time will not affect this electromagnetic registry of sound. It can be read as long as steel will last. It is as effective for long distances as for short, and there is wire enough on one of these spools for thirty minutes of uninterrupted record. ”

“ When large bodies of water must be crossed, tensile strength is a prime requirement. Thus a 142-mile line from Colgate to Oakland, in California, crosses the Straits of Carquinez in the form of steel cables, each seven-eighths of an inch in diameter and 4,427 feet long. Steel wire was selected for this long span, probably because it can be given a greater tensile strength than that of any other metal. Annealed iron wire has a tensile strength between 50,000 and 60,000 pounds per square inch. ”

“ Slaymaker asked, looking at it but not touching it.
“That,” said John, “is a steel wire nail. It will drive the iron nail out. It’s just as good and costs much less to make. You feed steel wire into one end of a machine and nails come out at the other like wheat.” ”

“ Where poles have heavy circuits and several cross-arms each it is sometimes desirable to attach a guy or strut beneath the lowest arm and also a guy close to the pole top. Galvanized iron or steel wire is the material best suited for guys, and the cable form has greater strength and is more flexible than solid wire. ”

“ Taking the market price of steel at one-fifth that of copper, which is amply high for the steel, as a rule, a steel wire of equal conductivity with the copper will cost only 1.6 times as much and will have 26.7 times the tensile strength of the copper, or four times the tensile strength of a wire of equal conductivity made from the high-resistance silicon-bronze. From this it is clear that steel offers a cheaper combination of conductivity and strength than does silicon-bronze of high resistance. ”

“ The piles of this equipment, waiting shipment in the Roebling storerooms, give proof that the satire of the cartoonist and the mockery of the funny writer cannot destroy an ancient faith.
The telephone and telegraph companies use uncountable miles of copper wire in line service and other miles in fine sizes for instrument coils and divers other functions. Electricity as an agent would be a halting cripple without wire. The dynamo would have little more utility than a washtub. Armatures, frames for which are formed from flat steel wire, are wound in the Roebling plant in impressive number. ”

“ Especial care is necessary to avoid using common steel wires, or strands which have a frayed or broken wire, or wire that has been kinked and then straightened or wire that has been locally heated or wire that has been bruised. ”

“ The speed of the machines is so great that the eye cannot begin to follow the operation.
Wire being so well known it is not necessary to speak of its uses, but it will be interesting to call attention to the very extensive production of this steel product. Of the 32,000,000 tons of steel produced in 1915, for instance, over 3,000,000 tons were rods and wire, and when we think of the length of small or even average sized wire that it takes to make a pound, a hundred weight, or a ton, some slight conception of the amount of wire produced and used comes to us. ”

“ In making the selvage of these goods a hard steel wire is used, around which the filling passes at each pick. This wire, shown at W in Fig. 6A, is highly tempered piano wire, of the very best quality obtainable. Sharpened to a needle point at one end, with a loop turned at the other end, it is fastened at the back of the loom by a cord which has an adjustable slip knot, so as to be able easily and quickly to regulate the length of wire running in the web. It is then passed through a harness heddle eye on the rubber or gut shaft, and through a reed space next outside the selvage rubber thread. ”

“ It is undoubtedly true that steel wire carefully hardened and tempered will, under equal conditions, wear longer than a softer variety, but it is sometimes argued that the advantage thus derived is counterbalanced by the grave faults often existing after a surface of this kind has been side ground. ”

“ MAKING WIRE STEEL Of course, the making of steel is no new story, but this is wire steel—the high carbon, the tough, the sinewy, the resilient, that must carry in itself as it moves along through these interminable buildings the analytically measured proportions of this or that, which fit it to bear up the traffic of a giant bridge or convey a whisper of telephonic sound or register split seconds in an Elgin timepiece. ”

“ This wire should merely rest in the hole, whereby it may be easily removed when it is required to detach the pendulum from the clock, in order that the stirrup might then stand securely on its base. One of the screw holes should be rather larger than the body of the screw, in order to admit of a small adjustment, in case the steel wire should not stand exactly perpendicular to the axis of motion. ”

“ Wire.—Wire-drawing, which formerly had to be done by hand, does not appear to have been made into a spacial trade earlier than the beginning of the 18th century, the first wire mill we read of being that of Penns, near Sutton Coldfield, which was converted from an iron forge in 1720. Steel wire was not made till some little time after that dace. The increased demand for iron and steel wire which has taken place during the last 35 years is almost in- credible, the make in 1850 being not more than 100 tons: in 1865 it was calculated at 2,003 tons, in 1875 it was put at 12,000 tons. ”

“ A bundle of such wire is cut in lengths, either by shears or by laying it down upon an angular wedge of hard steel fixed horizontally in a block or anvil, and striking off the proper lengths by the blows of a hammer. In fashioning the barbs of the hooks, the straight piece of wire is laid down in the groove of an iron block made on purpose, and is dexterously struck by the chisel in a slanting direction, across so much of the wire as may be deemed necessary. A sharp-pointed little wedge is thus formed, whose base graduates into the substance of the metal. ”

“ However, even with the softer grades of steel wire, it was found that there were sometimes hard spots in the wire which revealed themselves only upon test, and that when a hard spot occurred in the twisted portion where the loop was formed, the final strength of the completed guy-wire was sometimes only twenty-five per cent of what it should be. ”

“ Take a piece of copper wire about six inches long in one hand, and a piece of steel wire of the same length and thickness in the other. Put one end of each piece in a flame, holding the wire by the extreme end. Notice which first becomes too hot to hold at the end farthest from the flame. ”

“ These rods are then drawn with great force through a plate of hardened steel having a series of holes, gradually diminishing in size, bored through it, which is called the “draw-plate;” the wire (of whatever metal it be) has to be heated red-hot from time to time, to soften or “anneal” it, for the compression produced by the drawing so hardens it that it becomes brittle. A pair of nippers holds the end of the wire, and these are moved along a sort of bench by a “rack and pinion” (fig. 5) . When all has passed the first hole, it is drawn through the second, and so on to the size required. ”

“ Zinc, in its best application, makes steel wire weatherproof for many years and the apparently simple process of galvanizing, the fixing of a coating of zinc on the steel has multiplied many fold the utility of steel wire in places where it could ill be spared. ”

“ Messrs Johnson & Phillips, Ltd., of Charlton, Kent, make combination machines which lay the steel wires, apply the tapes and cover with the preservative compound, in one continuous operation. The wire is carried on bobbins in two rotating cages, having twelve bobbins each, and the jute bobbins, seventy-two in number, are mounted on disks, while the compound is supplied from steam-heated tanks, through which the cable is passed by rollers. A machine of this class will turn out as much as 8 m. ”

“ Hard steel preserves its structure, but its molecular rigidity is so great that we obtain but mere traces of any change of polarity by torsion. I have found, however, that fine cast drill steel, untempered, of the kind employed by watchmakers, is most suitable; these are generally sold in straight lengths of 30 centimeters. Wires 1 millimeter in diameter should be used, and when it is desired to increase the force, several of these wires, say, nine or ten, should be formed into a single rod or bunch.
The wire as sold is too rigid to give its maximum of molecular rotation effect. ”

“ A steel finger then advances and knocks the finished spike out of the way to make room for the next. Wire staples, three inches long, are turned out at the rate of a hundred a minute; the wire is pushed forward into the machine and cut off on the bevel to form the points; a hook rises, catches the wire, and draws it down into the proper form, when a staple falls out compete. ”

“ These inventions were the foundation of the system of patents under which barbed wire has been protected and sold. The development of the barbed wire industry would hardly have been possible without steel. Iron wire, used for fencing prior to the introduction of steel, was not suitable, seeing that iron does not possess sufficient tensile strength and lacks homogeneity, qualities which Bessemer and open-hearth steels possess in a high degree. ”

“ WIRE AND WIRE DRAWING It may be rather disconcerting to some enthusiastic ones who assume that we Moderns have made all the progress that is worth while to learn that so many of our supposedly new products were far antedated. In the case of wire, again, we were antedated as much as 30 centuries. The wires which were produced by the Ancients, however, were usually of the noble metals, gold and silver. They were not drawn through dies as are the wires that we know, but were hammered into shape from long, thin strips of metal. ”

“ In order to work properly and not cut the die too fast, which would rapidly enlarge the hole and cause the rear end of the wire to be of different thickness than the forward end, the rod or wire must be of maximum softness. Either under-cleaning or over-cleaning will make the metal harsh, as, also, will under-baking in the dry ovens. ”

“ In other systems a stout wire is wound continuously in a spiral form round the four rods. Modern investigation goes to prove that the latter is theoretically the more economical way of using the steel, as the spiral binding wire acts like the binding of a wire gun, and prevents the concrete which it encloses from bursting even under very great loads. ”

“ Steel of the best quality in the form of fine wire has been known to bear a tensile strain represented by not less than 150 tons per square inch before breaking, and even this cannot be said to be the limit to the tensile strength of steel, since the tenacity increases as the diameter of the wire is reduced. Rejecting 'action at a distance,' therefore, these molecules of the wire must be controlled by some external agent, and therefore, the pressure of the external agent must at least equal the static value of the strain. ”

“ We apparently produce out of nothing but the whirling of a huge bobbin of wire any power we may wish, and send it over a thin wire to where we wish to use it, though every adult can remember when the difficulty of distance, in the propelling of machinery, was thought to have been solved to the satisfaction of every reasonable man by the making of wire cables that would transmit power between grooved wheels a distance of some hundreds of feet. ”

“ COATING AND FINISHING Use determines much in the finishing of wire, and of wire rope as well, as not alone concerning the chemistry of the inside, but the covering of the outside. Material that is made for service out of doors, under water or under ground, to ensure long life needs an exposed surface more resistant to moisture than the naked steel. Copper is proof, but the pure wire is expensive for most uses and where severe strains are incurred it lacks in strength. Modern science has been too busy to recover the art of hardening copper which the ancient Egyptians lost. ”