Industry

Abstract

The manufacture of iron in the early eighteenth century was a long and expensive business involving several separate processes. Iron ore was smelted in the blast furnace using charcoal as fuel. Some iron goods could be cast directly from the blast furnace (cast iron), but most of the iron from the blast furnace was run off into sand moulds as pig iron for further treatment. Pig iron contained some impurities, and its brittleness made it valueless for most purposes. The impurities were therefore removed in the forge, where repeated hammering and re-heating in charcoal fires removed the impurities and produced bar iron, pliable and tough, from which the whole range of ironware could be made.