[TheForge] OK, now I'm mildly perplexed...

Sun Feb 15 14:47:01 2004

There is a Fort Vancouver National Historic Site
with a searchable archaeology database of items found in that area, may
include the river.

http://www.museum.nps.gov/fova/page.htm

Mike McKim

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Andy Vida" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, February 15, 2004 1:07 PM
Subject: Re: [TheForge] OK, now I'm mildly perplexed...

>
>
> [email protected] wrote:
> >
> > In a message dated 2/14/2004 2:50:26 PM Eastern Standard Time,
> > [email protected] writes:
> >
> > > The grain is fine, which I expected, but what I didn't expect was the
> > > seemingly high silica content.  I've etched quite a lot of wrought
iron
> > > and the quality has ranged from basically muck bar to highly refined.
> > > In no case did I ever get such a glassy sheen.  I'm assuming this
> > > indicates a higher proportion of iron silicate (where's Hochella when
> > > you need him?).  Is this in fact the case, or is this odd visual
> > > the result of something else?  I etched in HCL to exhaustion.  Could
> > > the ferric chloride have caused this?
> > >
> >
> > To All,
> > Beats me!  I would first try fresh acid.  The next thing I would do is
cut
> > one of the links in half to expose the transverse section and then etch
again.
> > Let me know.
>
> OK, I did this.  Fresh acid seems to have revealed the regular
> dull-ish grain.  The end grain etched VERY deeply... and I find
> the grain isn't as fine as I'dve expected.  Voids in the end grain
> far larger than I would have expected from iron employed in a
> high stress component such as a roller chain... unless it wasn't
> high stress :)
>
> Speaking of manufacture, as I look at it, I'm wondering if this
> could have been built in-house, as it were.  The end of the link
> is not round but appears almost the have been cut in facets with
> a chisel... perhaps it's just the years under water?  You can
> see a scan here at http://netlabs.net/~osan/Photos/WI_Chain_Link.jpg
>
> The pitch of the chain is about 6".
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