[TheForge] hot portable atmospheric forges may need propylene

[David E. Smucker]

You are not kidding about the range on prices for oxygen.  The Folk School 
here in NC is on the state contract for oxygen and they pay only a small 
percentage of what we do for our small shops.  We get it cheap compared to 
"medical" or aviation grade.  Steel mills make it on site, usually 
contracted with one of the big air reduction folks who run the oxygen plant 
and their cost is way below any of the above.  (The steel mills lease the 
oxygen plants -- at Alcoa we used nitrogen in the furnace for heat treating 
and annealing of metal and used the same type of air reduction plants --  
except we used the oxygen as part of the interstage cooling.)

Dave Smucker
----- Original Message ----- 
From: <Keporter at aol.com>
To: <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Tuesday, May 31, 2005 8:33 PM
Subject: Re: [TheForge] hot portable atmospheric forges may need propylene


>
> In a message dated 5/31/2005 4:14:08 P.M. Pacific Standard Time,
> davesmucker at hotmail.com writes:
>
> Interesting discussion.  At the industrial level the difference  between a
> BOF (Basic Oxygen Furnace) and the Bessemer Process of old is  replacing 
> the
> blow air feed with oxygen.  Because you don't have to  heat the nitrogen 
> in
> the air (approx. 80 %) you can use that energy to  melt scrap.  That is 
> why
> for steel making today the BOF is  "King".  It can use around 25 percent 
> cold
> scrap as a feed the rest  of the metal being hot high carbon iron from the
> blast furnace (i.e. pig  iron).  Part of what made the BOF go was the WWII
> development of bulk  oxygen by the Germans.  They developed this for 
> rockets
> (V2) but post  war it found it use in steel production.
>
>
>
>
> Dave:
> I've about come full circle. Burner design was a way to get around being
> skinned alive for the price of oxygen to the small user when I started 
> doing
> this (2000). It snuck back into my plans in a small way. Just can't seem 
> to kill
> the beast (not for lack of trying). I figure to maim it a little more in 
> the
> next book though :-) Big industrial consumers pay industrial  prices, but 
> the
> little guy takes a real beating on oxygen.
> Mike P.
> Well, it's time to go do something honest before I get  caught.
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