[TheForge] Re: File Making, sniffing up wrought iron

[Andrew Vida]

David E. Smucker wrote:
> If there was a market it would be made.  We all (blacksmiths) like 
> working with things like pure iron and wrought iron -- but we don't want 
> to pay for it.  Pure Iron is the perfict example. 

	I fully agree.  Furthermore, the "failure" of Pure Iron in the market 
was an indication more of the lack of a business clue than any fault of 
the material.  People saw cost as high.  I disagreed and attempted to 
explain to them the idea of cost effectiveness, but apparently those 
people were either not bright enough to get it, closed minded to the 
notion, or I simply was too stupid to explain it properly.  I'll go with 
the latter.

	By and large, I have found most blacksmiths to be highly 
clue-challenged where issues of basic business management are concerned. 
   I've never hidden my opinion on this.  A material such as Pure Iron, 
if properly marketed, could be sold at a premium (offsetting the 
additional material cost, which in the grander scheme of things is 
almost trivial in any event) and its superior workability would save the 
smith in terms of labor cost.  Apparently none of this ever sank in and 
Mike's endeavor went toe-up.  I thought it was a shame, but the market 
spoke and that was that.  I don't know whether Mike & company engaged in 
sufficiently effective marketing, so some fault may lie there as well, 
but I have learned to never underestimate the boorishness of a market.


 > Everyone seems to
> bitch about A36, but most were not ready to pay 5 or 6 times the cost of 
> A36 for Pure Iron. We get what we pay for.

	A36 is generally pretty lousy IMO, particularly when compared with PI. 
  The only disadvantage of PI that I ever noticed was that it was next 
to useless for normally proportioned structural members such as a gate 
post.  So for that you use steel and maybe design the post such that 
when the metal rots away it can be readily replaced without having to do 
surgery on the gate itself.  That, or you make the structural part of PI 
with about 3 or 4 times the mass to gain the needed rigidity.
> 
> Stainless steel, gets paid for because of life cycle cost.  For many 
> industrial uses it really pays.  In a number of applications we could do 
> the numbers and it said that if mild steel lasted 7 years it was a 
> better deal than stainless -- but it was really hard to put a price on 
> downtime for replacement of the mild steel -- in the end we went with 
> stainless which we guessed had a service live of at least 20 years -- 
> still working fine and that has been 19 years now.

	For some apps it is certainly worthwhile, but stainless is a PITA to 
work.  Even the ferritic grades, which do not even work harden to any 
appreciable extent are slow to move under the hammer.  If you have to 
have the stainless properties, then you go with it, but AFAIK a PI gate 
would have lasted a very long time when compared with mild steel and it 
can be worked more rapidly and with fewer heats.  There is something to 
be said for that... probably a lot in some cases.

	Businesses most often fail to consider the hidden costs of the 
decisions they make.  One reason for this is that they are not expert in 
identifying them, which is something I have done professionally for my 
clients for many years.  Even so, they will often make what I consider 
to be poor decisions even knowing the problems that will come down the 
pike, but those happen after the decision makers have taken their 
bonuses, promotions, retirements and have moved on to let their 
replacements do the suffering.

As for wrought iron, I see no future for it at all.  Market is far too 
small - most people either don't have the patience to learn it and to 
work it, or the economics just don't add up.  Using a cool material 
won't cut the mustard if you are going to lose your shirt on it in the 
process.

> Dave
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Andrew Vida" <osan at netlabs.net>
> To: "Sponsored by ABANA" <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
> Sent: Sunday, March 23, 2008 9:09 PM
> Subject: Re: [TheForge] Re: File Making, sniffing up wrought iron
> 
> 
>> From my perspective it is a shame that nobody is making it anymore.  
>> It has some very good qualities and I would imagine it would be a lot 
>> less costly than stainless.  I guess some of the troublesome working 
>> characteristics made it unworthy of further consideration.
>>
>> ries wrote:
>>> As I understand it, this type of pipe was the last product made of 
>>> real wrought iron, and was made at least into the early 70's.
>>> I have heard the last mill making it was in Sweden.
>>> It had certain chemical plant uses that kept in production until 
>>> various alloys of stainless and newer metals finally did it in in the 
>>> mid 70's.
>>>
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	-Andy V.

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