Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “Primitive Technology: Decarburization of iron and forging experiments”.
Collecting iron bacteria, as ore for smelting, Making charcoal as fuel for the furnace Charging, the furnace with fuel and ore, Mass of slag and iron Cast iron, prills, Crushing and panning the slag to get more iron out Iron from several smelts, Making a clay crucible. The centrifugal blower being assembled for air supply Cast iron prills to be melted and later decarburized (, removing carbon from the metal ). The crucible is covered with hot coals and charcoal The ingot is only partially melted prills and was not the solid ingot. I hoped for Breaking up ingot to try again This time, I’m going to rust the iron so that when it melts there is an exothermic reation that theoretically heats up and decarburizes the metal. After a day the iron rusts and is ready to melt The open hearth. Forge is simply a shallow pit with air supply. The results were actually worse, this time with no melt at all..
The rust does not help the process, as I thought it would.. Now I’m going to simply melt the prills in front of the air blast without a crucible, A small pit is filled with charcoal and blasted with air. The iron is sprinkled in on top above the air blast, where it is most oxidizing and covered with more charcoal. In theory, the oxidizing blast will burn the carbon out of the iron, making it more malleable.
Looking for the ingot, Hammering the ingot to test its malleability, It didn’t flatten much. So I’m not convinced it is malleable. Yet It doesn’t shatter when cold forged and may have become more malleable, but it’s inconclusive at this stage. Another attempt to further decarburize the iron Note. The iron is glows brighter than the coals when the blast is stopped, making it easier to find Hammering the iron while at a yellow, heat.
Success. It is now malleable Trying it with more iron Success. The iron is more forgeable. Now This piece is still brittle and probably hasn’t decarburized or has slag inclusions The decarburized and now forgeable flattened iron. This technique is an important step towards forged iron tools. .