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Post by Timo Nieminen on Jun 14, 2021 22:00:25 GMT
It helps tremendously that modern steel starts from a much better iron ore. But it doesn't. Today, iron sand is still used, because it's a high-quality ore. Today we use magnetic separation rather than washing to separate the magnetite grains from the rest of the sand, but washing does a good job too. The other difference is the modern blast furnace vs a bloomery smelter. The folding etc. done to get good steel out of the traditional process isn't due to bad ore being used; it's due to a bloomery smelter being used. The same things were done to get good iron/steel out of bloomeries in Europe, in Africa, everywhere else that bloomeries were used, whether the ore was iron sand, bog iron, or mined iron ore. |
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Post by RufusScorpius on Jun 14, 2021 22:37:00 GMT
What I meant was the ore is higher Fe content than what was available in Japan. You get more steel per ton/ less waste. I've got the study somewhere that shows Japanese iron sand is almost half what Europeans had available.
Once again, I am amazed that they figured it all out and got really good steel out of their materials and processes, and it enough quantity to field armies for hundreds of years of nearly constant warfare, and still have enough to make farm tools and such.
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Post by treeslicer on Jun 14, 2021 23:06:39 GMT
What I meant was the ore is higher Fe content than what was available in Japan. You get more steel per ton/ less waste. I've got the study somewhere that shows Japanese iron sand is almost half what Europeans had available. Once again, I am amazed that they figured it all out and got really good steel out of their materials and processes, and it enough quantity to field armies for hundreds of years of nearly constant warfare, and still have enough to make farm tools and such. Iron sand isn't the only iron ore in Japan, "Mochi-tetsu" from what is now Iwate Prefecture (where there are some hard-rock iron mines) was used in steel making in koto times. It's reported to be a superior type of ore (pun intended, for those who can spot it  ).
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Post by Student of Sword on Jun 15, 2021 0:24:02 GMT
So if you go to the gas station and pump 93 gas. It makes zero difference if the initial crude came from tar sand in Canada or light sweet crude from Saudi Arabia. It is 93 gas.
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Post by treeslicer on Jun 15, 2021 1:18:36 GMT
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Post by Timo Nieminen on Jun 16, 2021 7:25:48 GMT
What I meant was the ore is higher Fe content than what was available in Japan. You get more steel per ton/ less waste. I've got the study somewhere that shows Japanese iron sand is almost half what Europeans had available. The good-quality Japanese iron sand (masa) which was used for making sword steel is usually 60-65% iron by weight. Pure magnetite is 72% iron, hematite 70%. No iron ore will have much more iron than masa. Mined ores are usually 60-65% iron by weight after concentration, which is about the same as masa. Some data on iron sand composition at: www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/isijinternational/54/5/54_1044/_html/-char/enwww.hitachi-metals.co.jp/e/tatara/nnp020603.htmAFAICT, the columns/rows that are labelled "FeO" should be Fe 2O 3 (hematite) and "Fe 2O 3" should be Fe 3O 4 (magnetite) - as the text in the first paper says, and as the XRD results (in figure 2) shows, the main component is magnetite, and next is hematite. The total iron content ("T.Fe") should be accurate. |
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