Sand used as a flux?

[mark stephen]

Silica sand was used as a flux when everyone was forge welding true wrought iron and not todays mild steel.The forge welding temps are higher for wrought and the silica would act as borax does with todays mild steels and high carbon steels.

[Jan]

Hi everyone,
there is yet ANOTHER way;when we were completely broken(i mean one day before bankrupcy),we were using broken glass from beer bottles...it worked.