1944 steel mill video

[matt87]

From the Tube, 9 minutes 52. A wartime documentary about the steelmills in a small town in Ohio, from the coal, ore and flux coming in to rolling to dimension. Touches on a number of topics including smelting pig iron in a blast furnace, converting to steel in the Siemens open hearth process, visual examination of ended steel samples, rolling to dimension and some information about the social and economic factors involved. Simply staggering!

YouTube - Steel Industry 1944 Toledo Ohio

[horseshoe182]

Thanks Matt, its interesting to see the enormous size and how its done at that time, I love watching this old stuff.

[Bully]

Thanks Matt found that to be very interesing, hard to comprehend the scale of works

[TASMITH]

I have worked at a major steel producing plant and have seen all of those operations performed with the exception of the old open hearth operations. At the time that I started they had shut down the old open hearth in favour of the basic oxygen operations for steel making.My Dad however worked in the open hearth for 32 years and retired as a charger operator when they closed the open hearth down. I had a chance to see it in operation though as they used to hold open house tours of parts of the plant every year.
They no longer cast ingots any more now either as it is all done by continuous casting, but they still used that method when I worked there. They also don't use the old blooming mills either due to casting of slabs now.

I worked in maintenance in the plant and therefore did a tour in pretty much every dept. and have seen all of these operations first hand. It really is quite an orchestrated operation right from coke making, iron making,steel making, casting, hot rolling, cold rolling and finishing.

I have written a series of articles on all the operations for Glenn and hope that some time in the future that he may be able to find a spot on the forum for them. I think everyone would find them interesting.

Terry

[Dodge]

Matt, that was awesome! Thanks for sharing. Visiting a steel mill is on my "List"!!
Terry, that would be some great info to have available!

[TASMITH]

Scott;
Here is a link to a you tube video made by British steel back in the early sixties I think. They present three videos all together on steel making. The computers they used in those days still used the old 'Ticker Tape'. There is more processing power in one of todays calculators than there was in any of those old computers but it is amazing what information they gathered. Todays modern steel making only differs in the better equipment and high tech computers but the process that were new technology then are still in use today.
Interesting old videos. Brings back memories to me:o.......LOL

YouTube - Study In Steel (Part 1 of 3)

This link is for part one and the next ones will come up at the end of it.
Seems to start out strange but just keep watching.
Terry

[Jason M]

Great video Matt. Here is another video that many will probably enjoy. ~ Jason

YouTube - Hand forging chains (1) - Blacksmithing

[Quenchcrack]

Ah the good old days when 19,000 men and women had good jobs in the mills. Today, they are mostly replaced by automation. Typical mill might only have 500-600 people. And Youngstown is mostly dead as far as steel goes. I was there a few years ago and it looked like a Twilight Zone set from the 1950's. The newer electric arc furnaces melt 150 tons of scrap in under an hour. I was in a Nucor mill and there was one lonely maintenance man on the rolling mill floor, looking for something to fix. Did ya notice nobody wore hard hats or safety glasses?

[Sask Mark]

I also had the opportunity to visit a local mill when I bidding on the construction of the foundations for their new turret ladle for one of the electric arc furnaces.

They warned me when they were going to turn on the current to the carbon electrodes. I still jumped at the noise. They were running 600 volts at 30,000 amps through the electrodes. Then they charged the furnace with the alloy and the sparks started showering again. I watched as employees dressed in reflective 'space suits' took samples from the furnaces for lab analysis. I was over 100 feet away from the furnaces and sweating, I can just imagine what those guys up on the catwalks were experiencing.

[ChrisB]

Nice little movie.