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By T. B. Counselman

PRobably the earliest concentration of iron ore in this country was carried on in the northeastern magnetite areas. Magnetic concentration was relatively simple and gave a concentrate that, after agglomeration, and in spite of beillg high in phosphorus hecause of the dry concentrating methods then in use, was satisfactory blast-furnace feed. Production from the northeastern magnetitc area languished after the discovery and development of the Lake Superior ores, where there was seemingly an unlimited tonnage of high-grade ore, first the Michigan ores, and subsequently the still larger deposits of Minnesota. For years only the higher grade, direct shipping ores of the Lake superior district were mined. Those of Michigan, and of the Vermilion Range in Minnesota, were hard ores and came principally from underground mines. The softer ores of the Mesabi came partly from underground mincs, but mostly from the enormous deposits that could be worked by open-pit methods. The costs of ore from these open-pit deposits, even with the high initial cost of stripping, were so low that the underground mines of the Mesabi could hardly compete. The so-called Old Range ores, of Michigan and of the Vermilion Range of Minnesota, were hard and lumpy, and opened UP the burden in the blast furnace, therefore making possible harder driving with greater output. Also, some of these Ores were of such grade and physical characteristics that they were suitable for charge ore in the open hearth. These ores, therefore, commanded a price premium. and could compete with the softer, finer, but cheaper, Mesabi ores. The big tonnage reserves, however, are on the Mesabi. and it is these big open-pit deposits that contitue- our stock pile of iron ore, from which we are drawing so heavily during this war period. On the western end of the Mesabi the ore was found to be high in silica, and not suitable as furnace feed. As early as 1902, attempts were made to concentrate this so-called wash ore and by 1910 the first washing plant was put into operation. The Process was very simple, consisting essentially of a sizing and washing operation, with scalping screens, logwashers and tables, which later were replaced by classificrs. Ore particles finer than I00 mesh were deliberately wasted, because these fines were undesirable in the furnace. Fortunately, these tailings were impounded, and already are being reworked. Before long some of the low-grade ores began to require more elaborate treatment than the simple washing operation and, tables having been discarded because of their low capacity, in favor of classifiers, jigs were next introduced. These were able to discard coarser pieces of tailing than classifiers. Jigs are in active use today, various improvements having been made in their design and application. Various other machines and methods of concentration have been tried from time to time, and have in turn been discarded for more improved processes., The latest and most important process that has been 38

Jan 1, 1944

By T. B. Counselman

PRobably the earliest concentration of iron ore in this country was carried on in the northeastern magnetite areas. Magnetic concentration was relatively simple and gave a concentrate that, after agglomeration, and in spite of beillg high in phosphorus hecause of the dry concentrating methods then in use, was satisfactory blast-furnace feed. Production from the northeastern magnetitc area languished after the discovery and development of the Lake Superior ores, where there was seemingly an unlimited tonnage of high-grade ore, first the Michigan ores, and subsequently the still larger deposits of Minnesota. For years only the higher grade, direct shipping ores of the Lake superior district were mined. Those of Michigan, and of the Vermilion Range in Minnesota, were hard ores and came principally from underground mines. The softer ores of the Mesabi came partly from underground mincs, but mostly from the enormous deposits that could be worked by open-pit methods. The costs of ore from these open-pit deposits, even with the high initial cost of stripping, were so low that the underground mines of the Mesabi could hardly compete. The so-called Old Range ores, of Michigan and of the Vermilion Range of Minnesota, were hard and lumpy, and opened UP the burden in the blast furnace, therefore making possible harder driving with greater output. Also, some of these Ores were of such grade and physical characteristics that they were suitable for charge ore in the open hearth. These ores, therefore, commanded a price premium. and could compete with the softer, finer, but cheaper, Mesabi ores. The big tonnage reserves, however, are on the Mesabi. and it is these big open-pit deposits that contitue- our stock pile of iron ore, from which we are drawing so heavily during this war period. On the western end of the Mesabi the ore was found to be high in silica, and not suitable as furnace feed. As early as 1902, attempts were made to concentrate this so-called wash ore and by 1910 the first washing plant was put into operation. The Process was very simple, consisting essentially of a sizing and washing operation, with scalping screens, logwashers and tables, which later were replaced by classificrs. Ore particles finer than I00 mesh were deliberately wasted, because these fines were undesirable in the furnace. Fortunately, these tailings were impounded, and already are being reworked. Before long some of the low-grade ores began to require more elaborate treatment than the simple washing operation and, tables having been discarded because of their low capacity, in favor of classifiers, jigs were next introduced. These were able to discard coarser pieces of tailing than classifiers. Jigs are in active use today, various improvements having been made in their design and application. Various other machines and methods of concentration have been tried from time to time, and have in turn been discarded for more improved processes., The latest and most important process that has been 38

Jan 1, 1944

By Jeremias K. Chitunda

Significant cost savings and improved ground stability are two initial indications from the current wet process shotcrete ground support program at the Lakeshore mine. The area of shotcrete for ground stability is not strange to the Lakeshore operation. Since the beginning of the project, various shotcrete techniques have constantly been experimented with, incorporating all the latest technological developments. Over the years, the use of shotcrete has been employed as a primary, temporary, or permanent support, singly or in combination with rockbolts and steel sets. The extent of shotcrete usage compared with steel sets and rockbolts has varied from time to time as dictated by the overall state of the art. In 1972, for example, the ratio of the linear drift footage supported with shotcrete to that supported with steel sets averaged 1.0. In 1973, that ratio was about 3.0. Overall, for the Lakeshore mine, there are about 8000 drift ft of shotcrete, 8000 drift ft of steel sets and timber, 750 drift ft of formed concrete, 21,000 drift ft of rockbolts, and 3700 drift ft of combined type support.

Jan 12, 1974

Jan 1, 1947

By Harold Rose

THE peak of production from the Appalachian natural gas field was apparently reached about 10 years ago, and the annual production from Pennsylvania, West. Virginia and Ohio has now dropped to about two-thirds of the amounts obtained in 1916-and 1917. This falling off in production has occurred in spite of vigorous efforts and large expenditures by producing companies to maintain or increase their output. The greatly increased costs of development and handling are reflected in the present average value of natural gas at the point of consumption, which value in the three states referred to, has more than doubled in the past 10 years. While it is true that the natural gas production of the United States has increased during recent years, this increase has come from southwestern states, particularly from Oklahoma, California, Louisiana and Texas, which states are now leaders in the production of this valuable but fleeting resource. Pennsylvania, originally the leading state in natural gas production, occupies sixth place in the latest (1924) U. S. Bureau of Mines statistics. West Virginia, which held first place for 15 years, has dropped to third rank, and Ohio is the seventh state in the order of natural gas production. Domestic and industrial demands for gas are constantly increasing everywhere in the United States. These growing demands have accentuated the difficulties in the localities with depleted natural gas supplies, and serious shortages have already occurred during winter months in the Pittsburgh district. Some relief has been obtained by placing restrictions on the industrial use of natural gas, and by, increasing the price (which tends to reduce consumption). Yet these are but temporary expedients for checking gas consumption, which fail to solve the problem of adequate future supplies of gas.

Jan 10, 1926

By C. E. Jackson, E. C. Nelson, A. L. Christenson

Much information regarding the transfornlatio~lal characteristics of a steel as it cools in a known manner from the austenitic state can be obtained from dilatometric studies. This method has received more arid more attention because of its great flexibility, accuracy, and ease of interpretation. 'The method is entirely applicable to any rate of heating and cooling although the experumental procrdures for high rates of cooling have offered some difficulties. This paper presents a description of equipment employing cooling rates up to 500 °C. per secorld and the results of dilatometric observations on six commercial steels are included. French and Klopsch1 studied the cooling transformations of a serirs OF carbon steel, using the thermal arrest method. This was followed by the systematic investigatiol1 of Esser and co-workers on the effect of carhon2 and other alloying additions. in which the transforlnation temperature\ were determined by magnetic induction measurements indicated by a string galranoineter. Emphasis was placed on determining Ar' trailsformations and the critical cooling rates for these steels. The maglietic measurements wrere used in an effort to obtain more accurate data at higher cooling rates. Measurements of thermal arrest were made also to check the validity of the magnetic indications, and good correlation was found between the two, although Esser's,Ar' temperature measurements on iron-carbon alloys were about 200°F. lower than the measurements made by Fresnch and Klopsch. A notable contril~ution by Esser was the introduction gas quenching. wever and Rose4 used a moving-coil galranometcr in the study of the .Ar and Ar" of iron-carbon alloys by the thermal arrest method and obtained somewhat lover Ar" temperatures than those observed by Esser below I per cent carbon and considerably higher ahove. They concluded that the cooling rate had little influcncc on the Ar" temperatures above 0.4 per cent carbon, although Esser had observed a decrease in the -4r" temperature with increasing cooling rate with similar steels. Digges determined the .Ar" temperature4 for a scries of high-purity iron-carbon alloys, and close agreement with his results was obtained by Greninger. The thermal arrest method. together with metallographic observation used in both these studies, represents the latest investigations of this type. Any investigation by thermal analyses is dependent on the heat of reaction and the specific heat of the

Jan 1, 1945

By Northcutt Ely

International developments affecting foreign in- vestments in 1960-61 were many, varying from region to region and differing with respect to various categories of investments. Total value of U.S. private investment abroad in 1960 was approximately $32.7 billion, an increase of $2.9 billion over 1959. Production and distribution of mineral resources was, by a sizeable margin, the most important function of American capital working in foreign countries in 1960. Investment in mining or petroleum interests totaled approximately $14 billion, or 42% of all direct foreign investment. In- vestments by industry for 1960 were as follows: Petroleum-10.9 billions, Mining-3.0 billions, Manufacturing-11.2 billions, Utilities-2.5 billions, other-5.1 billions. American investors found Canada and Latin America to be most desirable in 1960 with the greatest percentage of American capital in all areas centered in the petroleum and mining industries. The areal breakdown of total American investments is as follows: Canada-$11.2 billions, Latin America-$8.4 billions, Western Europe-$6.6 billions, Middle East-$1.2 billions, Far East-$1.2 billions, Africa-$.9 billions, other areas-$3.2 billions.

Jan 3, 1962

By Harold Rose

THE peak of production from the Appalachian natural gas field was apparently reached about 10 years ago, and the annual production from Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio has now dropped to about two-thirds of the amounts obtained in 1916 and 1917. This .falling off in production has occurred in spite of vigorous efforts and large expenditures by producing companies to maintain or increase their output. The greatly increased costs of development and handling are reflected in the present average value of natural gas at the point of consumption, which value in the three states referred to, has more than doubled in the past 10 years. While it is true that the natural gas production of the United States has increased during recent years, this increase has come from southwestern states, particularly from Oklahoma, California, Louisiana and Texas, which states are now leaders in the production of this valuable but fleeting resource. Pennsylvania, originally the leading state in natural gas production, occupies sixth place in the latest (1924) U. S. Bureau of Mines statistics. West Virginia, which held first place for 15 years, has dropped to third rank, and Ohio is the seventh state in the order of natural gas production. Domestic and industrial demands for gas are constantly increasing everywhere in the United States. These growing demands have accentuated the difficulties in the localities with depleted natural gas supplies, and serious shortages have already occurred during winter months in the Pittsburgh district. Some relief has been obtained by placing restrictions on the industrial use of natural gas, and by increasing the price (which tends to reduce consumption). Yet these are but temporary expedients for checking gas consumption, which fail to solve the problem of adequate future supplies of gas.

Jan 10, 1926

By C. Land, R. Hultgren

Heat contents of four Cr-Ni alloys were determined in a diphenyl ethev calorimeter. Aside from ferromagnetic effects, Kopp's law of additivity of heat capacities is approximately fol-lowed, in disagreement with earlier results of A. W. Foster. In 1934 Foster1 reported heat-capacity measurements of dilute solutions of chromium in nickel, primarily as a study of the effect of alloying on the ferromagnetic Curie temperature. He found that, apart from the Curie temperature effect, the general level of heat capacities was reduced 10 pct by the addition of 1 pct Cr; 20 pct by the addition of 2 pct Cr. His measurements of pure nickel essentially agreed with accepted values. These results indicate that small amounts of dissolved chromium cause an increase in the Debye temperature of nickel, presupposing a change of frequency of interatomic bonding vibrations which is much larger than should be expected. If Foster's results were verified, therefore, they would have important implications for bonding theory. The only other heat-capacity measurements in this system seem to be those of Taylor and Hinton,' who studied anomalies which they attributed to super-lattice formation at 25 at. pct Cr. At temperatures above the anomaly, Taylor and Hinton found heat capacities at this composition were quite normal, approximately obeying Kopp's law of additivity. EXPERIMENTAL WORK In order to verify or disprove the remarkable results of Foster, the heat contents of four dilute solid solutions of chromiunn in nickel were measured in a diphenyl ether calorimeter. This instrument, described elsewhere,, operates on the principle of the Bunsen ice calorimeter, but uses diphenyl ether as the working substance. Diphenyl ether melts at the convenient temperature of 26.S°C and supplies a more sensitive measure of heat than ice. The hot sample, in an atmosphere of argon, is dropped from a furnace at a measured temperature into a chamber which is surrounded by a mixture of solid and liquid diphenyl ether. The heat from the hot specimen melts some of the solid without chang- ing the temperature of the calorimeter. The amount of solid melted, and therefore the number of calories released by the specimen, is measured from the increase of volume of the mixture, which pushes mercury down a graduated capillary tube. The apparatus has been standardized against the known heat content of pure platinum. Heat loss during the dropping of the specimen was estimated by comparing the heat content of an empty platinum capsule with a solid platinum ball of the same radius and degree of polish of the surface. Repeated tests demonstrate the precision of measurement to be closer than *0.3 pct. Smoothed experimental results are listed in Table I. The tabulated values for pure nickel are taken from kelley, several measurements were made which agreed closely with this tabulation. For chromium, however, no similar agreement was found. The values tabulated were taken from a thorough study of chromium with the diphenyl ether calorimeter which will be published elsewhere.= Suitable plots of the data showed the expected ferromagnetic anomalies in the low-chromium alloys, while the 11 pct alloy shows no ferromagnetic anomaly, but a different, small anomaly below 900°K. This is perhaps the same anomaly found in CrNi, which was once attributed to superlattice formation,' but is probably due to some other cause, such as antifer-

Jan 1, 1960

By T. B. Counselman

PROBABLY the earliest concentration of iron ore in this country was carried on in the northeastern magnetite areas. Magnetic concentration was relatively simple and gave a concentrate that, after agglomeration, and in spite of being high in phosphorus because of the dry concentrating methods then in use, was satisfactory blast-furnace feed. Production from the northeastern magnetite area languished after the discovery and development of the Lake Superior ores, where there was seemingly an unlimited tonnage of high-grade ore, first the Michigan ores, and subsequently the still larger deposits of Minnesota. For years only the higher grade, direct shipping ores of the Lake Superior district were mined. Those of Michigan, and of the Vermilion Range in Minnesota, were hard ores and came principally from underground mines. The softer ores of the Mesabi came partly from underground mines, but mostly from the enormous deposits that could be worked by open-pit methods. The costs of ore from these open-pit deposits, even with the high initial cost of stripping, were so low that the underground mines of the Mesabi could hardly compete. The so-called Old Range ores, of Michigan and of the Vermilion Range of Minnesota, were hard and lumpy, and opened up the burden in the blast furnace, therefore making possible harder driving with greater output. Also, some of these ores were of such grade and physical characteristics that they were suitable for charge ore in the open hearth. These ores, therefore, commanded a price premium, and could compete with the softer, finer, but cheaper, Mesabi ores. The big tonnage reserves, however, are on the Mesabi, and it is these big open-pit deposits that constitute our stock pile of iron ore, from which we are drawing so heavily during this war period. On the western end of the Mesabi the ore was found to be high in silica, and not suitable as furnace feed. As early as 1902, attempts were made to concentrate this so-called wash ore and by 1910 the first washing plant was put into operation. The process was very simple, consisting essentially of a sizing and washing operation, with scalping screens, logwashers, and tables, which later were replaced by classifiers. Ore particles finer than 100 mesh were deliberately wasted, because these fines were undesirable in the furnace. Fortunately, these tailings were impounded, and already are being reworked. Before long some of the low-grade ores began to require more elaborate treatment than the simple washing operation and, tables having been discarded because of their low capacity, in favor of classifiers, jigs were next introduced. These were able to discard coarser pieces of tailing than classifiers. Jigs are in active use today, various improvements having been made in their design and application. Various other machines and methods of concentration have been tried from time to time, and have in turn been discarded for more improved processes. The latest and most important process that has been

Jan 1, 1943

RECORDING that the latest annual meeting was the largest and most successful ever held has be-come almost a habit, but when, as this year, the registration on the first day exceeded any other first day by two hundred, the annual dinner attracted nearly 1200, as compared with 750 at the previous largest one, and the number of technical sessions was larger than ever before, there seems no escape from so regarding it. In spite of the third day being a legal holiday (Washington's Birthday) no slackening, in attendance and interest was noted, and throughout the four days the greatest problem was to find enough meeting rooms and chairs to provide for the sessions, of which as many as twelve were in progress at one time. Solution of the problem would not have been possible (since the Engi-neering Societies building, was designed to provide only three general meeting rooms) except that a part of the eighth floor happened to be temporarily vacant. As these extra rooms will not be available next year, it may become necessary to adopt measures to keep the annual meeting down to the limit of facilities for handling it. The meeting opened on Monday with simultaneous sessions on iron and steel, geophysical prospecting, mine ventilation, non-metallic minerals, and milling, methods. The first four, which were continued after the usual recess for lunch, are reported in more detail elsewhere.

Jan 3, 1928

By F. C. Blickensderfer

THE CHAIRMAN (B. B. GOTTSBERGER, Miami, Ariz.).-On your trip today through the Inspiration and Miami mills you have seen in actual operation the machines which represent the changes adopted in grinding methods in the Miami district from the beginning of operations in March, 1911. In one section of the Miami plant are three Chilean mills not yet discarded, representing the first machines adopted. In another section, pebble grinding is still in operation, while in the balance of the plant, pebbles have been replaced with iron balls. In all cases these machines are handling a feed which is the product of roll, grinding down to about ¼ in. in, size. The latest step in grinding in the district, You saw at the Inspiration plant, where in Marcy mills a filed, the larger pieces of which remain on a 2-in. opening, is being reduced in one operation to a product of which only about 3 per. cent. remains on the 48-mesh screen. A detailed comparison of the methods used at the two plants would be very instructive but our own work at Miami has not yet reached a point where such a comparison is possible, the reason being that our final product is not yet fine enough. By means of larger Hardinge mills operating in closed circuit with Dorr classifiers soon to, be installed in one section of the plant, we hope to obtain, under properly balanced operating conditions the same end result as at Inspiration. It, might interest you, however, to know some of the results we have obtained here by the substitution of balls for pebbles. With pebble grinding, using three 8-ft. by 22-in. mills, followed by one 8-ft. by 66-in. mill for regrinding the coarse product of the primary mills, we handled 636 tons per 24 hr. in one section of the plant. Substituting balls for pebbles in the first operation and using two mills in place of three we obtained a tonnage of .714 tons to the section. With the use of balls both in the primary mills and in the regrinding mills, the tonnage for one section was raised to 822 tons per day. Coincident with this increase in tonnage, we also obtained a greater efficiency. The use of pebbles in all mills showed 21.5 per cent. plus 48-mesh material in the final tailing, which figure was reduced to 13.9 per cent. for balls followed by pebbles, and to 4.6 per cent. with the use of balls both in the primary and regrinding mills.

Jan 12, 1916

By J. W. Ristori, V. R. Garfias

ONE of the most serious problems now confronting Gel- many-and one that will affect Italy even more seriously if she goes to war against England and France -is that of supplying her navy, mechanized army, and air force as well as her industrial and other needs with the necessary and related products. This problem, serious even now, will become vital should hostilities on a large scale develop.

Jan 1, 1939

By Wilbur C. Helt

The United States is self-sufficient in bituminous coal and lignite resources to meet the high range of energy demands forecast for the remainder of this century and beyond. The known or proved recoverable reserves of energy from coal in the United States are estimated to be 88% of all fuel reserves, whereas the energy reserves for oil are estimated to be 276, gas 376, shale oil 5% and uranium 2% (as now used). The demand for all forms of energy used in the United States is increasing at a rate of 3% to 4% per year. Presently, coal is competitive on a supply and cost basis with other fuels in conversion to electrical energy and as a source of energy for converting raw minerals to metals and nonmetals, but it is not competitive in transportation and other uses that demand the high flexibility that oil and gas enjoy because of their form. Coal conversion to fluid forms is essential to make it interchangeable with gas and oil to meet the markets they now occupy. Essentially, the chemical constituents that make up coal are the same hydrocarbons that make up oil and gas; it is a matter of reconstituting the proportions of hydrocarbons to make coal interchangeable with the other fuels. The production of coal has fluctuated widely between the peak production of 631 million tons in 1947 to a low of 403 million tons in 1961. Throughout this period, the total value of the production, f.o.b. mines, has averaged more than $2 billion annually. Beginning with 1962, there has been a steady upward trend in coal production with only minor fluctuations that were mainly caused by labor disputes. Output for the latest typical year, 1970, was 588 million tons. Production in 1971 was affected by a major strike and dropped to 548 million tons. Exports of coal from United States to foreign countries have increased steadily and developed into a substantial annual market for over 71 million tons per year. About 56 million tons of this is suitable for metallurgical purposes, and the remaining 15 million tons is exported for electric power generation. The largest single-industry demand for coal is in the electric generating industry, Fig.1. Roughly, the production of electricity has doubled every

Jan 1, 1973

By Robert H. Richards

During tile summer of 1870, I had an opportunity to visit the laboratory of the late David Forbes, Esq., in London, and was much interested in a labor-saving device which he had attached to his agate mortar. The mortar was placed in the centre of a small table, and about ten inches to the right of the mortar, a post, perhaps two

Jan 1, 1879

By John C. Kleiber, George M. Meisel

From time to time since the initial installation of an experimental flotation section in 1940, Permanente Cement Co. has made efforts to beneficiate the low-grade limestone fraction which occurs in its deposits at Permanente, Calif. The encouraging results outlined in this article are the result of Permanente's latest effort. THE PERMANENTE LIMESTONE AND THE REASON FOR ITS BENEFICIATION The Permanente deposit is a sheet of Calera limestone over 700 ft thick lying within the Franciscan sediments of the San Francisco peninsula. Limestone suitable for cement manufacture underlies, overlies, and is interbedded with low-grade limestone and chert. Andesite intrusions are found as a secondary gangue. The limestone is identified as follows:

Jan 3, 1964

By C. H. Mathewson

UNFORTUNATE evasions of metals specifications recently brought to public attention through news items and editorials have caused executives of at least two great corporations to set up defensive procedures and to re¬affirm the patriotic purpose and conscientious effort of their plants in this battle of production. Whatever the exact conditions affecting these cases, in which the public interest has been safe-guarded by vigorous action, my reaction to such offenses in general is a feeling that they arise from the pressure and limitations that afflict our overextended war effort and that inevitably there will be more of them, doubtless more and more expertly conceived and less and less subject to detection as simple faked, or substituted analyses or tests. To the ladies, who doubtless are already beginning to ac¬quire a sense of painful resignation to a dry technical talk, may I say that the cookbook is full of specifications which customarily are varied within rather wide limits but it is generally recognized that the proof of the pudding is in the eating without regard to its exact composition or some scientific evaluation of its texture.

Jan 1, 1943

By G. H. Anderson

During an investigation of the copper-rich portion of the copper-silicon-iron system as part of an extensive research program on P.M.G. alloys, which was begun in 1937 in the research laboratory of the Phelps Dodge Corporation, it became apparent that the binary copper-silicon system below 7 per cent Si needed revision, therefore an investigation was undertaken. Both X-ray methods and microscopic technique were employed. Despite the many investigations that have the clarification of this system as their object, no two successive reports on the system have agreed in placement of the alpha-phase solubility limit, and uncertainty about the secondary phase first to appear has been voiced several times.3,4,5 It was therefore not surprising, when T. Isawa's6 and M. Okamoto's7 works were reported at the time we were finishing up our experimental work, to find essential disagreement between their results and ours. But when C. 5. Smith's latest work on the copper-silicon systema was published just as we were finishing our laboratory report, it was indeed gratifying to find that the latter's diagram and ours checked in all essential features, except the temperature of the peritectoid line above 830" C. Many attempts were made to retain the beta phase during the present investigation, but none was successful. Isawa,6 however, reports that he has been able to obtain X-ray photograms of the beta phase. The structure, he states, is body-centcrcd cubic with a lattiee constant of 2.848 ,&. at 7.2 per cent Si. Okamoto7 and Smith8 both use the designation Kappa for the hexagonal phase, and to avoid confusion this designation will he adhered to in the present paper. Preparation of Samples The alloys were melted in vacuum in a high-frequency furnace. from copper cathodes containing 99.98 per cent Cu, and specially refined silicon supplied by The Electro Metallurgical Co. This silicon is stated

Jan 1, 1940

By G. H. Anderson

During an investigation of the copper-rich portion of the copper-silicon-iron system as part of an extensive research program on P.M.G. alloys, which was begun in 1937 in the research laboratory of the Phelps Dodge Corporation, it became apparent that the binary copper-silicon system below 7 per cent Si needed revision, therefore an investigation was undertaken. Both X-ray methods and microscopic technique were employed. Despite the many investigations that have the clarification of this system as their object, no two successive reports on the system have agreed in placement of the alpha-phase solubility limit, and uncertainty about the secondary phase first to appear has been voiced several times.3,4,5 It was therefore not surprising, when T. Isawa's6 and M. Okamoto's7 works were reported at the time we were finishing up our experimental work, to find essential disagreement between their results and ours. But when C. 5. Smith's latest work on the copper-silicon systema was published just as we were finishing our laboratory report, it was indeed gratifying to find that the latter's diagram and ours checked in all essential features, except the temperature of the peritectoid line above 830" C. Many attempts were made to retain the beta phase during the present investigation, but none was successful. Isawa,6 however, reports that he has been able to obtain X-ray photograms of the beta phase. The structure, he states, is body-centcrcd cubic with a lattiee constant of 2.848 ,&. at 7.2 per cent Si. Okamoto7 and Smith8 both use the designation Kappa for the hexagonal phase, and to avoid confusion this designation will he adhered to in the present paper. Preparation of Samples The alloys were melted in vacuum in a high-frequency furnace. from copper cathodes containing 99.98 per cent Cu, and specially refined silicon supplied by The Electro Metallurgical Co. This silicon is stated

Jan 1, 1940

By K. G. Wikle, W. W. Beaver

A general survey of the mechanical properties of commercially pure beryllium fabricated from powder by vacuum hot pressing and other consolidation methods is presented. The effect of fabrication method, grain size, strain rate, and directionality upon both room and elevated temperature tensile properties is reported. BERYLLIUM metal, in spite of its rather restricted use, has been the object of attention for many researchers in the past half century. However, such work was performed on special experimental lots of metal made in small quantities by a variety of reduction methods. Not until 1946 was there a substantial production of beryllium metal, and not until 1950 was there a steady production of a commercially standard beryllium in the United States. This output was both the result of a requirement of the Atomic Energy Commission for a high grade beryllium of consistent quality and the development of a powder metallurgy process, by the Brush Beryllium Co., known originally as Process Q, which yielded a fine grained beryllium suitable for fabrication. Because this powder metallurgy product, known as QMV, superceded other types of metal made previously and represents the great majority of beryllium in use today, it seems worthwhile to present the results of studies on the mechanical properties of this metal as currently made. To the design engineer and the metallurgist, beryllium has extremely interesting properties. It is as light as magnesium alloys while having a stiffness modulus 40 pct greater than steel and a strength-weight ratio superior to titanium and aluminum alloys and aircraft steels. The melting point is high, 1287°C (2348°F), and it has good corrosion resistance both in air and water. Also, it is highly transparent to X-rays and has good heat and electrical conductivity (electric conductivity is greater than 40 pct of Cu). To the atomic energy program beryllium is considered a valuable material because of its low neutron-capture cross section and high neutron-scattering cross section which make it a good moderator and reflector for the lower velocity neutrons. A major technical difficulty limiting the use of beryllium, especially in structural applications, has been its notch sensitivity and consequent room temperature brittleness. Kaufmann, Gordon, and Lillie1 have reported their work on the mechanical properties of beryllium performed from 1946 to 1950. They studied the room and elevated temperature properties of cast and extruded beryllium and extruded electrolytic flake, Table I. Cast and extruded alloys of 85 to 99 pct Be were tested also. They found that extruded metal developed good strength and appreciable ductility in the extrusion direction and that thermal treatment and alloying provided little improvement in mechanical properties. They concluded that preferred orientation and fine grain size were the means of obtaining optimum tensile properties in beryllium. Other investigators have measured and commented on one of the most striking mechanical properties of beryllium, namely, its abnormally low Poisson's ratio.2 Udy, Shaw, and Boulger3 presented the latest published survey on properties of beryllium but their information is based only on published data available before April 1949 and cites little information on metal fabricated by powder metallurgy

Jan 1, 1955