Smelting Iron in a Bloomery Furnace! 

Ah well, I don't do music over timelapsed footage that obscures what I'm actually doing and release two videos a week so I can plug mobile game sponsorships, so I guess I'll never make it big :P I'm ok with that.

@@BennettTheSmith 2 months later and still loving the videos. Keep it up!

Thanks! It was a blast, though next time will be even better. I'm already collecting more ore and a better mic and camera setup will make a big difference.

@@BennettTheSmith you can get high puritiy iron nickel copper by taking iron rich dirt, centrifuging it to remove organic matter, roasting the sand and cooking it with HCL Muriatic acid for 3 hours at 95 celsius. This will dissolve all iron as fecl3, calcium as cacl2 and gamma alumina as alcl3 (main component of antiperspirant deodorants). The silica will not dissolve and phosphorus will be dissolved as phosphoric acid and calcium hydroxyapatite. The dissolved salts can be based (neutralized) with limestone caco3 or caoh, the cacl2 will stay dissolved. The feco3/feoh and aloh3 along with the copper carbonate/hydroxide and nickel carbonates/hydroxide will precipitate, pump out the water and wash the precipitate a few times with water to remove any residual phosphoric acid, cacl2 and then add a small amount of na2co3 to neutralize the last phosphoric acid, hcl and fecl3 and alcl3 that may be left to yield soluble sodium phospate and nacl table salt + co2 gas. Roast the percipitate and reduce it with hydrogen at 1100 celsius or carbon or syngas/woodgas. To have cleaner steel if you are reducing with carbon, grind the charcoal and wash the ash out with hcl, or vinegar.

It was a good time :)

Thanks :D I'm working on it! I've got a lot in the pipeline, this damn pandemic just keeps tripping me up. The amazing SLOW-FAST where despite being incredibly busy, weeks go by where seemingly nothing... happens.

@@BennettTheSmith Yeah I feel that. In Australia, and in particularly my state, we have been in lockdown for almost 9 months. It's been so fucking long and yet it feels like yesterday that I was at work, but then it feels like a lifetime ago I went to that festival in Feb.

It has a certain something, doesn't it?

No kidding! I guess when you've got nothing else to do but die of plague and maybe a game of stick and hoop, you've got lots of time for grueling manual labor! Seriously though, learned TONS.

@@BennettTheSmith plague death doesn’t sound too bad 🤷🏻‍♂️ but there’s no blacksmithing post death, i assume, so definitely not an option. Hope to see a 2nd attempt at this to see how you improved. No time soon i’m sure. But still!

I've only streamed to youtube so far. Haven''t done many more due to recurring internet issues at my workshop, but its getting better! I'll probably do another ... soon. ish.

Haha! I forgot about that one, must have missed it in the edit.

Yep, basically no carbon anywhere I tested. probably less than modern mild steel. However, when I consolidated it, it etches with a ton of layers, so maybe I should spark it again. Some of the layers sure etch like they have different carbon content. I definitely lacked sufficient flux in the form of silica sand - especially since I wasn't using raw ore.

A test piece is probably best, too many possible variables to account for. What I would say is make a long test piece, if you can, and heat it on one end so that when you quench it, there are a range of temperatures. Then you can more quickly test to see what will work by checking the hardness at several points. If you have the option, I prefer to use pre-heated vegetable oil. Motor oil smells awful and I have never seen any research supporting the theory that used motor oil adds carbon.

@@BennettTheSmith Thanks mate. Im gonna try it when i can.

You should take a piece of the metal, anneal it, then quench in vegetable oil. do this with another piece in water and another air cooled. test with a file for hardness. tracks, to my knowledge, are not made of high carbon steel.

@@obh7762 what ive read about tracks is that they are high carbon steel and mangane aswell and i see larger sparks when cuttin track than mild steel aswell. But modern tracks migh be less carbon than older ones

HA! Yeah, no kidding.

I refined it as much as I could, most ended up breaking into bits too small that I’m saving for a second smelt in a better shaped furnace. I did keep two larger pieces just as mementos of the first attempt.

@@BennettTheSmith Did it turn into wrought iron or steel I was wondering if it was possible to turn ordinary scrap metal into wrought iron since technically you should start with pig iron in that case? Or did the blooms not consolidate properly and they were too fragile?

⁠@@Mechanicus_Instrumentum I suppose it’s possible to end up with wrought iron, but it would likely be more efficient to do that as a secondary process, after refining and homogenizing the bloom. I ended up with a piece of steel with many distinct layers, probably a medium to low carbon steel overall. It might be possible to turn scrap mild steel into wrought, but it would probably cost more in time and effort than sourcing antique wagon wheels and other existing wrought iron.