Bessemer Steel
steel made from pig iron, from which practically all the carbon, etc., has been removed by exposing the molten mass to a current of air. The Bessemer process, that of Sir Henry Bessemer was patented in 1856.
Bessemer's first idea was to blow air through molten pig iron till practically the whole of the carbon was oxidized when malleable iron was required, and to stop the blowing when a sufficient degree of decarburization was effected in steel has been produced ranging from 1.00 per cent. carbon to .08 per cent. carbon, the former being a steel suitable for springs, and the latter a soft material replacing wrought iron, rail steel usually containing 4 to 5 per cent. carbon.
The production of Bessemer steel in the U. S. in 1918 was 9,376,236 long tons, compared with a production of 10,- 479,960 tons in 1917.