Fine-art Moulding
This branch includes moulding of statuary, groups, figures, busts, etc., in bronze by the cire perdue and other processes common to the art, besides the general work connected with clay and wax modelling, taking plaster and wax casts, etc. See MODELLING; PLASTER-CAST; STATUARY-FOUNDING.
Finery-furnace--also called a refinery--consists of a rectangular hearth formed by the junction of four troughs, through which cold water circulates to prevent them from fusing. A bottom is formed within the troughs with prepared sand, with a droop towards the tap-hole. The blast enters the hearth through tuyeres which incline at an angle of about 28 deg. Above the hearth is a chimney about 17 feet high, built on four pillars in order that the air may have free access to the fire on all sides. The tap-hole is at the lower end of the hearth, and through it the metal and slag run out on plates, where it is at once cooled by copious streams of water. This sudden cooling of the molten mass causes the carbon to combine chemically and produces a silvery-white metal. This is the preliminary process before puddling the iron in the reverberatory furnace. See MALLEABLE IRON; PUDDLING-FURNACE.