Indian Science and Technology in the Eighteenth Century: Some Contemporary European Accounts c24.11

c24.11

9. In France, Sweden, Norway, and parts of Germany, the fuel principally used is charcoal, and the ores are pure oxides of iron; the furnaces are about thirty feet in height, and in shape resemble in great measure the blast furnaces of England. Leathern forge bellows are frequently used to blow them, and the results vary from five hundredweight of cast iron per day, to sometimes five tons. The quantity of charcoal used also varies very much, from one and quarter ton, to two and half tons for each ton of cast iron, according to the nature of the mineral oxide smelted.