Indian Science and Technology in the Eighteenth Century: Some Contemporary European Accounts c24.23

c24.23

20. Although the aggregate manufacture of iron in India is no doubt very considerable, yet from the difficulty of inland transport in Southern India, it is probable that no extensive iron works will ever be established by European capitalists; and the only improvements which are capable of being introduced with advantage, or may be within the comprehension of natives, are those by which the expenditure of fuel may be economised by increasing the size of the furnace, and by which a sufficiently powerful blast may be produced. From my own experiments, I am led to believe, that the catalan forge will not answer except when the ores of the peroxide are procurable, in consequence of a peculiar property possessed by the magnetic oxide. But I am of opinion that the German, ‘steuck often’ might be used with great advantage, and the complete reduction of the ore at one operation to malleable iron, is easily effected. One of these furnaces may be easily built for ten rupees. The bellows for it may cost about ten rupees. A small tilt hammer about fifty rupees, and the whole stock in trade capable of turning out a ton of bar iron per week, need hardly cost one hundred rupees. I believe that nearly all the jungly tracts of Southern India are granitic, and in them of course fire clay and magnetic iron sand abound. Charcoal can be made at about fifty pounds for an anna, and the iron sand is sold at thirty pounds for an anna, which prices are as cheap as the iron stone and coal are now sold for in South Wales.