Steel Making on Teeside

[Arthur]

Good question Brian and I cannot give a definitive answer. I was discussing this with John Cowburn of the Industrial Railway Society just before Christmas. Yes, Distington are no longer in business but John was telling me that a traditional, open topped, hot metal ladle and car was supplied by a U.K. based company to the former Stanton ironworks not long before it's closure in 2007. Of, course that would be a relatively small vehicle, maybe 25t capacity.

 

The final Distington designs, those at Redcar, were designed in collaboration with DEMAG of Duisburg in Germany. DEMAG has since been broken up and parts sold off. The iron and steel division still operates as SMSDemag and they would be my best guess. Thyssenkrupp had a new No. 8 blast furnace built just a few years back at Duisburg and I guess somebody built torpedo ladles for them.

 

I think these days the design would be farmed out for manufacturing and assembly to whoever had the facilities for such heavy fabrication work.

 

Arthur

[Lambton58]

They're lined with furnace brick, which is replaced fairly frequently. The steel superstructure and running gear shouldn't have any contact with the molten iron, and will have a design life of about 40 years.

Relining things like torpedo and slag ladles is a contender for 'worst job in the world'. When I was at BSC Landore, the ladles would stop being used on a Friday afternoon. On Saturday morning, the brickies would chisel out damaged linings with a pneumatic drill- at this point, the things would take your skin off if you touched them. By Sunday, they'd have cooled off enough for the new bricks to be inserted, and cemented into place. On Monday morning, they'd be back in service.

 

Thanks Brian. I hadn't thought about them being brick lined, but that makes sense. The weekend maintainance sounds horrendous though.

 

Ralph

Lambton58

[Lambton58]

Years, those at Port Talbot have seen at least twenty years service and those at Redcar a little over thirty years. Not only are they massively constructed they have a hundred tonnes or so of refractory brick lining which is replaced every few months.

Thanks Arthur. I'm beginning to get an appreciation of the sheer scale of the iron & steel industry. Big, very big!

Ralph

Lambton58

[Arthur]

If you are interested Ralph, and have not already seen them, there are a lot of iron & steel images, mostly from the 1950's/60's, in my gallery.

 

http://www.rmweb.co....er/6861-arthur/

 

Edit; I should add that the site has reversed their original order, so the attached captions, which in some cases tell the story, are also reversed. It's because the site now lists them from latest added first.

Edited January 21, 2012 by Arthur

[Fat Controller]

Thanks Arthur. I'm beginning to get an appreciation of the sheer scale of the iron & steel industry. Big, very big!

Ralph

Lambton58

My recollection of the one at Landore, which was a baby in comparison with the ones used at the major plants, was that the capacity was about twenty tons, whereas the gross weight was close to 100t. It was used to transfer molten iron from the Hot Blast Cupola (which was integral with the Ingot Mould Foundry) to the General Castings Foundry. As there was no way of returning surplus iron to the cupola, the GCF workers ran a sideline in 'plancs' (bakestones for cooking Welsh Cakes on) with the left-overs- sadly, my mother threw our old one out..

[hmrspaul]

Dear all

Lackenby Steel works

Some of you may be interested in the considerable additions I have made to the

collection of photographs I have posted taken at Lackenby in July 1989

 

see http://paulbartlett....com/bsclackenby

 

Not many locos!

 

Paul Bartlett

[Lambton58]

Thanks Arthur & Paul, this is RMWeb at it's best. Unfortunately it may also mean that my lunch hour is going to overrun!

Ralph

Lambton58

[Beatty 139]

Hi I know that last posting on this thread was a while ago, but does anyone have any infomation on the D&L site (orignally B&V) I have had been told was known as Dock St foundry?

It was right in the shadow of the transporter bridge and I understand it was the jobbing foundry of D&L producing castings for works but not for sale.

 

Many Thanks

[RJL]

Yes, Auden's chessmen I always thought a very poetic description of blast furnaces. As far as the gouts of flame, Brian has, reasonably, suggested Bessemer convertors, like this at Ebbw Vale;

 

 

Ebbw Vale Bessemer 1.jpg

 

Not so much a flame, more a volcanic eruption lasting about 15 minutes. However, I think this unlikely. Bessemers were relatively rare in this country, Teeside was very much open hearth steelmaking country and DL definitely had no Bessemer convertors. Some of the smaller steel founders used them and smaller tropenas convertors, so it's just possible one of these was operating locally. If what you saw was actually a flame then I think the most likely explanation would be gas escaping from a coke oven when the door is removed and then igniting. That would be a brief flare but might occur every few minutes.

 

If, however, you saw an intense glow, perhaps reflecting off smoke or vapour, then that could be a blast furnace being tapped, hot coke being pushed, soaking pits being charged, activity at the pig caster, a whole range of possibilities in fact.

Now that's a good shot.

[jonhall]

Some British Pathe Film on the mainline registered torpedos

 

http://www.britishpathe.com/video/molten-metal-transported-by-train/query/railway+wagon

 

and

 

http://www.britishpathe.com/video/consett-iron-works/query/railway+wagon

 

Jon

[Mark Saunders]

The first film shows the use of MGR wagons as spacers, so this film is after the withdrawl of the LMS brake van chassis that were originally used as spacers.

 

Mark Saunders

[micmav]

Hello everyone,I was wondering if anyone knew where I could get old photos or Evan a plan of the old Warrenby works,both of the blast furnace site and the steelplant as these seem to be quite scarce, as I'm planning a 00 gauge layout loosely based on the old works.

[Arthur]

By Warrenby, do you mean the Bessemer blast furnaces and associated steel plant?

 

These;

 

 

If we can burrow down to just which bit of Dorman Long is of interest, I've probably got something to help.

[rope runner]

Interesting collection of Iron Ore hoppers in that photograph *right to left*- LMS 20 ton, Stanton 22 ton and a rarer 20 ton Ebbw Vale hopper. 

 

Paul A. 

[micmav]

It's the old Dorman Long works that were on the site of the new complex,from what I can remember they were demolished in the early 70's when the gare road was diverted to make way for iron ponding. I also believe there were a couple of blast furnaces but these were closed down in the 60's and they were close to where the old Warrenby halt station used to be.

[Arthur]

Okay, I'm with you now, it's the old Redcar iron & steelworks which you're referring to. The blast furnace plant was rebuilt in 1953, two were modernised and they supplied iron to a open hearth shop which in turn fed ingots to the plate mill.

 

As you say, the site was cleared in the early 70's to make way for the furnace and plant which is in use today.

 

These are the blast furnaces, an image posted earlier in the thread.

 

 

I'll see what else I can find.

[russ p]

Something on Dorman Longs extensive railway system and an answer to Davids question above.

 

Firstly a schematic showing the railways serving the various works.

 

Railway Schematic.jpg

 

A close up of the lines serving the ore wharf at South Bank, circled in Davids post above, showing the electrified lines.

 

South Bank Ore Wharf plan.jpg

 

A couple of shots showing the ore unloaders and the electric locos at work.

 

Ore Unloaders and Electric Loco.jpeg

 

South Bank Ore Wharf.jpg

 

The electric locos were used on a captive circuit moving ore from the wharf to the stocking grounds just south of it.

 

Electric Loco 1.jpg

 

Ore wagons were hauled, by rope, up the gantry shown in the next photo and their contents dumped onto the ore stocking piles beneath.

 

Electrc Loco at Stocking Grounds.jpg

 

DL had some 45t capacity hopper wagons built for this service.

 

45t Ore Hopper.jpg

 

Along with a large fleet of conventional steam locomtives in the 1950's DL took into service some Sentinels for use at the Clay Lane plant. shown below is the single, double ended, articulated locomotive used on coke traffic.

 

Sentinel Articulated Loco.jpg

 

Fireless locomotives were used at theLackenby open hearth plant for moving ingot bogies.

 

Fireless Loco at Lackenby.jpg

 

Another specialised wagon was this bogie open used for moving crop ends, the ends of rolled blooms which contained flaws and slag, which were returned to the open hearth plant for re smelting.

 

60t Bloom Crop Wagon.jpg

 

Two photos of sidings serving the Clay lane works, the lower one shows some of the colour light signaling used for traffic control at this busy point.

 

Clay Lane Sidings.jpg

 

Signals and Signal Cabin.jpg

 

And finally, two photos showing the hot sinter transfer car. Sinter required cooling and DL's method copied that used at coke ovens. The transfer car was loaded with the hot sinter, run out onto the gantry and the hot sinter dumped onto the bench for cooilng. Not a method I've seen used elsewhere.

 

Sinter Car.jpg

 

Hot Sinter Car.jpg

Just found this, absolutely stunning! When did the electrics start and finish? There was one dumped near clay lane into the early 80s but the catenery had long gone, did the wires extend south of the mainline? Anymore pictures of DL electrics would be greatly appreciated

[12CSVT]

Try Britain from above and search Redcar, there is a nice 1924 photo of the works on here  .

Edited December 4, 2014 by 12CSVT

[micmav]

Thanks very much for the warrenby works information,after doing a little more research there was an iron works on this site a lot earlier. Any further info or even a plan showing the works layout would be great.

[micmav]

By Warrenby, do you mean the Bessemer blast furnaces and associated steel plant?

These;

image.jpg

If we can burrow down to just which bit of Dorman Long is of interest, I've probably got something to help.

[micmav]

Are these two furnaces at the old redcar ironworks? they look similar to the two merchant iron furnaces at Cleveland works.

[Arthur]

 

The photo in post 66 above shows the rebuilt Redcar furnaces, those in post 63 are the Cleveland (Bessemer) furnaces, the two plants are very easy to differentiate.

 

The furnaces have different arrangements of gas off takes. The Redcar furnaces have, what was to become the 'modern' standard, the four off takes combine into two and then merge, at the top, to a single downcomer, the large pipe descending to the right. Whilst the Cleveland furnaces have an older arrangement, the off takes rise vertically with each having it's own downcomer which merge low down.

 

It was the Cleveland furnaces which survived into the 1990's. Whilst the building of the large, still standing, Redcar furnace dispensed with the need for the rest, two of the Cleveland furnaces were retained to smelt manganese.

[Arthur]

Just found this, absolutely stunning! When did the electrics start and finish? There was one dumped near clay lane into the early 80s but the catenery had long gone, did the wires extend south of the mainline? Anymore pictures of DL electrics would be greatly appreciated

I can't help with withdrawal dates for the electrics, nor any more photographs I'm afraid. I'm pretty sure that the electrics did not run south of the mainline, they were restricted to a circuit between the wharf and the stocking grounds.

 

The tunnel under the mainline was of restricted headroom such that Dorman Long had locomotives with cut down cabs. The large 0-6-0 sentinels supplied to DL had much lower cabs than similar locomotives supplied to GKN's East Moors works at Cardiff. So I doubt there would have been headroom for catenary.

[russ p]

Is that the tunnel at the east end of Southbank coke ovens or the filled in one at the other end. I once was told that the electrics were used on a gantry somewhere after their work to the warfe was finished.

Those pictures are the only ones I ever seen of those locos. They are not far off the look of the old triang 0-4-0 electric loco

[Arthur]

 

The tunnel to the South East of the ore plant and South Bank coke oven on this map;

 

 

Not sure about their later use. They may have ceased trip working between the wharf and ore stocking grounds but still worked the gantry at the stocking grounds. I don't know, just a thought.