GC: n
CT: Pig iron is the product of smelting iron ore (also ilmenite) with a high-carbon fuel and reductant such as coke, usually with limestone as a flux. Charcoal and anthracite are also used as fuel and reductant. Pig iron is produced by smelting or iron ore in blast furnaces or by smelting ilmenite in electric furnaces. Pig iron is supplied in a variety of ingot sizes and weights, ranging from 3 kg up to more than 50 kg.The vast majority of pig iron is produced and consumed within integrated steel mill complexes. In this context the term “pig iron” is something of a misnomer: within integrated steel mills, blast furnace iron is transferred directly to the steel plant in liquid form, better known as “hot metal” or “blast furnace iron.” The term pig iron dates back to the time when hot metal was cast into ingots before being charged to the steel plant. The moulds were laid out in sand beds such that they could be fed from a common runner. The group of moulds resembled a litter of sucking pigs, the ingots being called “pigs” and the runner the “sow.”
S: IIMA – https://bit.ly/2Lw3xn0 (last access: 3 January 2019)
N: 1. – pig (n): Old English *picg, “hog a large pink, brown, or black farm animal with short legs and a curved tail, kept for its meat.” Originally “young pig” (the word for adults was swine). Apparently related to Low German bigge, Dutch big.
– iron (n): Middle English iron, iren, yron, from Old English iren, “a chemical element that is a common greyish-coloured metal. It is strong, used in making steel, and exists in very small amounts in blood.” From Proto-Germanic *isarn (source also of Old Saxon isarn, Old Frisian isern, Old Norse isarn, Middle Dutch iser, Old High German isarn, German Eisen).
2. Semi-finished metal produced from iron ore in blast furnace, containing 92 percent iron, high amounts of carbon (typically up to 3.5 percent), and balance largely manganese and silicone plus small amounts of phosphorus, sulfur, and other impurities.
3. Pig iron is the metallic ore that contains 90% of iron. Pig iron is used for making steel and pure iron units. It has very high carbon content along with silica and another constituent of dross. Pig iron made from smelting iron indulges with the high amount of carbon for further processing steps. When the metal is cool and hardened, the small ingots break into the runner and named as the pig iron. The process of smelting the iron has been used from the ancient time.
4. Pig iron can also be used to produce gray iron and high purity pig irons can be used to produce ductile iron.
In modern steelmaking, pig iron/slag is transferred, in liquid form referred to as “hot metal”, from the bottom of the blast furnace into a steel-making vessel, typically with an electric arc furnace, induction furnace or basic oxygen furnace by burning off the excess carbon and adjusting the alloy composition.
S: 1. OED – https://bit.ly/2CC3F1I; https://bit.ly/2TbJJbl (last access: 27 December 2018); CD – https://bit.ly/2BI945x; https://bit.ly/2Q3tknf (last access: 27 December 2018). 2. BD – https://bit.ly/2Q5yKhI (last access: 27 December 2018). 3. MC – https://bit.ly/2TfgEvM (last access: 27 December 2018). 4. WR – https://bit.ly/2rXKbhF (last access: 27 December 2018).
SYN: pig metal, pig cast iron.
S: TERMIUM PLUS – https://bit.ly/2s8qofD (last access: 3 January 2019)
CR: carbon
