What is the Difference Between A Hearth and A Foundry

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

I am designing my N scale FREELANCE layout and I have completed my mining (mining walls and smelter) and logging sawmill and logging field sites/small towns. I am currently working on (designing and labeling) my steel mill scene and I am at a stand-still. I already decided that I will…

…combine the boiler-house and blast furnace into one building with an attached rolling mill
…Have a building or a little shed area for in-coming scrap metal to be process into steel-making
…Have a shipping warehouse

I plan on having scrap metal, used metal products, sawdust, woodchips, and smelted ore being used at the steel mill.

Please understand, before you comment and leave a smartass comment, that I have a Learning Disability and it is hard for me to tell the difference without the assistance of a visual aid.

Thank you.

Note: Sorry to any future or returning respectful commentor who positively left advices or comments. I have closed this since two immature users are trolling my thread and I do not want any negatively on any of my post. If you want to give me any advice please send me a message instead. Have a great day or night depending on your location.

2

If by “hearth” you mean “open hearth”, it’s a type of furnace (not much used nowadays) which converts hot metal (iron - from a blast furnace) into steel. Often, the material charged into it includes selected scrap steel, and, of course, the various elements needed to meet the metallurgical requirements of that batch, which is commonly known as a “heat”. The resultant steel is then poured into moulds to form ingots, or is transported, in its liquid state, to a continuous caster, which usually forms slabs or billets.

A foundry also works with molten metal, but it could be iron, steel, copper, lead, or any other type of metal. The process involves pouring the molten material into moulds, which could be ingot moulds, but could also be for recognisable items like a cast iron piggy bank or a brass lamp.

While a steel mill complex takes up an enormous amount of space, and it’s natural to have to compress things, these adjustments should be logical, if possible. That means that your boiler house/blast furnace is a reasonable combination - waste heat from furnaces was often used for heating boilers. However, a rolling mill is several important steps removed from iron-making and at least one or two major steps from steel-making. If possible, put it somewhere else.

While there may be an example somewhere that uses sawdust and woodchips, iron-making and, to a lesser extent steel-making, requires coal, usually in the form of coke. This is because it’s not only a source of heat, but also a vital part of the chemical reactions needed to achieve the required results. Send your sawdust and wood chips to a paper plant or to a mill that produces OSB or MDF…

Iron ore does not generally require smelting, although some types (and often in conjunction with “fines” from other steel-making processes) may be “sintered”. This involves combining the ore and other iron-bearing material with coke breeze (fine-grained coke) and then burning it . Thi

3

Wayne’s got it covered well. I can only add that an open hearth or other such furnace is big.

On the other hand, a foundry can come in any size. There’s one locally that makes car parts that’s all one story, except for some silos for sand, etc that are taller. But they can be much larger, too, if they make large parts or are high volume producers. That’s good, because you can stick one in practically any place. I have one planned on my layout.

4

@doctorwayne

Thank you for a complete explanation of the two structures.

I was planning using a few covered hoppers for the sawdust and a few sugar beet cars to send to the steel mill to be used as fuel for the fire and use around the sawmill and send the woodchips to a local business to make BBQ fuel. The smelter/mining scene will haul many minerals and sent to the smelter then sent to the steel mill.

After reading your comment repeatedly over and over, I will just use a single building for my Boiler-house/blast furnace which will be attached to another building to continue the steel making process since the steel mill main customer is my railroad. The Rolling mill, even tho you say put in another location, I want to keep it close to the mill to keep the steel mill look since I’m going to use either pikestuff or DPM.

5

Do you want your steel mill to be prototypical?

6

No.

7

Steel mills don’t burn sawdust. They use coal, coke, natural gas or electricity. Adding sawdust would create impurities and defects, plus wouldn’t burn hot enough.

Sawdust wouldn’t go in covered hoppers, it would go in open top hoppers or boxcars with the roofs cut off. If you loaded sawdust into a covered hopper you would have one heckuva time getting it out.

I would suggest doing some research on steel mills before you start. A blast furnace is a huge building hundreds of feet tall. Steel mills cover acres, if not square miles. If there even was a boiler house, it would be an incredibly minor part of the operation.

Search for “HABS-HAER”, it will lead you to a Library of Congress site. Search there for “steel mills”. There are all sorts of pictures and plans and descriptions of steel mills. That will give you ideas on how to make your models.

8

@dehusman

Thank you for your comment, but I’m just going to use two whole buildings, built within a quarry for my steel mill scene.

9

@dehusman

My steel mill main customer (other than the logging and mining camp and my city) is the railroad so they will not be operating all the time. During the down time, my steel mill is burn both wood products or the woodchips would go straight to a local business.

I’m using covered hoppers because 3/4 of the covered hoppers will use the sawdust to spread around the tracks near the sawmill and other customers.

10

Well, I guess it’s your railroad, but there’s not a single thing in this post that has any relationship to reality.

11

It isnt suppose to be reality in this post. I was just asking a question and my layout will make sense when its complete

12

LMD,

If your mind was already made up (as apparently it is), why did you post your question? The folks here have posted good information on how to make your steel mill more accurate, but you seem to have flat rejected their comments. It is, of course, your railroad, and you can run it how you please, but why waste everyone’s time if you don’t want to take their advice? The least you could do would be to say thanks for the info, and let it go at that…

13

I’m with you Gary. I’m really at a loss to understand this guy’s posts.

Ask a question, ignore every reasonable answer and piece of advice, and then deliberatly go with something that has not even the remotest connection to being even plausible and 100% against the answers to your question.

You say that your layout “will make sense” in the end, but you’ve demonstrated a deliberate intention to not make it make sense and actively reject every suggestion that would help make it make sense.

What is the point at all?

14

Maybe his point is only to amuse himself online for months by making people respond to the nutty ideas.

15

There is a real good book by Kalmach about steel mills. I used it for my N scale layout worth the money

16

Thank you sir.

17

IF you have read clearly, you would see I took some of their advice and not the advice of people just being a smartass. I took the first few posters advices and looked up information they advise me to look up and not you and that other person since you are here to caused trouble.

Instead of “can you explain it to me” or something like that, you are trying to start something that I clearly stated I do not want any smartass comments. Sorry if I’m not clear to you, but everyone get what I am asking.

18

I did ask a question and I’m grateful for the ones who actually post information or tips for me to follow. You and that other posters are just trying to start trouble and I’m not going to fall to your level and start anything on my post. How did I ignore everyone else when I thank them? Yes I said it will make sense when it’s built. I would look at all the post because you make insane comments like this because no one else have any problem with my question. Sorry if you do not understand when everyone else does.

19

Sorry, but if you read all of my posts you will see if anyone didnt understand something I said, they left a comment asking me to explain myself and I did. All you are doing is amusing yourself and making yourself look like a fool because everyone else doesnt have a problem with asking me to clarify myself.

20

When Walthers’ came out with Blast Furnace in HO scale, I decided to rip out my roundhouse scene and substitute the Iron making compressed (3’x5’) complex. One of the requirements is to provide a place to dump the slag. The slag car can be cut, so that the ladle can be tipped, as shown in thew first photo shows the supposed dumping of molten slag. The rubber slag is painted with yellow-orange fluorescent paint (which glows in the dark, when illuminated with a small “black light tube”. My Iron & Steel Mill is located next to a harbor, where an iron ore boat is being unloaded by two Hulett unloaders. One of the ingredients in the process, is scrap iron, as is shown in the compressed view of a Cat sorting the scrap to be lifted to the skip of the Blast Furnace, via a gondola. The Blast Furnace must be supplied with compressed hot air, which comes from the attached structure.