Hot blast
Alto horno de aire caliente (hot blast)
- Date
- 1828 · confidence high
- Place
- Glasgow (Clyde Ironworks), Scotland, United Kingdom
- Credited to
- James Beaumont Neilson
- People
- 👤 James Beaumont Neilson1792–1865
- Field
- Matter & energy
What it is
The preheating of air blown into the blast furnace, which cut coal consumption to a third and allowed the use of raw coal and low-grade ores. It multiplied Scottish iron output and made cast iron cheaper.
1828 patent; applied at the Clyde Ironworks and then throughout Scotland.
What it led to
- Ironmaking in Scotland (Lanarkshire) and South Wales
- Cheap cast iron for structures, machines and piping
- Cowper stoves (1857) and blast-furnace efficiency
- Larger furnaces and industrial concentration
Built on
- Coke blast furnace
- Blowing steam engine
- Thermodynamics of combustion
Made possible
- Structural iron and prefabrication (Crystal Palace)1851
- Bessemer process1856
- Cowper regenerative stoves
- Structural iron and the Crystal Palace
- Bessemer process (abundant pig iron)