Siemens-Martin open-hearth furnace
Horno de solera abierta Siemens-Martin
- Date
- 1856-1864 · confidence high
- Place
- Sireuil (Charente), France; regenerative furnace in Birmingham, United Kingdom
- Credited to
- Carl Wilhelm Siemens (regenerative furnace) and Pierre-Émile Martin (steelmaking process)
- People
- 👤 Carl Wilhelm Siemens1823–1883👤 Pierre-Émile Martin1824–1915
- Field
- Matter & energy
What it is
A furnace that recovers heat from waste gases to reach temperatures capable of melting scrap and pig iron in a controllable bath. It produced steel of more uniform quality than the Bessemer process and allowed scrap to be recycled.
Siemens developed the regenerative furnace in England (1856 patent); Martin applied it to steelmaking at his works in Sireuil in 1864.
What it led to
- Quality steel for boilers, ships and construction
- Industrial scrap recycling
- Dominance of the method in continental Europe and the United States until 1960
- Chemical control of steel through laboratory analysis
Built on
- Puddling and rolling1784
- Bessemer process1856
- Bessemer process
- Siemens regenerative furnace (1856)
Made possible
- Alloy steels
- Steel ships
- Wide-span metal structures