Wrought iron=mild steel?

[rcav8r]

Have a perfect excuse for a welding project. My moms cheapo metal handrails have rusted to heck, and she wants me to replace them. She probably has the same stuff in mind, but I got a bunch of 1" square tube that would be perfect for this.

My question is, is the "wrought iron" scrollwork one sees these days really just mild steel? I have some 1/2" flat stock MS that would work for this too.

John

[usmcpop]

What is called "wrought iron" these days is just plain old mild steel. True wrought iron is hard to find. I have a few pieces of old buggy or harness parts that I picked up in old farm scrap piles, or dug out of the woods.

[Some Creep]

No, MS is NOT wrought iron. MS is just that, 'mild steel'. Like Pop said, true 'wrought' is hard to find. You can use the MS for your projects, but realize it won't be quite the same. The fact the old stuff rusted to heck makes me think it wasn't 'wrought' either.......

[unkle spike]

Most of the rail elements I am seeing now are cast steel, which is yet another story......

Triple S steel has a ton of styles available, a ton? Actually more than that.

[Broccoli1]

Have a perfect excuse for a welding project. My moms cheapo metal handrails have rusted to heck, and she wants me to replace them. She probably has the same stuff in mind, but I got a bunch of 1" square tube that would be perfect for this.

My question is, is the "wrought iron" scrollwork one sees these days really just mild steel? I have some 1/2" flat stock MS that would work for this too.

John

The Flat stock scroll work you see today is in fact Mild Steel- so your 1/2" will work just fine

You can look through King and see the various steel used today

http://www.kingmetals.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrought_iron

[jerryo]

Wrought iron is essentially just iron and a very small amount of carbon, generally <.10%, and some slag stringers as impurities. It is easily welded due to its low carbon content, and is a good deal weaker than mild steel. I tried to obtain some scraps from an ironworking shop a couple of years ago and found that they don't even use it anymore, use mild steel instead.

[usmcpop]

You can occasionally find true wrought iron, but it is scarce and expensive. For example, here is some from old chain links. Presumably, knife makers may want it for forging Damascus or some such use.

http://elliscustomknifeworks.com/

[injun joe]

:D:Dwell wrought iron when it is made it has 1 more alloying element added into it and that is silica so if you have a fracture just look at it and it should look like fibers that broke and to make wrought iron they beat the heck out of it with a bit hammer or something to that extent upon doing so they beat the carbon out of it and it tends to rise to the top therefore escaping the metal leaving it with a reduced carbon content.

i think those college courses helped alot:D

[Bob S2]

Ok, then using mild steel to replicate wrought iron, how do you give it the look of wrought and the rust-resistance of wrought? Maybe that's a question for king metals, but does anybody know how it's done? I'm thinking modern 'wrought' iron fences, railings, etc.
--Bob

[Broccoli1]

BFH and paint.

You can buy hammered Flat, Round Square stock-Mild Steel
or iffin' ya want the fancy stuff you can get the Cast Steel Panels or individual pieces.

Both will need some sort of protection as neither one will provide any type of resisitance to RUST as true Wrought Iron does.


or.. make it out of aloominum- they got dat too:D

[Blacksmith]

BFH and paint.

You can buy hammered Flat, Round Square stock-Mild Steel
or iffin' ya want the fancy stuff you can get the Cast Steel Panels or individual pieces.

:D

I find it interesting that the old blacksmiths (pre-industrial revolution) went out of their way to remove all evidence of hammer marks as a mark of a quality job and today we go out of our way to put hammer marks in to indicate "handmade." I'll go back to sleep now.

[unkle spike]

One common finish in Blacksmithing circles is Beeswax and Linseed oil, melted down and applied to warm metal. Not sure the ratio. I have heard that properly applied this is a rust resistant finish.

[Blacksmith]

I have used just beeswax or vegetable (cooking) oil for kitchen utensils. I have also used parafin and heard of people using linseed oil. Do not know of any ratios.

[Bob S2]

And that gives you that 'wrought iron' black look? I'd be using a map gas torch, so it might take a while. Thanks for the pointers!

[Broccoli1]

Bob,

The Mapp torch will work plenty fast to get the metal hot enough to apply a wax treatment.
:)

[mcostello]

A coat of paint or two automatically makes welds look prettier. :)

[unkle spike]

For paint, I have been using "Tractor and Implement" paint from Tractor Supply, it seems pretty "thick", covers well, and we will see how it holds up.

[Monte55]

No, MS is NOT wrought iron. MS is just that, 'mild steel'. Like Pop said, true 'wrought' is hard to find. You can use the MS for your projects, but realize it won't be quite the same. The fact the old stuff rusted to heck makes me think it wasn't 'wrought' either.......

I also refer to it as mild steel but a couple of years ago I was reading something about steel and it said MS stood for mill stock and not mild steel as most think. Maybe both the same:confused::confused:

[Sandy]

Well in days gone by there was wrought iron as in the grade of cast, then there was wrought iron as in iron that was hand wrought (wroght). Of course wrought iron (the cast) could he easily heated and hand wrought, or ordinary iron (mild steel) could be heated and hand wrought. Both could be considered a wrought iron fence, roight?? :)

So back before grampa's grampa had a welder, when you ordered a wrought iron fence you didn't know whether you were going to get a wrought iron fence or a wrought iron fence, but you knew for sure you would get a wrought iron fence.:D

[vicegrip]

Blacksmith !
good point about the hammer marks.

My brother-in-law pulled a big cast concreate lawn roller out of a tangled grove
of brush and trees in the process of clearing for new constuction .
He gave it to me ( hint about my ruFF lawn ??:p)
The handel looks a great deal like 3/4ish round wrought iron.
Probably the largest amount of Wrought I've ever seen in one place.
(if it is indeed wrought) I have had the stunning privledge of working some
3/8 wrought in the 80s...this has identical surface.....

If any-one knows of a smith or a blade-maker that has a genuine need for
wrought I would consider rendering it and using tubing for a handle.

I would need to be payed for the effort and transfer , since I have little time
for such horsing around on this whacky rotating shift.
But i don't need to make gain on it.

Phil

[PentaWelder]

If the rust looks like tree bark and feathery, then it is wrought iron. But as they said, wrought isn't used in much railings now adays.

Btw, wrought iron isn't usually used in damascus steels. It is just the contrasts between the carbon, nickel, chromium, and vanadium. That is where the colors in damascus come from.

[shorerider16]

In school we were taught that wrought iron was pure iron mixed in with its own slag. The slag is the reason that wrought iron has a stringy apperance when it is broken. Since it is almost pure iron it also is extremely resistant to rusting, technically supposed to be less than .04% carbon content.

Just what I was taught, thought somebody might find it interesting.:)

[wireburner]

One common finish in Blacksmithing circles is Beeswax and Linseed oil, melted down and applied to warm metal. Not sure the ratio. I have heard that properly applied this is a rust resistant finish.

I used the beeswax once! I appiled one it was in the Black heat (black but warm)

[327rat]

I also refer to it as mild steel but a couple of years ago I was reading something about steel and it said MS stood for mill stock and not mild steel as most think. Maybe both the same:confused::confused:

I always wondered what the "mild" in mild steel meant too. I thought it meant that it wasn't hardened or tempered.

[Ed Thomas]

From Wikipedia: "Mild (low carbon) steel: approximately 0.05–0.15% carbon content for low carbon steel and 0.16-0.29% carbon content for mild steel (e.g. AISI 1018 steel). Mild steel has a relatively low tensile strength, but it is cheap and malleable; surface hardness can be increased through carburizing."

The reason it is called "mild" is there is insufficient carbon in the steel alloy to significantly harden by heating and quenching.

Wrought iron, as several folks have already said, means "worked" iron, and referred to the days when there was a large percentage of impurities in the iron (silicon, sulphur, etc.). The iron was wrought (worked) by heating to welding temperatures and folding it over on itself, and pounded out. The more times it was wrought, the better the purity, with triple-refined being about top, I think.

The reason wrought iron weathered so well was because of the silicon striations in it. I'm not sure of the percentage, but I think it may have been around 3% of the wrought iron. The silicon layers provide a barrier against oxidation. Modern structural-grade steels have little or no such natural protection and must be painted. I heard a story once about farmers and ranchers who bought miles and miles of the new "improved" steel barbed wire fencing, only to have it rust to nothing in short order. It was thought to be yet another government conspiracy. :p

[a69mustang4me]

Hello rcav8r (John),
I hope you are still around. I saw a thread posted by you posted in 2002 on another site that is no longer up, on mold making tips using soft metals. You seemed very knowlegable on the topic. I do not know how I found the text without the website. The internet is an amazing thing... I have a simular need and was wondering if I may ask your advice. Thanks, Sean