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1 Thomas, Sidney Gilchrist
SUBJECT AREA: Metallurgy[br]b. 16 April 1850 London, Englandd. 1 February 1885 Paris, France[br]English inventor of basic steelmaking.[br]Thomas was educated at Dulwich College and from the age of 17, for the next twelve years, he made his living as a police-court clerk, although he studied chemistry in his spare time as an evening student at Birkbeck College, London. While there, he heard of the difficulties encountered by the Bessemer steelmaking process, which at that time was limited to using phosphorus-free iron. Any of this element present in the iron was oxidized to phosphoric acid, which would not react with the acidic lining in the converter, with the result that it would remain in the iron and render it too brittle to use. Unfortunately, phosphoric iron ores are more common than those free of this harmful element. Thomas was attracted by the view that a fortune awaited anyone who could solve this problem, and was not discouraged by the failure of several august figures in the industry, including Siemens and Lowthian Bell.Thomas's knowledge of chemistry taught him that whereas an acidic lining allowed the phosphorus to remain in the iron, a basic lining would react with it to form part of the slag, which could then be tapped off. His experiments to find a suitable material were conducted in difficult conditions, in his spare time with meagre apparatus. Finally he found that a converter lined with dolomite, a form of limestone, would succeed, and he appealed to his cousin Percy Carlyle Gilchrist, Chemist at the Blaenavon Ironworks in Monmouthshire, for help in carrying out pilot-scale trials. In 1879 he gave up his police-court job to devote himself to the work, and in the same year they patented the Thomas- Gilchrist process. The first licence to use it was granted to Bolckow, Vaughan \& Co. of Middlesborough, and there the first steel was made in a basic Bessemer converter on 4 April 1879. The process was rapidly taken up and spread widely in Europe and beyond and was applied to other furnaces. Thomas made a fortune, but his health did not long allow him to enjoy it, for he died at the early age of 34.[br]BibliographyL.G.Thompson, 1940, Sidney Gilchrist Thomas, an Invention and Its Consequences, London: Faber.T.G.Davies, 1978, Blaenavon and Sidney Gilchrist Thomas, Sheffield: Historical Metallurgy Society.LRDBiographical history of technology > Thomas, Sidney Gilchrist
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2 Metallurgy
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3 Bessemer, Sir Henry
SUBJECT AREA: Metallurgy[br]b. 19 January 1813 Charlton (near Hitchin), Hertfordshire, Englandd. 15 January 1898 Denmark Hill, London, England[br]English inventor of the Bessemer steelmaking process.[br]The most valuable part of Bessemer's education took place in the workshop of his inventor father. At the age of only 17 he went to London to seek his fortune and set himself up in the trade of casting art works in white metal. He went on to the embossing of metals and other materials and this led to his first major invention, whereby a date was incorporated in the die for embossing seals, thus preventing the wholesale forgeries that had previously been committed. For this, a grateful Government promised Bessemer a paid position, a promise that was never kept; recognition came only in 1879 with a belated knighthood. Bessemer turned to other inventions, mainly in metalworking, including a process for making bronze powder and gold paint. After he had overcome technical problems, the process became highly profitable, earning him a considerable income during the forty years it was in use.The Crimean War presented inventors such as Bessemer with a challenge when weaknesses in the iron used to make the cannon became apparent. In 1856, at his Baxter House premises in St Paneras, London, he tried fusing cast iron with steel. Noticing the effect of an air current on the molten mixture, he constructed a reaction vessel or converter in which air was blown through molten cast iron. There was a vigorous reaction which nearly burned the house down, and Bessemer found the iron to be almost completely decarburized, without the slag threads always present in wrought iron. Bessemer had in fact invented not only a new process but a new material, mild steel. His paper "On the manufacture of malleable iron and steel without fuel" at the British Association meeting in Cheltenham later that year created a stir. Bessemer was courted by ironmasters to license the process. However, success was short-lived, for they found that phosphorus in the original iron ore passed into the metal and rendered it useless. By chance, Bessemer had used in his trials pig-iron, derived from haematite, a phosphorus-free ore. Bessemer tried hard to overcome the problem, but lacking chemical knowledge he resigned himself to limiting his process to this kind of pig-iron. This limitation was removed in 1879 by Sidney Gilchrist Thomas, who substituted a chemically basic lining in the converter in place of the acid lining used by Bessemer. This reacted with the phosphorus to form a substance that could be tapped off with the slag, leaving the steel free from this harmful element. Even so, the new material had begun to be applied in engineering, especially for railways. The open-hearth process developed by Siemens and the Martin brothers complemented rather than competed with Bessemer steel. The widespread use of the two processes had a revolutionary effect on mechanical and structural engineering and earned Bessemer around £1 million in royalties before the patents expired.[br]Principal Honours and DistinctionsKnighted 1879. FRS 1879. Royal Society of Arts Albert Gold Medal 1872.Bibliography1905, Sir Henry Bessemer FRS: An Autobiography, London.LRD
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Thomas, Sidney Gilchrist — ▪ British metallurgist born April 16, 1850, London, Eng. died Feb. 1, 1885, Paris, Fr. British metallurgist and inventor who discovered (1875) a method for eliminating phosphorus (a major impurity in some iron ores) in the Bessemer… … Universalium
Thomas, Sidney Gilchrist — ► (1850 85) Técnico británico. Inventó un procedimiento de eliminación del fósforo contenido en el hierro en el convertidor Bessemer … Enciclopedia Universal
Sidney Gilchrist Thomas — Pour les articles homonymes, voir Thomas. Sidney Thomas Sidney Gilchrist Thomas (Canonbury à côté de Londres 16 avril 185 … Wikipédia en Français
Sidney Gilchrist Thomas — Infobox Scientist name = Sidney Gilchrist Thomas box width = image width =150px caption = Sidney Gilchrist Thomas birth date = April 16, 1850 birth place = Canonbury, London death date = February 1, 1885 death place = residence = citizenship =… … Wikipedia
Thomas — Thomas, Albert Thomas, André Antoine Thomas, Ch. L. Ambroise Thomas, Dylan Thomas, Sidney Gilchrist Thomas, Theodore * * * (as used in expressions) Adès, Thomas … Enciclopedia Universal
thomas — (1625 1709) frère du préc.; poète dramatique français; auteur d un Dictionnaire des arts et des sciences (1694) et d un Dictionnaire géographique et historique (1708). Acad. fr. (1685). Thomas (1875 1955) frère du préc., écrivain allemand. Son… … Encyclopédie Universelle
Sidney Thomas — Sidney Gilchrist Thomas (* 16. April 1850 in Canonbury (London); † 1. Februar 1885 in Paris) war ein bedeutender britischer Metallurg. Sidney Thomas erfuhr eine humanistische Ausbildung und wurde zunächst Gerichtsschreiber. In seiner Freizeit… … Deutsch Wikipedia
Gilchrist — is a surname of Scottish origin, having originated in Islay. According to several genealogy websites, it literally means servant of Christ. Some variations known to exist are Gillecrist , Gilcreest , Gilcrest , and Gilcress . Gilchrist may refer… … Wikipedia
Gilchrist — Cette page d’homonymie répertorie les différents sujets et articles partageant un même nom. Sommaire 1 Patronyme 1.1 Prénom 1.2 P … Wikipédia en Français
Thomas — Cette page d’homonymie répertorie les différents sujets et articles partageant un même nom. Pour l’article homophone, voir Tomas. Thomas est un nom propre qui peut désigner : Sommaire … Wikipédia en Français
Gilchrist, Percy — ▪ British metallurgist born Dec. 27, 1851, Lyme Regis, Dorset, Eng. died Dec. 16, 1935, England metallurgist who, with his better known cousin Sidney Gilchrist Thomas, devised in 1876–77 a process (thereafter widely used in Europe) of… … Universalium
