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In 1903, Carnforth invested in new equipment that raised the output of the ironworks and the temperature of the slag. It was now less viscous and required two ladles for each furnace. The Dewhurst ladle was in widespread use throughout the country. There were two main types, side tipping and end tipping. This was taken around 1903 at the East Ardsley blast furnaces near Leeds. Right to left :
An older style square slag box with dumb buffers receiving molten slag. The joint between the box sides and the flat bogie top was sealed with clay. In the middle is a side tipping ladle, sprung buffers and inside frames to the carriage.
Side tipping ladle, sprung buffers and inside frame carriage. "Cylin Boxes" is chalked on the end frame. Note the double trunnions which shift the pivot point slightly outboard of the carriage centreline. This shifts the pouring point further away but it also causes the ladle to self right when it has been emptied. There are two chains, one is for haulage and the other (draped over a buffer) is for tipping.
End tipping ladle, sprung buffers, and outside carriage frame. "No Oil in Boxes" is chalked on the end frame, which is likely a reference to the axle boxes being in need of lubrication. Note that the trunnions are perpendicular to the side tipper. It also has two chains, one for haulage and one for tipping.
An unusual aspect of the design is one I have not noticed before, and that is a reinforcing band around the circumpherence of the open ladle mouth. It looks very similar and has the same function as steel bands on rubber hoses found in the engine compartment of a motor car. The ladles themselves did have a tendency to crack over time due to the relentless thermal expansion and contraction caused by the slag. In contrast to hot metal ladles, slag ladles had no refractory lining to combat the effects of heat. A slag ladle will generally crack at the mouth, so a tensioned steel reinforcing strap will be all that's required to stop a crack developing in to complete failure.
It is highly likely that Carnforth had two different types of slag ladle (discounting the earlier slag boxes).
A side tipper can deposit slag to either side but it has to be at height, either from a bank, or into a trough of some sort.
Over time, the slag will build up and encroach on the rail tracks (unless it is removed). At that point, subsequent dumping must move further along the track.
What happens when you reach the end of the track?
That is when you need an end tipper.
Very soon the end tipper will have to be used to extend the line of the bank. Note the chain attached to the locomotive during tipping.
Left is a side tipping ladle and right is an end tipping ladle. they are built as two halves joined by flanges and bolts. In the unfortunate event that a slag load refuses to release, it was possible to open it up (and hopefully still tip the slag) without parting the halves.
When the ladle has been positioned, since it has no brakes, the carriage was secured with a wood Scotch which is a bit like a cheap and dirty cricket bat. Wedged between a wheel and the rail it was enough to retain the carriage while the locomotive retreated, pulling on the tipping chain.
In the fullness of time, carriages were equipped with steam or pneumatic cylinders for remote tipping, while coupled safely to the locomotive.
Courtesy Peter Holmes
Barrow No28 has uncoupled from the ladle and the tipping chain is attached. No sign of a Scotch though!
There is an array of wood planks, steel bars, a pick axe and adjustable spanners to the left, tools of the trade.
Short lengths of bullhead rail on the ground.
The electric light tends to reaffirm that slag tipping was a 24 hour activity.
This image, from the book North Lancashire by John Edward Marr, published in 1912 shows slag being tapped from one of the Ulverston furnaces to a Dewhurst type side tipping ladle.
Barrow
Accidents were not uncommon and sadly the locomotive driver perished in the Workington accident in 1934.
It is reasonable to assume there were several near misses which went unrecorded. Both these involved end tipping ladles.
Workington
KEER SANDS
The slag on Keer Sands is generally from the later time period, when temperatures were higher and the slag more fluid and mixed.
Several years of industrial activity following closure have removed some of the slag, leaving the softer, less useful slag behind.
KEER MARSH
The slag at Keer Marsh is from the earlier period and has a very different appearance. There are blocks which have an overall tapered square shape, from the square slag boxes. There are lots of smaller consolidated lumps which is consistent with a cooler, more viscous slag. The site has been extensively contaminated with building and general waste from the demolition of the works.
Keer Marsh has some very unusual and interesting surviving slag deposits although there has been considerable dumping of building, general, and railway waste here and nature is slowly reclaiming the ground. There are some obvious drainage channels. There are some remaining concrete foundations and brick structures and artefacts (as of 2024) but I have not determined if they were contemporary or from a later date. The ironworks area has seen several different uses since 1930. It is possible that the building waste originated there. Earthmoving equipment is working on the site in Spring 2024.
There are occasional mounds of material that have the appearance of being dumped in lines, like a fallen wall. This one is about a metre high. They are piles of finely crushed slag which has started to gently fuse together over time (or have been bound in an industrial process). There was a slag processing plant shown on old maps in this area so it may be residual material from that.
A local resident advised that some of the housing in Millhead was built with slag blocks (and it was the ironworks that built them for their employees). It is a possible link.
In 1920 there was a fatal accident on the Slag line which was reported in local newspapers and is described in The Railways of Carnforth by Philip Grosse. It offers a detailed insight in to normal activities on the slag line which would otherwise have probably been lost. I have devoted a separate page to it. Living in the modern age, it is still quite shocking to learn how such a dangerous activity was expedited.
An excerpt from RAILWAY APPLIANCES by John Wolfe Barry published in 1881, gives some indication how slag may have been processed at a later date to make it suitable for sale as a commodity. It could be used as railway ballast, in road construction and building block manufacture.
.....One of the best materials is slag from blast furnaces, which is now extensively used on railways in the iron districts. Slag is generally allowed to run away from the furnaces in a red-hot and fluid state into iron boxes or moulds, in which it is cast into an exceedingly hard solid lump called a slag-ball. The slag-balls usually weigh 3 or 4 tons; and if the slag be required for road-making or ballast, these heavy masses of slag have to be broken up into pieces of suitable size, at a very considerable expenditure of labour. Of late years, however, a mode has been adopted, when slag is to be used for ballast, of allowing the red-hot slag to fall on to shallow trays mounted on an endless horizontal chain, which slowly brings each tray in its turn below the spout out of which the slag runs, and the pace at which the trays travel is so regulated as to allow each tray to be below the spout just long enough for it to be filled. The tray, full of slag, then travels away from the spout, cooling as it goes, and in about a minute a jet of water is allowed to fall on the still hot slag. The water further cools the slag and makes it brittle, so that when, at the end of its horizontal course, the tray turns over, the slag falls out of the tray and breaks into small pieces, of a size suitable for ballast. Slag prepared in this way is extremely well suited for ballast, and is perhaps the best material to be found. It is, moreover, a great advantage to the ironmaster to find a use and market for his slag, which until lately was worse than useless, causing him great difficulty and expense in finding places where it could be deposited.....
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