Smelting extracts a metal from its ore by heating the ore with a chemical reducing agent, usually carbon in the form of charcoal or coke, which bonds with the ore oxygen and other non-metal elements and frees the metal in molten or spongy form. It is the foundational method behind the Bronze Age and Iron Age, and still underlies the production of iron, copper, tin, lead and many other industrial metals today. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
Facts
Disputed
Origin YearCopper smelting is attested independently across the Balkans and the Near East from roughly the fifth millennium BCE; no single point of origin is established. Core PrincipleHeating a metal ore together with a reducing agent, typically carbon, so the agent draws off the ore oxygen and other impurities, freeing the metal in molten or spongy form. 1 Smelting
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FAQs
What is flux and why is it added during smelting?
Flux binds impurities into slag and then covers the molten metal to keep oxygen away.
Flux is a material added to the ore during smelting to help the desired reactions along and to bind chemically to unwanted impurities. Lime, meaning calcium carbonate or calcium oxide, is often used because it reacts with sulfur, phosphorus and silicon impurities so that they can be separated and discarded as slag. Fluxes can also control the viscosity of the melt and neutralize unwanted acids. After the reduction step, the flux and slag form a molten cover on the purified metal that keeps oxygen away while the metal is still hot enough to oxidize readily, which prevents impurities from forming in it.
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Associated With
Bronze, Materials Bronze is produced by smelting and alloying copper and tin ores.
Forging, Methods Forging typically works metal that smelting has already extracted from its ore.
Ore that mining engineering extracts is generally processed further by smelting to yield usable metal.
The blast furnace is an industrial-scale, continuous smelting furnace for iron ore.
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Sources
1. Smelting (Wikipedia)
Wikipedia contributors, Wikimedia FoundationLead section
Smelting is a process of applying heat and a chemical reducing agent to an ore to extract a desired base metal product.
In Group: Metal Heat Treatment and Powder Methods, Introduction
Smelting is a process of applying heat and a chemical reducing agent to an ore to extract a desired base metal product.
View the Source 2. A History of Technology
Charles Singer, E. J. Holmyard, A. R. Hall and Trevor I. Williams, editors, Oxford University Press, 1954View the Source Reader Challenges (0)
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