L'échelle de Brinell mesure la dureté de matériaux, par la compression d'une bille, généralement en acier, sur le matériau que l'on désire tester. Elle a été proposée en 1900 par l'ingénieur suédois Johan August Brinell (1849-1925), travaillant sur la transformation de l'acier selon la température. La norme Brinell a été éditée dès 1924. La méthode consiste à appliquer sur la surface du matériau dont on veut mesurer la dureté une bille en matériau dur d'un certain diamètre D avec une force F donnée, mesurée en kilogramme-force selon les conventions de notation pendant une durée t.
Hot blast refers to the preheating of air blown into a blast furnace or other metallurgical process. As this considerably reduced the fuel consumed, hot blast was one of the most important technologies developed during the Industrial Revolution. Hot blast also allowed higher furnace temperatures, which increased the capacity of furnaces. As first developed, it worked by alternately storing heat from the furnace flue gas in a firebrick-lined vessel with multiple chambers, then blowing combustion air through the hot chamber.
Iron has a long and varied tradition in the mythology and folklore of the world. While iron is now the name of a chemical element, the traditional meaning of the word "iron" is what is now called wrought iron. In East Asia, cast iron was also common after 500 BCE, and was called "cooked iron", with wrought iron being called "raw iron" (in Europe, cast iron remained very rare until it was used for cannonballs in the 14th century).
