Front page · Cosyford Steelworks
On the night shift: melt, pour, hammer and roll
Scrap cubes from the Crush Yard go into an arc furnace and come out as girders, loaded onto the train before dawn.
It is always night at the steelworks. Drive the big overhead crane with its magnet, drop scrap cubes into the arc furnace and hit MELT!: the electrodes come down and the arc roars. Swap to the hook, lift the ladle of molten steel, swing it over a mould and hold to pour. It swings on the rope, so steady it first.
At the steam hammer, hold the button and it pounds away, walking the glowing steel along underneath. Turn it and go again, and when it has gone dull, send it back to the furnace to reheat.
Finally the rolling mill: each pass through the rolls it comes out longer and thinner, until it is an I-beam girder. Lift the cooled girders onto the train and, six on, off it goes. Iron Irene has been forewoman here for forty years.
