The swing to all-basic furnaces
GT V01 1960 011-016
Although all-basic furnaces were tried in Great Britain even before the war, it is only in the last few years they have proved economical. The swing having started is proving violent, some five all-basic furnaces in 1956 having risen to fifty by the beginning of 1960. Attempts to justify such furnaces purely on the basis of longer life have proved futile. They can only become economical with faster driving-involving greater fuel input rates with or without oxygen for combustion and lancing. Increased outputs of 10-30% are now being achieved with roof lives two or three times that of silica in spite of substantially higher operating temperatures.
J. H. Chesters