Q.601. Hi Henry. What is the difference between a Casting and a Forging?

Ah! The Art of the Blacksmith.

When Iron is a pure metal, Wrought Iron, it is very soft. By adding carbon it becomes steel which is very strong. But shaping the steel is a highly skilled job which makes the product very expensive. Steel can be shaped in four differing ways:
1. It can be cast from molten metal into a mould and a lot of carbon is needed to make it flow, this causes a random structure which is very strong in compression but weak in tension and bending making the product fairly brittle. This is the cheapest way to make many copies of Steel products like spear heads and cannon barrels.
2. It can be worked when hot to change the structure from a random arrangement into a directional flow to increase its strength and harden its working edges like swords and long spikes. This is done by a skilled blacksmith and is very expensive, the products are also not identical.
3. It can be shaped when cold with a hammer, though this ruins the structure and can cause surface cracking, it is usually the last process to refine the product such as patterning, beating a fine edge.
Some products can have all three processes involved in the making. It could start with a rough casting, then be reheated to be shaped on an anvil to a more complex shape, then finally finished cold to get that final shape and surface finish desired. Cold working also work hardens the metal so a keener edge could be obtained.
4. It can be cut away or added to, machined or fabricated, like adding rivetted joints.

Basically it all depends how much money you want to spend, a lowly pike-man will be given a cast-steel pike end for his pole. A knight will be able to afford a pike which has had the spear-end lengthened by forging, whilst the Duke can afford his armour to be made with embellishments because he will not be fighting, his metalwork is for show only.
Now locks and hinges are normally only forged to make sure they are strong enough to secure the contents.
See the picture below to show you what to look for.



Before any metallurgist jumps in, Tudors mainly worked by the rules of learning the hard way, they did not know about grain structures and Spheroidal Graphite cast irons. They would find stronger steels by accident which have been contaminated at some time by carbon from their own graphite powered forges. Quality of steel would vary considerably from town to town, forge to forge and even the time of year influenced the product outcomes. The best steel seemed to come from Northern Europe, countries liked Sweden and Northern Germany seemed to have more consistent metals and nominally consistent working conditions. It would have been quite risky to assume that all cannon barrels made of cast iron were the same and that one sword was as strong as its stable mate.

Q. 602. Hi Henry. How did the Tudors make soap?

You may not like the answer. Refined pig fat would be mixed with caustic soda and then it would be scented. If you read the manufacturing declaration on a modern packet of soap or shampoo, it does contain animal fats today!

Q.603. Hi Henry. What was Tin used for in Tudor days?

Tin is a pretty useless metal in its pure condition, too soft for weapons, too silver-like for jewels. It does however have a glorious property, it mixes well with other metals and makes them flow better when molten, it also hardens other softer metals like Copper to become Bronze and added to Lead makes it hard wearing to become an alloy called Pewter. So Tin made other metals more productive.

Q.604. Hi Henry. What did Tudors think was happening when there was a natural eclipse of the sun?

We were not stupid, we knew the moon was an object which moved around Earth, but then we also thought the sun did too, which as you know is wrong. Nobody had worked it out that our system revolved around the sun and also we rotated on our own axis too. Not knowing when it would happen is all we are ignorant of, when it did happen that the Moon aligned with the Earth and the Sun it came as a surprise but not a warning, there would have been recorded words about eclipses of the past.