Originally Posted By: Drew Hause
Thought I'd add some infro from this interesting Witten steel thread here, and thanks to Bro. Raimey for his contributions
http://www.doublegunshop.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=445562&page=1
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By 1890 the steel producers were obviously attempting to manipulate carbon content, along with manganese
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The steel industry had moved to using coke (they had been using charcoal) to forge the iron. This caused the carbon to build up after it had combined with silicon. which in turn ruined the patterns for the barrel makers. After much work the two were able to develop an alternative formula. Part of this search included buying iron form various European sources.

Pete

http://www.damascus-barrels.com/Movie.html