# What looks like steel wool and is carried in bulk by rail? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 21, 2018, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990 "2018-08-21T17:36:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2018, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/21 "2018-08-23T00:00:00Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **Isosleepy** : > > Swarf, in the other hand, often has too much non-metallic content to charge into a furnace. Even if relatively clean, the small particle size means there is a high surface-to-mass ratio. Meaning much of the material will be oxidized (and so useless in an electric-arc furnace). Further, the small particle size means it will never hit the bath ( molten steel) but more likely end up with the gasses in the baghouse as waste. It consequently has no to negative value, and is more often landfilled than recycled. It’s not completely useless, though: It’s great for tossing handfuls into the face of malicious fae. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2018, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/22 "2018-08-23T00:41:54Z")
> [@Surreal](#): > > I spent years working in machine shops and I’ve never, ever heard anyone use the term “swarf” before. I’ve spent years working with people who work in machine shops and I’ve never, ever heard anyone use the term “turnings” before… ---
**Author:** ![Duckster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/duckster/32/1244_2.png) [@Duckster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duckster)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2018, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/23 "2018-08-23T02:48:15Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > A fast-food restaurant near a machine shop: Swarf & Chips. Pepsi! Cheeseburger! Swarf! ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2018, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/24 "2018-08-23T04:18:39Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > It’s not completely useless, though: It’s great for tossing handfuls into the face of malicious fae. Also works against Tina. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2018, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/25 "2018-08-23T04:57:06Z")
> [@Melbourne](#): > > I’ve spent years working with people who work in machine shops and I’ve never, ever heard anyone use the term “turnings” before… Turning is what happens to parts in a lathe (or on a potter’s wheel), versus, say, milling. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2018, 7:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/26 "2018-08-23T07:25:40Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > Thanks for my word of the day, folks. Coming to a crossword near you. “conflict in the West Coast produces scrap metal” (5) ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2018, 9:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/27 "2018-08-23T09:49:20Z")
In Britain, “swarf” used to mean the oily, gritty stuff that collects in machinery and gets all over your hands. Hence [Swarfega](https://www.plumbingtrademagazine.co.uk/content/swarfega-celebrates-70-years), an essential stand-by in every dad’s garage. ---
**Author:** ![Disheavel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@Disheavel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Disheavel)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2018, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/28 "2018-08-23T22:03:19Z")
When I was a kid, I lived near a propeller manufacturer (airplane for sure and perhaps others) that had a tremendous piles of swarf out back. Big, long and really shiny coils. As a kid it looked like a Slinky fanatic’s dream to play with. We always rode bikes around the neighborhood and one day stopped to take a closer look. My friend put his foot on the swarf and started pushing up and down and it was even more inviting with everyone now wanting to climb up the mound. And that is when an employee came out to dump a load and just screamed, “NOOOO!!!” and warned us to stay away. A fence went up within 24 hours. And that is the story of how I didn’t remove my hands or skin from much of my body. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2018, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/29 "2018-08-24T00:44:16Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > In Britain, “swarf” used to mean the oily, gritty stuff that collects in machinery and gets all over your hands. Hence [Swarfega](https://www.plumbingtrademagazine.co.uk/content/swarfega-celebrates-70-years), an essential stand-by in every dad’s garage. And yet the online Oxford Living Dictionary defines swarf as > [@OLD](#): > > Fine chips or filings of stone, metal, or other material produced by a machining operation. > > ‘a curl of metal swarf’ > ‘The swarf became hot and started to steam, so the loading master called Essex Fire and Rescue Service, who dealt with the incident.’ > ‘For holes of a depth greater than five diameters, it is helpful to retract the drill at intervals and clear the swarf.’ > ‘When we first arrived at one of the designated factories and saw wing struts being milled out of solid slabs of Aluminium on a milling machine 80 metres long, I was gobsmacked - swarf and shiny metal everywhere.’ > ‘Using metal scrap and the steel swarf turned out from munition factories, blending in nickel, vanadium and manganese they created the high-speed tool steels that the arms factories were crying out for.’ > ‘There is a perception is that engineering is still cloth caps, oily rags, swarf and metal bashing - however, it isn’t like that.’ > ‘Grinding, for a variety of reasons (e.g., speed of operation; coolant and swarf handling; wheel cost), can be an expensive operation.’ From this it sounds like chips and turnings would be subsets of swarf. ---
**Author:** ![Isosleepy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/isosleepy/32/479_2.png) [@Isosleepy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isosleepy)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2018, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/30 "2018-08-24T17:24:53Z")
In a prior career I traded these products in very large quantities. To the people I dealt with, the definitions were very much as I outlined above, with swarf being, as Colophon put it very well, gritty stuff, rather than slinky-like, and with very clearly different possible uses for the various grades. They used these words daily, and the meanings were precise and served a purpose. That doesn’t mean they (and I ) were neccesarily correct in that usage. But there is zero doubt that the railcar which the op saw contained what both the buyer and the seller would call turnings, and if it were to be found to contain any of what buyer and seller would call swarf, the load would be rejected or down-graded at destination (said destination will be a mini-mill) ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2018, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/31 "2018-08-25T01:53:42Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > Turning is what happens to parts in a lathe (or on a potter’s wheel), versus, say, milling. We had fitters and turners. But our turners created swarf rather than turnings. And our long bits of swarf came from drilling, not turning. Perhaps because ‘a turning’ would have been the product, not the scrap. ---
**Author:** ![TSBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/77aa72/32.png) [@TSBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TSBG)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2018, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/32 "2018-08-25T02:12:21Z")
I was sort of hoping the answer would be a raven on a writing desk. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2018, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/33 "2018-08-25T14:43:10Z")
It does seem like it’s time to treat the question as a riddle. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2018, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990/34 "2018-08-25T16:15:20Z")
> [@Isosleepy](#): > > The difference is in what you can do with it. Turnings, though a low-value grade of scrap, can be charged into the furnace and melted for new steel, with relatively little yield loss. Swarf, in the other hand, often has too much non-metallic content to charge into a furnace. Even if relativelsell you dwarf clean, the small particle size means there is a high surface-to-mass ratio. Meaning much of the material will be oxidized (and so useless in an electric-arc furnace). Further, the small particle size means it will never hit the bath ( molten steel) but more likely end up with the gasses in the baghouse as waste. It consequently has no to negative value, and is more often landfilled than recycled. > [@Chronos](#): > > It’s not completely useless, though: It’s great for tossing handfuls into the face of malicious fae. Until you find a guy who’ll sell you swarf at unbelievably low prices, and you’re smiling, until you run into a peeved pixie and find out that your swarf came from a shop that machined aluminum. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-looks-like-steel-wool-and-is-carried-in-bulk-by-rail/819990.md?page=1)