Peter Onions (1724 – 1798) was an English
ironmaster
An ironmaster is the manager, and usually owner, of a forge or blast furnace for the processing of iron. It is a term mainly associated with the period of the Industrial Revolution, especially in Great Britain.
The ironmaster was usually a large ...
and the inventor of an early
puddling process used for the refining of
pig iron
Pig iron, also known as crude iron, is an intermediate product of the iron industry in the production of steel which is obtained by smelting iron ore in a blast furnace. Pig iron has a high carbon content, typically 3.8–4.7%, along with silic ...
into
wrought iron
Wrought iron is an iron alloy with a very low carbon content (less than 0.08%) in contrast to that of cast iron (2.1% to 4%). It is a semi-fused mass of iron with fibrous slag Inclusion (mineral), inclusions (up to 2% by weight), which give it a ...
.
Biography
Onions was born in
Broseley
Broseley is a market town in Shropshire, England, with a population of 4,929 at the 2011 Census and an estimate of 5,022 in 2019. The River Severn flows to its north and east. The first The Iron Bridge, iron bridge in the world was built in 17 ...
, Shropshire, later moving to
Merthyr Tydfil
Merthyr Tydfil (; cy, Merthyr Tudful ) is the main town in Merthyr Tydfil County Borough, Wales, administered by Merthyr Tydfil County Borough Council. It is about north of Cardiff. Often called just Merthyr, it is said to be named after Tydf ...
in Wales. He married Elizabeth Guest, sister of
John Guest, a founder of Guest, Keen and Nettlefold, which is today the British conglomerate
GKN
GKN Ltd is a British multinational automotive and aerospace components business headquartered in Redditch, England. It is a long-running business known for many decades as Guest, Keen and Nettlefolds. It can trace its origins back to 1759 an ...
In 1783, Onions received
patent
A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A p ...
number 1370 for his invention.
Henry Cort
Henry Cort (c. 1740 – 23 May 1800) was an English ironware producer although formerly a Navy pay agent. During the Industrial Revolution in England, Cort began refining iron from pig iron to wrought iron (or bar iron) using innovative producti ...
later improved on Onion's process during the development of his puddling furnace.
References
cc
1724 births
1798 deaths
Businesspeople from Shropshire
Foundrymen
British ironmasters
Engineers from Shropshire
People from Broseley
People of the Industrial Revolution
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