
Pig iron - Wikipedia
Pig iron is an intermediate product of the iron industry, also known as crude iron, which is obtained by smelting iron ore in a blast furnace. Pig iron has a very high carbon content, typically 3.8–4.7%, along with silica and other constituents of dross, which makes it very brittle and not useful directly as a material except for limited applications. The traditional shape of the molds used for pig iron ingots was a branching structure formed in sand, wit…