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"No inventions; no innovations" A History of US Steel

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Re: "No inventions; no innovations" A History of US Steel

#51

Post by Animats »

For an overview of how Nucor became #1 in the US steel industry, see "American Steel" (1992) by Richard Preston. The author was present for the building and startup of Nucor's first continuous thin sheet casting mini-mill. Nucor bought a new experimental continuous caster from a German company, after trying to build their own, and built a mill around it. This plant could turn scrap metal into sheet steel. "You could punch garbage cans out of it all day." Gradually, the quality improved, and soon they were making steel for auto parts. Previously, steel recycling just produced lower grade steel - cars in, rebar out. So this closed the recycling cycle.

The amount of steel in use per capita in developed countries seems to have reached a constant level. About 69% of steel produced in the US is the same steel going round and round. If you ignore rebar, low-grade steel stuck inside concrete, it's even higher. It's the developing countries that are still making and using new steel. They don't have enough steel infrastructure yet.

"Mini-mill", in this context, means "smaller than a square mile". Here's Nucor's Crawfordsville plant.[1] It's not small. Compare with US Steel's Gary Works.[2] That century old plant is just about their last remaining big plant in the US.

US Steel somehow missed this change.

[1] https://earth.google.com/web/@39.97805108,-86.8271336,264.41...

[2] https://earth.google.com/web/@41.62932676,-87.36187513,174.7...

Re: "No inventions; no innovations" A History of US Steel

#52

Post by marcosdumay »

fudged71 wrote: post #31
aresant wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes you are thinking of Syd Mead - here’s the series https://sydmead.com/category/gallery/us-steel/

You’re telling me the Stanford torus space colony that has filled my dreams for my entire life was propaganda for US steel?

Anybody since the 70s designing those radial supports out of anything that isn't a polyester isn't paying attention.

Re: "No inventions; no innovations" A History of US Steel

#53

Post by l33t7332273 »

KMag wrote: post #50
pomian wrote: post #30

One of the ideas that seems to be missed from the study of history and economy, was the effect on the total destruction of the Japanese and German industrial base - during WWII. Britain and USA, were left with their archaic industrial systems. After WWII, the Japanese and the German steel industry had to be completely reborn. (At the cost of primarily USA financing.) Those two countries had no more relics of the past…

See the movie "The Mouse That Roared". Having seen the results of Germany and Japan being bombed and rebuilt by the US, a small fictional country comes up with the brilliant development plan of intentionally starting and losing a war with the US. Spoiler alert: they end up having to deal with the tragedy of accidentally winning the war. As I recall, part of it was they just assumed their generals would lose, so the g…

A small country winning the war against post WW2 USA seems like it would be a bit of a plot hole.

Re: "No inventions; no innovations" A History of US Steel

#54

Post by altairTF »

mitthrowaway2 wrote: post #34
pomian wrote: post #30

One of the ideas that seems to be missed from the study of history and economy, was the effect on the total destruction of the Japanese and German industrial base - during WWII. Britain and USA, were left with their archaic industrial systems. After WWII, the Japanese and the German steel industry had to be completely reborn. (At the cost of primarily USA financing.) Those two countries had no more relics of the past…

Solution for the future of American industry: Bomb US Steel? Maybe this would also be an effective way of clearing out NIMBYs blocking the routes for high-speed rail lines?

Every 100 years, the government send a warning and carpet bomb a city to the ground. This for sure would remove all the past vicious of the region affected. That would be something

Re: "No inventions; no innovations" A History of US Steel

#55

Post by loloquwowndueo »

l33t7332273 wrote: post #53
KMag wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See the movie "The Mouse That Roared". Having seen the results of Germany and Japan being bombed and rebuilt by the US, a small fictional country comes up with the brilliant development plan of intentionally starting and losing a war with the US. Spoiler alert: they end up having to deal with the tragedy of accidentally winning the war. As I recall, part of it was they just assumed their generals would lose, so the g…

A small country winning the war against post WW2 USA seems like it would be a bit of a plot hole.

Vietnam.

Re: "No inventions; no innovations" A History of US Steel

#57

Post by sokoloff »

mitthrowaway2 wrote: post #47
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Solution for the future of American industry: Bomb US Steel? Plenty of places are bombed into oblivion. What makes the rebirth is the rebuilding. The marshalling of public resources. You can replicate that without the bombs with a public-spending initiative.

The OP's contention was that Japan and Germany had an advantage due to their steel industry being bombed , which is apparently easier than upgrading legacy production facilities that haven't been blown to rubble.

It’s often easier to rebuild rubble using other people’s money than to modernize in-place using your own.

Beyond just the “whose money is buying?” is that the latter costs you current production while the bombed-out scenario has no current production to forego.

Re: "No inventions; no innovations" A History of US Steel

#58

Post by ben_w »

l33t7332273 wrote: post #53
KMag wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See the movie "The Mouse That Roared". Having seen the results of Germany and Japan being bombed and rebuilt by the US, a small fictional country comes up with the brilliant development plan of intentionally starting and losing a war with the US. Spoiler alert: they end up having to deal with the tragedy of accidentally winning the war. As I recall, part of it was they just assumed their generals would lose, so the g…

A small country winning the war against post WW2 USA seems like it would be a bit of a plot hole.

It's a comedy, one I feel I ought to watch at some point.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mouse_That_Roared_(film)

Re: "No inventions; no innovations" A History of US Steel

#59

Post by kevbin »

hef19898 wrote: post #36
pomian wrote: post #30

One of the ideas that seems to be missed from the study of history and economy, was the effect on the total destruction of the Japanese and German industrial base - during WWII. Britain and USA, were left with their archaic industrial systems. After WWII, the Japanese and the German steel industry had to be completely reborn. (At the cost of primarily USA financing.) Those two countries had no more relics of the past…

>> (At the cost of primarily USA financing.) The Marshall Plan was one of the best foreign policy ideas ever so.

I’d like to see Chris Nolan follow-up “Oppenheimer” with “George (Marshall)” and “(William) Knudsen”

Re: "No inventions; no innovations" A History of US Steel

#60

Post by kube-system »

pfdietz wrote: post #44

Something like 70% of US steel production is now from scrap. Part of this was moderation of growth. In steady state, nearly all steel could come from scrap (limited by contaminants, I guess.) I expect aluminum to displace more steel in the future. Witness what's happening with "gigacasting" at Tesla and elsewhere.

Whether or not an application can use aluminum or remelted scrap depends on how picky an application is for the material.
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