William Herbert Hatfield (10 April 1882 – 16 October 1943) was an English metallurgist who contributed to the development of stainless steel. [1]
Hatfield was born in Sheffield on 10 April 1882 and studied metallurgy at University College, Sheffield, being awarded the Mappin Medal in 1902. In 1907 he married Edith Seagrave. In 1913 his research resulted in the award of the degree of Doctor of Metallurgy. [1]
Hatfield was appointed Director of the Brown - Firth Research Laboratories in Sheffield in 1916 (succeeding Harry Brearley and continuing Brearley's work on stainless steel), and later joined the Board of Messrs Thomas Firth and John Brown Limited.
Hatfield is credited with the invention in 1924 of 18/8 stainless steel (18% chromium, 8% nickel); he also invented 18/8 stainless with titanium added, now known as 321. [2]
In 1940 he devised "Rex 78", a stainless steel alloy for use in Frank Whittle's turbojet engine project, the material being first used in the Power Jets W.1. [3]
He authored a variety of technical papers on metallurgy, with particular reference to rust, acid and heat-resistant steels and cast iron. [4]
There is an Annual memorial lecture held in December each year at Sheffield University, called the "Hatfield Memorial Lecture" funded by a Trust set up in 1944. The lecture subject is related to metallurgy. [5]
Stainless steel, also known as inox, corrosion-resistant steel (CRES), and rustless steel, is an alloy of iron that is resistant to rusting and corrosion. It contains iron with chromium and other elements such as molybdenum, carbon, nickel and nitrogen depending on its specific use and cost. Stainless steel's resistance to corrosion results from the 10.5%, or more, chromium content which forms a passive film that can protect the material and self-heal in the presence of oxygen.
The University of Sheffield is a public research university in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England. Its history traces back to the foundation of Sheffield Medical School in 1828, Firth College in 1879 and Sheffield Technical School in 1884. University College of Sheffield was subsequently formed by the amalgamation of the three institutions in 1897 and was granted a royal charter as University of Sheffield in 1905 by King Edward VII.
Martensitic stainless steel is a type of stainless steel alloy that has a martensite crystal structure. It can be hardened and tempered through aging and heat treatment. The other main types of stainless steel are austenitic, ferritic, duplex, and precipitation hardened.
Frederick Brian Pickering, AMet, DMet, FIMMM, CEng, FREng was an English metallurgist. His research and development activities contributed significantly to the creation of stronger and lighter steels.
Henry Clifton Sorby was an English amateur microscopist and geologist. His major contribution was the development of techniques for thin sectioning of rocks and minerals with polarized light under a microscope which was also extended to study iron and steel, his family having being involved in the Sheffield iron and steel industry for generations. He also contributed to the study of meteorites by introducing a method of blowpipe analysis where molten beads were flattened for microscopic study. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1857.
Harry Brearley was an English metallurgist, credited with the invention of "rustless steel". Based in Sheffield, his invention brought affordable cutlery to the masses, and saw an expansion of the city's traditional cutlery trade.
The history of Sheffield, a city in South Yorkshire, England, can be traced back to the founding of a settlement in a clearing beside the River Sheaf in the second half of the 1st millennium AD. The area now known as Sheffield had seen human occupation since at least the last ice age, but significant growth in the settlements that are now incorporated into the city did not occur until the Industrial Revolution.
William Justin Kroll was a Luxembourgish metallurgist. He is best known for inventing the Kroll process in 1940, which is used commercially to extract metallic titanium from ore.
In 2008, Sheffield ranked among the top 10 UK cities as a business location and aims to regenerate itself as a modern technology and sports based city. Sheffield has an international reputation for metallurgy and steel-making. It was this industry that established it as one of England's main industrial cities during the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. This industry used Sheffield's unique combination of local Iron, Coal and water power supplied by the local rivers. This fuelled a massive growth in the city's population that expanded from 60,995 in 1801 to a peak of 577,050 in 1951. However, due to increasing competition from imports, it has seen a decline in heavy engineering industries since the 1960s, which has forced the sector to streamline its operations and lay off the majority of the local employment. The steel industry now concentrates on more specialist steel-making and, in 2005, produced more steel per year by value than at any other time in its history. The industry is now less noticeable as it has become highly automated and employs far fewer staff than in the past. However a small number of skilled industrial automation engineers still thrive in it. Today the economy is worth over £7 billion a year.
The Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland (RAI) is a long-established anthropological organisation, and Learned Society, with a global membership. Its remit includes all the component fields of anthropology, such as biological anthropology, evolutionary anthropology, social anthropology, cultural anthropology, visual anthropology and medical anthropology, as well as sub-specialisms within these, and interests shared with neighbouring disciplines such as human genetics, archaeology and linguistics. It seeks to combine a tradition of scholarship with services to anthropologists, including students.
Sir Robert Abbott Hadfield, 1st Baronet FRS was an English metallurgist, noted for his 1882 discovery of manganese steel, one of the first steel alloys. He also invented silicon steel, initially for mechanical properties which have made the alloy a material of choice for springs and some fine blades, though it has also become important in electrical applications for its magnetic behaviour.
Brown Bayley Steels was a steel-making company established in Sheffield, England in 1871, as Brown, Bayley & Dixon. They occupied a site on Leeds Road which was later occupied by the Don Valley sports stadium. The firm was founded by George Brown, Nephew of John Brown of the firm John Brown & Company. The firm manufactured Bessemer steel and railway tracks.
Firth Brown Steels was initially formed in 1902, when Sheffield steelmakers John Brown & Company exchanged shares and came to a working agreement with neighbouring company Thomas Firth & Sons. In 1908 the two companies came together and established the Brown Firth Research Laboratories and it was here, in 1912, under the leadership of Harry Brearley they developed high chrome stainless steel. The companies continued under their own management until they formally merged in 1930 becoming Firth Brown Steels. The company is now part of Sheffield Forgemasters.
Sir Harshad"Harry"Kumar Dharamshi Hansraj Bhadeshia is an Indian-British metallurgist and Emeritus Tata Steel Professor of Metallurgy at the University of Cambridge. In 2022 he joined Queen Mary University of London as Professor of Metallurgy.
Palle Rama Rao FREng is an Indian scientist noted for his contribution to the field of Physical and Mechanical Metallurgy. He has collaborated and conducted research activities for over dozen universities and associations all over India and abroad. He has been honoured with the titles of Padma Vibhushan in 2011 by president of India for his contributions to scientific community. He is acting as the chairman, Governing Council, International Advanced Research Centre for Powder Metallurgy & New Materials (ARCI), Hyderabad.
Bal Raj Nijhawan, was an Indian metallurgist, author and the first Director of Indian origin of the National Metallurgical Laboratory, Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR). He was a recipient of Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize, the highest Indian science award, which he received in 1964 in the Engineering sciences category. The Government of India honoured him in 1958, with the award of Padma Shri, the fourth highest Indian civilian award for his services to the nation.
Sir Charles Sykes CBE, FRS was a British physicist and metallurgist.
Richard Edwin Dolby, OBE, HonDMet, FREng, FIMMM, HonFWeldI is a metallurgist and former Director of Research and Technology at The Welding Institute (TWI) in Cambridge, UK. He is a past President at the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining and a current Distinguished Research Fellow at the University of Cambridge Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy.
Herbert William Gartrell was a South Australian academic and professor of mining and metallurgy at the University of Adelaide.