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Toxicology
Published in W. David Yates, Safety Professional’s Reference and Study Guide, 2020
Antimony isn’t used alone because it breaks easily, but when mixed into alloys, it is used in lead storage batteries, solder, sheet and pipe metal, bearings, castings, and pewter. Antimony oxide is added to textiles and plastics to prevent them from catching fire. It is also used in paints, ceramics, and fireworks, and as enamels for plastics, metal, and glass.
Properties and Uses
Published in Alan Cottrell, An Introduction to Metallurgy, 2019
About one-half of the tin produced is used in tinplate. The traditional method of dipping the steel sheet into molten tin is now becoming replaced by an electroplating process, to economize in the use of this rather scarce and expensive metal by producing a thinner coating. A recent use for molten tin has appeared in the float process for making plate glass by floating molten glass on the surface of a tin bath. Tin bronzes consume about 7% of the tin produced. In tin-based alloys the main alloy elements are lead and antimony. Britannia metal, used for tableware, consists of 7% Sb and 2% Cu in tin. There are many important tin-lead alloys, e.g. tinman’s and plumber’s solder (cf. § 15.3) and pewter (similar to Britannia metal but with about 10% Pb included). Tin foil (‘silver paper’) is made by rolling a sandwich of lead sheet in tin sheets down to a foil about 10−5 m thick; in recent years this has of course been largely replaced by the cheaper aluminium foil.
The production and properties of tin and its alloys
Published in R. F. Tylecote, The Prehistory of Metallurgy in the British Isles, 2017
Table 28 lists the main tin and pewter products so far discovered, with their analysis where known. English pewter from the middle ages to the nineteenth century contained 20% Pb, while the standard for French pewter was 16·5–18% Pb. The lead content of pewter has been decreased considerably in recent years since it became known that lead may be dissolved from certain grades of pewter. The French standard was fixed in the belief that it was a safe figure for use with wine. Modern English pewter, now known as Britannia metal, does not contain lead but about 8% Sb and 2% Cu to harden the tin.27
The Pewterer and the Chymist: Major Erasmus Purling and his Refined Tin
Published in Ambix, 2022
The assay recounted by Purling’s detractor, La Pierre, mentions no specific procedure to test the pewter. Salmon, in 1788, offered lengthy descriptions of the various kinds of assays and the results that could be expected in regard to several alloys. Among other procedures, he recommended the essai à la mouche (“spot assay”), which enabled the pewterer to roughly gauge the nature and the amount of the other metals alloyed to the tin, and to do so without melting and destroying the object.42 This kind of assay was a casual and standard procedure by the end of the eighteenth century.43 Surprisingly enough, neither the spot assay nor the other kinds (the “rock (stone) test,” “the trebuchet test”) were used during the 1657 assay, which relied above all on sensory input in normal conditions (appearance and sound of the metal). It seems likely that in early 1657, such assays were not common among Parisian pewterers, and this left room for non-regular alloys and fancy pretentions such as Purling’s.44 That might explain why the privilege delivered to Purling was almost immediately followed, in April 1657, by a royal edict prescribing new conditions for pewter control and assay, and that attempted to standardise productions and alloys. The complete text of the edict is not known, but a compilation of laws from the early eighteenth century gives us a fairly good appreciation of its content, as does the preamble of a royal declaration issued in 1674 which established offices for the assay and the marking of pewter.45We have received from time-to-time complaints of the abuses that are committed in the manufacture of pewter works and vessels, even since 1657. We had resolved to provide for it after having been informed of the alteration of the works of this metal in the memoirs by the principal pewterers of our good city of Paris and by the complaints that we often received, that several of them sold every day for various fine pewter works, which were mixed with a greater quantity of lead than is allowed by the statutes of this trade, which regulate the mixture that must be made of the common pewter with the claire-étoffe. We had, for this purpose, by our edict of the month of April of the said year, ordered that in the future the assay of the works of tin would be made in the offices that would be established, and then marked. But this regulation remained without execution.One projector among others, Purling took advantage of a commercial niche with his anomalous pewter. That niche was encouraged by a royal administration eager to develop new manufactures but faced resistance and hostility from a corporation that demanded further regulation. The confrontation, mainly commercial, soon involved alchemy’s promises and shortcomings, with Purling’s Le Cabinet de la Nature eliciting heated controversy almost immediately following its publication.