Practical Essay on the Strength of Cast Iron and Other Metals: Containing Practical Rules, Tables, and Examples, Founded on a Series of Experiments, with an Extensive Table of the Properties of Materials

Although cast iron was used in pagoda construction in ancient China, it was in Britain in the eighteenth century that new methods allowed for its production in quantities that enabled widespread use. An engineer who had educated himself tirelessly in technical subjects from carpentry to architecture, Thomas Tredgold (1788–1829) first published this work in 1822. It served as a standard textbook for British engineers in the early nineteenth century, and several translations extended its infl...