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Glidden’s design took off, and by 1876, his company was producing nearly 3 million pounds of barbed wire annually. Sentences like this always bother me. Of wha

Glidden’s design took off, and by 1876, his company was producing nearly 3 million pounds of barbed wire annually. Sentences like this always bother me. Of what use is this information? Barbed wire isn't used as a counterweight. How much fence is 3 million pounds?

masklinn 12y ago
Basic barbed wire is ~80 lbs per quarter-mile roll (1,320 ft) according to http://www.agf.gov.bc.ca/resmgmt/publist/300Series/307100-1.pdf http://www.agf.gov.bc.ca/resmgmt/publist/300Series/307100-1.... So 3 million lbs would be 9375 miles, or 15000km
- asavadatti 12y ago
  15,000km makes more sense than 3 million lbs.
rz2k 12y ago
Thanks a lot for the distraction! Assuming that the wire has a diameter of 2.5mm, there are two strands, and shortening by 1/3 accounts for the loss due to the twist and accounts for the mass of the barbs. Probably something like 9,000 miles[1] Of many metrics, the length might not be that interesting. For instance how much land did that represent making safe for crops, and conversely how much territory was ruined for grazing? While there isn't demand for barbed wire for as a counterweight, it does add some context on the supply side. The 173 m^3 of steel is about 0.3% of the steel used to construct the Three Gorges Dam, and 20% of the steel used to construct the Eiffel Tower[2] [1] Wolfram|Alpha seems to change the syntax handling from month to month, but for now using weight/density of steel treats it like a physical object unlike "volume of steel" which returns market trading volumes. http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=%283e6+lbs+%2F+density+of+steel+alloy%29%2F%282*1.5*pi*1.25mm^2%29+in+miles http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=%283e6+lbs+%2F+density+... [2] http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=173+m^3 http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=173+m^3
TeMPOraL 12y ago
Note: it's cool how two different back-of-the-napkin calculations gave a very similar result.
Someone 12y ago
I guess barbed wire was sold by weight, just like nails are to this day (see for example http://www.diy.com/search/results/?question=nails http://www.diy.com/search/results/?question=nails) I also guess that many nail manufacturers produced barbed wire.

masklinn 12y ago

Basic barbed wire is ~80 lbs per quarter-mile roll (1,320 ft) according to http://www.agf.gov.bc.ca/resmgmt/publist/300Series/307100-1.pdf http://www.agf.gov.bc.ca/resmgmt/publist/300Series/307100-1.... So 3 million lbs would be 9375 miles, or 15000km

asavadatti 12y ago
15,000km makes more sense than 3 million lbs.

rz2k 12y ago

Thanks a lot for the distraction! Assuming that the wire has a diameter of 2.5mm, there are two strands, and shortening by 1/3 accounts for the loss due to the twist and accounts for the mass of the barbs. Probably something like 9,000 miles[1] Of many metrics, the length might not be that interesting. For instance how much land did that represent making safe for crops, and conversely how much territory was ruined for grazing? While there isn't demand for barbed wire for as a counterweight, it does add some context on the supply side. The 173 m^3 of steel is about 0.3% of the steel used to construct the Three Gorges Dam, and 20% of the steel used to construct the Eiffel Tower[2] [1] Wolfram|Alpha seems to change the syntax handling from month to month, but for now using weight/density of steel treats it like a physical object unlike "volume of steel" which returns market trading volumes. http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=%283e6+lbs+%2F+density+of+steel+alloy%29%2F%282*1.5*pi*1.25mm^2%29+in+miles http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=%283e6+lbs+%2F+density+... [2] http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=173+m^3 http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=173+m^3

TeMPOraL 12y ago

Note: it's cool how two different back-of-the-napkin calculations gave a very similar result.

Someone 12y ago

I guess barbed wire was sold by weight, just like nails are to this day (see for example http://www.diy.com/search/results/?question=nails http://www.diy.com/search/results/?question=nails) I also guess that many nail manufacturers produced barbed wire.