On Sun, 13 Sep 2009 18:30:14 -0700 (PDT), rangerssuck
wrote:

On Sep 13, 5:58*pm, "SteveB" wrote:
"steamer" wrote in message

...

--Got to ruminatin' this morning; how the heck is steel wool made?
Anyone know?

--
* * * *"Steamboat Ed" Haas * * * * : *Imagine what I could do if
* * * *Hacking the Trailing Edge! *: *I knew what I was doing...
* * * * * * * * * * * * *www.nmpproducts.com
* * * * * * * * * ---Decks a-wash in a sea of words---

Saw a episode on "How It's Made). *The metal is actually scraped off bigger
pieces, leaving a piece of swarf. *(Is that what a machining waste is
called) *Then run through other machines that bundles it up into pieces.
Not the way I thought it would be made at all.

Steve

Saw that. The machine looked to be about a hundred years old, and
still crankin' away. The swarf is tufted, like felt, puncturing a pile
of it repeatedly with barbed needles that pull the upper strands into
the lower.

This was one of the most fascinating (to me, anyway) episodes of "How
it's Made" - I NEVER would have guessed this process.

Now - I wonder if the process is at all similar for Shredded Wheat? I
suspect not, even though the end product looks similar.
I remember visiting a booth run by Nabisco at the CNE in, IIRC, 1947.
They had a machine set up producing shredded wheat biscuits, wheat,
softened slightly by boiling was fed through a meat grinder type
machine then extruded in strands in a sheet the proper width onto a
table which went back and forth until the proper thickness was built
up. This stack was then cut crosswise into biscuits which were then
dried by baking in an oven. Any scrap from cutting went back into the
hopper for re-processing. Everyone who watched the full demo was given
a sample package of two biscuits.
Gerry :-)}
London, Canada