Before the war the United States imported considerable quantities of German ferrotungsten, but metallurgists claim that the ferrotungsten now made in this country is superior to any from Germany. For the present, of course, the German export trade is dead. England, formerly a small producer, is now making large quantities of ferrotungsten and tungsten powder at a number of plants. One of the producers, the High Speed Steel Alloys, Ltd., Widnes, near Liverpool, “is under government assistance and is owned by 31 of the leading consumers of Sheffield.”[75] The article quoted stated that the output was at the rate of 500 tons of tungsten per annum. The Thermo-Electric Ore Reduction Corporation,[76] Luton, was at the same time producing 140 tons of tungsten per month. The ferro produced carried 80 per cent. and the powder 98 per cent. of metallic tungsten. Only one company in the United States was producing as much as 60 tons of tungsten per month during the same war period. The Thermo Electric Ore Reduction Corporation owned mines from which it expected to produce each year 4,000 long tons of concentrates carrying 65 per cent. tungstic oxide. There are at least seven other manufacturers of tungsten or ferrotungsten in England. [75] _Mining Journal_, London. “High Speed Steel Alloys, Ltd., Visit of Inspection to the Works,” vol. 115, Nov. 25, 1916, p. 779. JULIUS L. F. VOGEL has since written an article (_Min. Jour._, London, vol. 20, p. 16, Jan., 1919) in which he says that government aid, though proffered, was not accepted. This statement confirms the government policy. [76] _Mining Journal._ “Thermo-Electric Ore Reduction Corporation, Ltd., Visit to the Luton Works,” vol. 115, p. 797, Dec. 2, 1916. France had a number of ferrotungsten plants before the war, and these are thought to be still in operation. At the beginning of the war about half of the tungsten used in the United States was introduced into steel in the form of ferrotungsten and about half in the form of tungsten powder. This practice has changed, so that now more than three-fourths of the tungsten used is introduced as ferrotungsten, largely, it seems, because of the ferro being now manufactured in purer form and partly because tungsten powder could not be obtained for a while. At one time tungsten ores were put in the charge and the tungsten alloyed directly with the steel; in fact, tungsten steels were first made in this way, although the process was patented in this country as new. The practice seems to have been dropped because of the introduction into the steel of impurities that may be eliminated when tungsten or ferrotungsten is made first.