James Beaumont Neilson, previously foreman at Glasgow gas works, invented the system of preheating the blast for a furnace. He found that by increasing the temperature of the incoming air to 300 degrees Fahrenheit, he could reduce the fuel consumption from 8.06 tons of coal to 5.16 tons of coal per ton of produced iron with further reductions at even higher temperatures. He, with partners including Charles Macintosh, patented this in 1828. Initially the heating vessel was made of wrought iron plates, but these oxidized, and he substituted a cast iron vessel.