Well, the question about how good old steels are is probably a never ending one. That's why Zircon took on the project to acquire and test samples from as many sources as practical. There's lots of speculation as to what these earlier steels were composed and how strong it is.
We constructed a hoop tensile fixture at my friends place and Zircon had the task of machining coupons from the samples collected. I haven't heard from him in while. With luck, he's making some progress, although he's a busy guy and this is a sparetime endevor.
We can speculate and read and quote qualitative writings on the subject, but the botton line is we haven't seen conclusive test data on the subject. That's why Zircon found this subject so interesting.
