File:Corral wood and charcoal blast furnace no. 1.png

English: In 1908 the French firm Hauts Fourneaux Forges et Aciéries du Chili started building the first blast furnace on the site now occupied by the Corral plant. This blast furnace was designed for the use of El Tofo iron ore; the iron ore was reduced by charging logs of wood directly into the blast furnace, which had been designed by Prudhomme. It commenced operations in 1914 and operated occasionally, mostly in an experimental way, until 1919, without achieving any large commercial production. In 1933, a private company was set up, with financial support from the government, for the purpose of working the Corral installations; it was called the Compañía Electro Siderúrgica e Industrial de Valdivia (ESVAL), and it began operating the same blast furnace, using charcoal instead of wood. Many technical difficulties arose, but as there were also financial and marketing difficulties, which often caused stoppages, no definite conclusions can be drawn from these operations. Over a period of 12 years, this blast furnace produced 83,000 tons of pig iron, and in general it can be said that it worked satisfactorily, in view of the fact that its design was not of the conventional type for the use of charcoal. In November 1944 the old blast furnace was abandoned, and a new one, the no.2, came into operation which was designed to operate on charcoal.