What yellow material is the iron railing attached with in the concrete slab?

[random_name]

Working on repairing the entrance steps of my house built in 1955. The post for the iron railing has rusted, so I chipped around it and see that it is attached to a cast-in iron pipe filled with some yellow and rock-hard substance. Does anyone know what it is?

 

[tommib]

Sulfur has been used for that before.

Scrape it and see if it smells

 

[allexx]

Working on repairing the entrance stairs on my house built in 1955. The post for the iron railing has rusted, so I chiseled around it and see that it is anchored in an embedded iron pipe filled with some yellow and very hard material. Does anyone know what it is?

[image]

Anchoring compound

 

[Peter2400]

It is most likely sulfur.

 

[random_name]

Sulfur has been used for that before.

Scratch it and see if it smells

Thanks, it does indeed smell like sulfur! Why was it used?

 

[tommib]

Low melting point and solidifies into a hard mass, I think. That is, easy to handle.

And so that curious youths can go to the hardware store and get it