September, 1945
INDUSTRIAL A N D E
. SINEERING CHEMISTRY
Alumina and the Red M u d . Conservation of bauxite may seem already foreign to our thinking, now that peace is with us once again, but during the dark days of the submarine menace we were really “strapped” for suitable supplies to use in the conventional process for the forerunner of aluminum. The chemists and chemical engineers of the Aluminum Company of America developed a method of making alumina from low-grade ores, the trick being to win the alumina carried away by the 3ilica in the waste red mud. Present in the less concentrated ores are greater quantities of silica, but a successful process for treating the red mud was found. One of the main difficulties was finding a method for eliminating sulfur introduced into the process. This step was performed by crystallizing evaporatom, shown ili the flow sheet in the article “Alumina from LowGrade Bauxite,” by our Midwest Editor, Robert F. Gould, with the cooperation of the ALCOA technical staff. This article describes another of the new techniques worked out for the war effort, which 1.dzE.C. will continue to bring to its readers. Corrosion Sequzl. August featured a symposium on corrosion inhibitors; this month we are presenting a paper by Powell, Bacon, and Lill, consulting engineers of Baltimore, wlio specialize in corrosion and allied problems. The authors prepared this manuscript at the request of the Editor after the symposium had been given a t the North Jersey meetlng of the A.C.S. last year. The experience they bring to the field is such that all will benefit from their freely given knowledge. War plants, built when copper and braas were scarce, were able to operate without resistant materials because of the methods described here for protecting steel equipment by the deliberate building of a calcium carbonate scale. An excellent history of success has been attached to this process but also a number of failures, which are analyzed by the authors. C. Madagascariensis and the Emergency. Back when our natural rubber was cut off (remember?) and we were arguing about synthetic us. the domestic natural product, one of the sources that came in for a great deal of investigation and publicity was cryptostegia, a vine bearing a beautiful flower and secreting latex from both stems and leaves. The stem latex has been sold in the past aa a rubber source, and now the Department of Agriculture reports on methods of obtaining the latex present in the leaves. There are problems galore attending such an interesting investigation, from the beginning when the cell of the plant containing the rubber is destroyed by fermentation through the solvent extraction and vulcanization of the rubber obtained. See “Cryptostegia Leaf Rubber”. From the Bleachers. Chlorine dioxide is proving itself as quite an agent for the breaching of many materials, flour being one of the first tried. It is not, then, surprising that a research team of General Mills should publish on research techniques using this gas. Hutchinson and Derby have worked with this bleacher for some time, and give to us the benefit of their experience in making small quantities of CIOz for investigational purposes. Depending on what you want, three methods are offered for use. Bluer md Bluer. Iron blues have long been a staple in the pigment field, but they have an annoying quality of turning
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brown under the influence of alkalies. Recent progress in the fiold ndicates that, modified with the metal nickel, improved resistance to alkalies is obtained. Holtzman, of AnsbacherSiegle Corporation, explores this territory thoroughly and advances a theory aa to why nickel helps overcome the fault of the iron blucs in becoming colorless. Controlled Combustion. Control of gas combustion is now a fairly common industrial procedure where special atmospheres are needed to accomplish some chemical change in the material being heat-treated Vandaveer and Segeler, of the American Gas Association, report on their investigations to determine the products formed when a gas is partially burned in a deficien-y of air. These data will aid in preventing unwanted side reactions in “heat treat”, and will materially extend our knowledge about the mysteries of combustion. M o r e Phos in Superph s. TVA has been making superphosphate for many years, and we now publish the latest study on making superphos more super. This time the effect of mixing and curing on the conversion of rock phosphate to superphosphrttc is elaborated on in great detail. Bridger, Burt, and Cerf a!so indicate that there are important differences in the results obtained in the official A.O.A.C. method of analyzing for P,O, and another analytical method. Peanut Glues. Burnett, of the Southern Regional Research Laboratory, hopes that glues and adhesives will soon be made from peanuts. The trick is to isolate the protein from the meal without altering the composition too much by heat or alkali. On top of that advice, he proceeds to disect the peanut by chemical means and tells how to accomplish the desired end. P,3-B.G. Nine papers, five from the Northern Regional Research Laboratory and four from the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn,jeport on the use of 2,a-butylene glycol as an intermediary in the production of butadiene. This work, carried on during the height of the rubber crisis, was of extreme importance, although the critical aspect is past. However, much of a vital nature is contained in the techniques explained in these manuscripts, and they now become part of the record. Future work may uncover many possibilities in this method for the chemical industry. With the Departments. A new column is introduced in this issue; Harold R. Murdock will comment on waste utilization, and readers will find much of interest there every month. Brown writes about those little appreciated but very vital leak stoppersgasketfl. Von Pechmann explores time study for the chemical industry; strangely enough, up-to-the-minute utilization of a time-study man’s ability does not stop a t incentive rates, and von Pechmann points out more important uses for this knowledge. Munch shows how data from lnstrumental analyses can be quickly correlated by electrical computer*.
