May, 1919
T H E J O U R N A L OF I N D U S T R I A L A N D E N G I N E E R I N G C H E M I S T R Y
the dangers in the use of a highly inflammable material like cellulose nitrate justifies the higher price for a non-inflammable product. Some of these applications are developing by sheer force of virtue. Others are slow in reaching their justifiable use through commercialism or industrial “politics.” It is not necessary to elaborate on this point. Some day a holocaust will wipe out industrial “politics” and cellulose acetate will be found to he on deck, unless in the meantime something new has developed to take its place. The war has perhaps been the best booster of cellulose acetate, because in airplane construction it has developed its biggest use. Cellulose acetate dopes for shrinking airplane wing fabrics not only possess the desired property of noninflammability but have also demonstrated their superiority in durability and minimum degrading effect on the fabric. hTo one who has been close to airplane production seriously doubts that there is a big future ahead of it. Travel through thc air in heavier than air machines is industrial progress and nothing, therefore, can more than temporarily impede its development. If the present method of fabric wing covering is going to persist, then a large use for cellulose acetate is in prospect. Perhaps, however, one of the biggest uses for cellulose acetate in the future is in the production of artificial silk. The manufacture of artificial silk from cellulose nitrate has been a commercial enterprise of many years’ standing but cellulose nitrate silk cannot be marketed as such, on account of its extremely high inflammability. I t therefore has to be denitrated with the result that it loses its waterproof properties and on denitration becomes closely similar to viscose and cuprammonium silks and suffers greatloss OF strength when wetted. Cellulose acetate silk, on account of its relatively low inflammability, can be marketed without deacetylation and therefore all the waterproof properties of cellulose acetate are retained. Silks made from it are, when wet, about three times as strong as the other types of artificial silks, but aside from the waterproof properties, cellulose acetate silk has dyeing, or perhaps better expressed, has resist properties which give it distinct individuality as a textile fiber which practically affords it a market a t any price below that OF spun silk. The production of cellulose acetate silk in the United States has been retarded rather than helped by the war, because the silk industry had t o yield up its raw products to the airplane requirements. Now that the war has ceased and the production of acetic anhydride has been expanded in this country, cellulose acetate silk and other non-war uses of cellulose acetate ought t o come in for a new lease of life. ARTHURD. LITTLE,INC. CHARLESRIVERROAD CAMBRIDGE, MASS.
PHENOL By A. G. PETERKIN
Before the war this country’s consumption of phenol was about g,ooo,ooo lbs. per year. The bulk of it came from England, and was obtained from coal-tar distillates directly. A small part was synthesized from benzol. The general impression here is that this synthetic phenol was made in German plants, subsidized, and kept in existence by the Government for war purposes. The production in the United States during the war continually increased. At the time of our entry into the struggle i t amounted to 75,000,000 lbs. per year, and after that time plants were erected so that a t the end we had capacity to produce more than 150,000,000 lbs. Of this, not more than 2,000,ooo lbs. was obtained directly form coal-tar distillates by extraction with caustic soda. At the present time the consumption in this country is not much greater than 6,000,000 lbs. per year, about equally divided
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between the drug and disinfectant, the dyestuff, and the synthetic resin industries. This means that there was a t the time of the armistice a sudden cessation of manufacture and use on a comparatively huge scale, and stocks on hand altogether out of proportion t o the possibility of use in times of peace. I n private and government hands to-day there are a t the very least 30,000,000 lbs. of phenol. The Government wants to know what t o do with it. No adequate suggestion has as yet been made; perhaps some of you can answer the question. The Bureau of Public Health Service a t Washington has refused it as a gift; phenol has come to be a very specialized antiseptic; it has been displaced by cheaper, safer, and more powerful materials in the wider fields of disinfection. Before the war phenol sold a t about g cents per lb , and although our own coal tar was an inadequate direct source, England was able to supply both the United States and Germany with all they required in excess of their home production. The prewar price of say 8 cents was an exceedingly low one; it was not sufficient t o insure that all of the phenol available from coal-tar oils was extracted, or separated from the mixture of phenol and cresols which was extracted. On a basis of pre-war prices for labor and material, it is possible that phenol might be synthesized from benzol a t a cost of between I O cents aad 15 cents per lb. Were the present stocks absorbed, one or two synthetic phenol plants might operate in this country and insure a home production equal to our needs a t a cost no greater than a fair cost of imported phenol plus the present duties For the present the plants are idle-the wastage of war-and are likely to remain so, so far as the production of phenol is concerned. CHEMICAL DEPARTMENT
THEBARRETT COMPANY NEWYORKCITY
THE PREPARATION OF PURE ORGANlC CHEMICALS By H. T. CLARKE
Members of this Division will recall that a t the Cleveland meeting last fall Dr. C. E. K. Mees, Director of the Research Laboratory of the Eastman Kodak Company, announced that a department of the laboratory was being organized to supplement the work taken up by the chemical manufacturing department of the University of Illinois for the supply of the pure organic substances required for research which had before the war been obtained almost exclusively from Germany. At that time the department of Synthetic Chemistry, as this section of the Eastman Kodak Research 1,aboratory is called, had been in existence for too short a period to have afforded any tangible results, and we feel it our duty to take this opportunity of reporting progress to the Section, the members of which were so good as to give their approval and support to the undertaking. The work of the department falls into three main divisions: first, the synthesis of substances, for which there is an immediate or a potential dernand,which are not available on the open market; second, the purification of substances obtainable in technical quality from chemical manufacturers; and third, the distribution of the materials thus prepared and those purchased in pure condition from manufacturers and from individual chemists in university laboratories. As can readily be understood, it is our principal aim to bring our products to the highest state of purity it is possible for us to obtain, without consideration of yield or of labor involved, and products with the quality of which we are satisfied we designate as Eastman Organic Chemicals. We do not consider it desirable to print upon the label a specification of the purity of the contents of the bottle, but we shall be glad to furnish, on application, information, including the approximate date of preparation, relevant to the purification or testing of any substance supplied.
