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THE JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL A N D ENGINEERING CHEMISTRY
than one name which is justified from one point of view or another, and the possibilities of incorrect names are great. It is not feasible to enter into a detailed discussion of the best procedure in building or using indexes of chemical compounds. The difficultiesincrease with increasing complexity of compounds. Some indexes are based on systematic nomenclature, irrespective of names used by authors; others are not. Cross references within an index and introductions thereto, and the use by index searchers of dictionaries, chemical encyclopedias, handbooks, and other sources of information leading to a knowledge of the names, sometimes numerous, of compounds, are helps to be utilized. As mentioned above, a knowledge of what constitutes good nomenclature is a great aid in the location of compounds in name indexes. This is particularly important for the organic chemist. I t is on account of the almost insurmountable difficulties due to the complexities of chemical nomenclature and because of language differences, that a basis other than their names-namely, their empirical formulas-has been sought and, to a limited extent, used, in the indexing of compounds. A formula index provides a certain means for the location of individual compounds; it is very doubtful if the average chemist can locate compounds in all cases in name indexes even though systematic nomenclature may have been consistently followed in the indexing. In name indexes it is possible, by appropriate devices, to group related
Vol. 14, No. 10
compounds to good advantage. This is well brought out in a discussion written in 1919 by Dr. Austin M. Patterson.' The subject index searcher is confronted with nomenclature problems relating to fields other than that of chemical compounds. For example, the chemist interested in plants must contend with the fact that some indexes use the scientific names (genus and species) of plants as headings and others use common names, of which there are frequently several far the same plant. The use of indexes in foreign languages presents obvious difficulties. It is one thing to be able to read a foreign language and another to translate one's thoughts into that language. The use of an English-French, English-German, or other like dictionary, depending on the language involved, is about the only help available. The introduction to Patterson's GermanEnglish Dictionary for Chemists and that to his French-English Dictionary contain some helpful suggestions useful for determining German and French names of chemical compounds. May I conclude by asking a question? Of the limited amount of information which we as individuals can store in our heads, is it not preeminently desirable that a part of that information consist of a thorough knowledge of wAere and how to locate additional information when needed? 4
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Research: Its Position in t h e Making of an Industry By John E. Teeple 50
E. 4 1 s ~Sr., N E W YORK,N . Y.
F
OR T H E last three or four years I have been very much interested in three different problems, all in industrial chemistry but in widely separated fields: (1) manufacture of decolorizing carbon, (2) cracking heavy petroleum, (3) manufacture of potash. Although in such widely separated fields, there was a close similarity in the method of handling each one. The ultimate aim in each case was to build a stable industry.
DECOLORIZING CARBON In this case the starting point was a process brought to me for investigation. The process proved entirely impractical. The next step was to accumulate some organized facts regarding the importance of various factors in making a good decolorizing carbon, factors such as temperature, pressure, time, raw material, catalyzers, state of division, reaction with gases. On the basis of the facts so gathered, I propounded a working hypothesis to guide the further investigation. The hypothesis was probably wrong in whole or in part, but it served its purpose in directing the work.' We finally succeeded in making on a small scale in the laboratory a better carbon than any commercial product that we could find. The study continued in larger apparatus until the laboratory limit was reached. Then came semiplant scale work, then larger units till the full plant-size unit was reached. Finally, these full-sized units were operated for over a year under most widely varying conditions, until we knew, not only the most favorable methods of operation and treatment on a large scale, but also the proper materials of construction, the shape, size, type, and life of equipment, the allowable limits of control, the proper specifications for a marketable decolorizing carbon, and the proper treatment to meet these specifications. Not until then was a plant finally designed and constructed. You recognize the method: a persistent study of all factors a t each step in increasing the size of the operation, from the small-
est laboratory trials to the completed plant. It is slow, but is a very sure way to success. In this case the time was five years from the original discarded impractical process to the full-sized plant, but to-day a plant of over 20 tons per day capacity is in operation making the decolorizing carbon which you know as Darco. This is all that the American industries are educated to using to-day. As their education improves, they willuse more, and more plants will be built. This is, in brief, the history of Darco decolorizing carbon from a process which contained no single correct idea to much the largest industry of its kind in America. CRACKING HEAVY PETROLEUM PRODUCTS The second problem of cracking heavy petroleum products came to me over four years ago. This was also a process that had passed the laboratory stage, if it ever had one, and was already on a semiplant scale when I first saw it. We succeeded in getting it to operate very, very feebly, so feebly that one had to look twice to be sure it was going, but it seemed t o me, after considerable study, to have a basic idea that was right and was possible of commercial development. Having determined this, the next step was to scrap the semicommercial plant and put the operation back into the laboratory to study fundamentals of pressure, temperature, time, character of materials, etc., which should have been done in the first place. From there on its course was the same as the decolorizing carbon. Having learned the respective importance of various factors, it proceeded step by step through the semicommercial-sized unit capable of handling 50 or 60 bbls. per day. To-day it is just going into the last stage of a full-sized unit, and is still probably a year from the design and construction of a full-sized plant. This is the method of cracking oils by using a submerged carbon electrode. It has already been over four years since the process with a right idea in it first came to me for investigation, and in about another year it should be in successful commercial operation.
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T H E JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL A N D ENGINEERING CHEMISTRY
You recognize the same method as before: A slow and steady trip through the laboratory and semicommercial plants, through full-sized units to the finished industry. Five years in each case. Very slow but very sure. Now there are many operations t h a t go from an idea to plant practice in much less time, but when it comes to building a new industry or a n industry on a new idea it pays to go slow and be thorough and count the time by years-not by days. This slow progress is usually very aggravating to the inventors and to the people furnishing the money, but I believe it is our duty who are directing such operations to prepare their minds for the long wait, to keep up their interest by intelligent statements of progress, not to allow ourselves to be hurried in any case where results may be prejudiced, and to make them stick to the end. If the people who intend to start such industries have not both the money and the patience to stay by them to the finish, we chemists should discourage them from ever starting. MANUFACTURE OF POTASH The third problem was the manufacture of potash. This came to me something over three years ago as a going plant which was using one process and had a dozen more that had been suggested or partially tried out. But, unfortunately, the process was not turning out very pure or high-grade potash, and the plant was losing money every day. After some study, it seemed to me that there was a fair chance of making an industry here, by following the only method I know-that is, first study the fundamentals in the laboratory. A second problem in this case was by proper engineering and management to make the existing plant operate, if possible-but we are not concerned with that to-day. Our problem here is to approach through the research side. Now these three problems of decolorizing carbon, cracking petrolwm, and making potash, have all been developed, you will see, along exactly the same lines, and through the same method, probably because it is the only method I know by which to make a new chemical industry where one did not exist before. The three problems have taken a large part of my time and attention for three or four years. Two of them are now industries and the third IS nearly there, but please do no misunderstand me. I did not make these industries. I am not presenting them here as things that I have done. There was a time when a man could know all science that was known, and there was another time when a man could know all chemistry t h a t was known, and there probably was a time when one man could make an industry. But now, “Them days is gone forever.” Making an industry to-day is a many-man job. It requires the cooperation of many minds of different types and training-the research man, the development man, the engineers, the plant managers, control men, business managers, sales managers, financial managers, and money. If any of these are lacking, the industry either is never born or it dies in early infancy. I cannot stress this point too strongly, because I so often meet the chemist who has an idea or a process and who accordingly thinks that he has a whole industry excepting a few minor details. They are not minor details. Often every one of them is more important than his contribution of an idea or a process. The credit for making industries like these three I have cited must go to the research, development, and control chemists, the engineers, managers, business, financial and sales directors, and the lawyers, who actually do the work. An adviser like myself deserves credit for only three things: first, for the vision to see that an industry is possible; second, for the common sense to see the logical way to develop it and t o get the right men working at the right jobs; and third, for the persistence, some might call i t obstinancy, that keeps him sticking firmly and unwaveringly to his course and makes him keep everybody else sticking too. He is often a nuisance, but is necessary. To come back t o our potash industry. Then, according to
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formula, the first job was to throw the whole problem back into the laboratory and gather some fundamental information so that we could know what we were doing in the plant, what we could do, and what we could not do. This should all have been done years before, but never had been.’ The plant now has a capacity of 100 tons qf potassium chloride a day and about 50 tons of borax. It has not yet quite reached its production in practice, its best output so far being 93 tons of 97 per cent potassium chloride. It may seem that we jumped from research laboratory to plant practice at 100 tons per day. But not so. I n some cases we did actually so jump because the plant was there, was going in bad shape, and if the jump failed no serious damage was done. But I do not recommend building a plant first and experimenting in it afterward. It is altogether too expensive. More often in my hurried sketch I have simply skipped for your benefit the intermediate struggles. What I have aimed to do here is to emphasize what I believe is the only safe formula for developing an industry-the slow method of fundamentals-and to show you how this has worked out in the potash industry, showing you only the first steps in the research laboratory and the last step in the plant. Now before I leave this subject, just a word about organization. This plant is in the desert with no civilization near it except of its own making. The company owns the plant, the town, the stores, pipe lines, water lines, railroad, and its part of the lake. The plant manager is a little czar from whom there can ordinarily be no appeal. Sewage, sanitation, housing, feeding, schools, churches, amusements, health, jealousy among wives of employees and small-town scandals, all come to him as the court of last resort. Chemical problems probably occupy the least of his time. Still I tried hard to find a chemically trained man for the position. Of the many men I considered, some I thought would not do for lack of experience or from improper temperament. Of the few who, I thought, might do, some feared to take a chance on the outcome of the proposition, some hesitated to leave present fairly satisfactory positions, some did not want to take their families to the desert, and some simply did not have the nerve or the insides to tackle the job. I finally quit looking for a chemical man and picked a mining engineer from the Michigan School of Mines, not for his training but for his sane judgment and executive ability developed during many years in mining camps in charge of men. Experience cannot be acquired in college or from books. It must be earned. I think we are making a chemist out of him. For plant superintendent the same thing can be said regarding the type of man wanted and failure to find him among chemical men. I finally took a mechanical engineer-a Cornel1 man with much executive experience. For director of development and research a chemical man had to be found. The man selected is a Columbia chemical engineer. He was chosen not so much because of his actual research ability but on account of his excellence in development work and his executive ability. This man knows the technical operation of the plant better than any of us-a man who can a t any time take charge of the plant a t a minute’s notice and run it for weeks or months. This is as strictly a chemical plant as there is in America, having no other production than two chemicals. It may seem strange that the best men found for the positions in a chemical plant should be a mining engineer for the manager, a mechanical engineer for superintendent, and a chemical engineer for the head of the research department. Yet the selections have been happy ones, and the results indicate how much more important personality and experience are than training as soon as a man steps outside of the laboratory or has control in any way of other men. 1 At this point the author introduced lantern slides illustrating the complexity of the problems encountered and the data incident to their solution, This material will appear later under the authorship of Mr. Harald de Ropp and Mr. W. E. Burke, who did the work.
