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National Resources Planning Board 



Manufacturers as well as users of chemical engineer- 

 ing equipment have participated in this advance. The 

 experimental station established a number of years ago 

 by the Swenson Evaporator Company at the University 

 of Michigan and under the direction of Prof. W. L. 

 Badger and coworkers " has contributed valuable 

 knowledge and experience that have been the basis of 

 improved design. Work done at the Western Precipi- 

 tation Companj''s laboratories in Los Angeles on elec- 

 trostatic precipitation " is typical of fundamental 

 investigations carried on by an equipment manufac- 

 turer. Extensive facilities for this type of investiga- 

 tional work are maintained by the Dorr Company at 

 Westport, Conn., by the Lummus Company in Eliza- 

 beth, N. J., the M. W. Kellogg Company Ln Jersey 

 City, E. B. Badger & Sons Company in Boston — to 

 name only a few laboratories that have been described 

 in current literature. 



Apart from quantitative research on the imit opera- 



'* Hebbard, G. M., and Badger, W. L. Steam-film heat transfer coefScients for 

 vertical tubes. Industrial and Engineering Cbemistry, £6, 420-24 (April 1934); Logan. 

 L. A., Fragen, N., and Badger, W. L. Liquid film heat— transfer coefficients in a 

 vertical-tube forced circulation evaporator. 1044-47 (October 1934). 



" Lissman, Marcel A. An analysis of mechanical methods of dust collection. 

 Chemical and Metallurgical Engineering, 57, 630-34 (October 1930). 



tions and the design and performance studies of the 

 equipment manufacturers, there is a broad field of 

 chemical engineermg activity concerned with the devel- 

 opment of entirely new manufacturing processes. Here 

 all of the chemical engineer's knowledge and resource- 

 fulness are called into use. Most important of his 

 responsibilities are the lay-out of the process flow sheet 

 based on material balances, heat, and power followed 

 by the design or the selection of the necessary equip- 

 ment of the proper materials of construction, tlirough 

 the testing and experimental operation of the pilot 

 plant and, finally, to the transition to full-scale 

 production. 



One can read an absorbing account of 15 years spent 

 in such a development by Dr. A. M. McAfee '* of the 

 Gulf Refining Company. In 1915 he read a paper before 

 the American Institute of Chemical Engineers propos- 

 ing the use of anhydrous aluminum cliloride in refining 

 petroleum. This material was then only a laboratory 

 reagent, selling for $1.50 a pound. But if his refining 

 process was to succeed, he needed tons of it and it had 

 to be cheap. Therefore he and his associates at Port 



'*Mc.\fee, A. M. The manufacture of commercial anhydrous aluminum chloride 

 American Imtitule of Chemical Engineers, Transaction, SI, 209 fl. (1929). 



FiGUKE 93. — Modern Dubljscracking Plant, Modeled in Wood, Equiflux Heater at Left, Universal Oil Products Company, Chicago, 



Illinois 



