June 15, 1917] 



SCIENCE 



605 



scale experimentation on new products and 

 substitutes. To resist corrosion by acid 

 and other chemicals, pottery or so-called 

 chemical stoneware, glass and natural 

 stone apparatus have been used heretofore. 

 This necessitated small-sized apparatus, 

 and meant in the case of stoneware a manu- 

 facturing time of about two months for the 

 clay working, drying and cooling after 

 firing. Attempts have been made for 

 many years to replace this material by 

 metal. Platinum, silver and gold are used 

 in special cases, but while these metals can 

 be made into any size apparatus, cost is 

 prohibitive for most uses. Two classes of 

 alloys have now been developed: rare 

 metal alloys such as tungsten, chromium, 

 or nickel irons, and more recently the 

 cheaper and more resistant silicon-iron al- 

 loys. Extensive trials in the last two years 

 have shown the usefulness of these alloys 

 though they do not possess quite the re- 

 sistance of stoneware to corrosion. They 

 are known under varying trade names, such 

 as durion, made here in Ohio, tantiron 

 and ironac. They are very resistant to all 

 strengths of sulphuric and nitric acids and 

 are used with great satisfaction in their 

 manufacture and permit plants to run for 

 months without shut-down. The success of 

 the modern tower system displacing plati- 

 num for concentrating sulphuric acid had 

 been largely due to the use of pipes and 

 fittings of this alloy. Early in 1915 the 

 demand for nitric acid for war purposes 

 increased to enormous proportions, result- 

 ing in extensions to old nitric acid plants 

 and the erection of new ones larger than 

 the world had ever seen. Deliveries on 

 stoneware jumped to six months and even 

 longer and had the production of nitric 

 acid been dependent upon stoneware alone, 

 as a few years ago, it would have been 

 greatly curtailed and the story of the great 

 war would have been different. As these 

 alloys can be secured on short notice, the 



same as cast iron, chemical manufacturers 

 do not hesitate, if a still should run wild 

 and froth sodium sulphate into the con- 

 denser, to direct workmen to break the con- 

 nections at once with a hammer and allow 

 the expelled material to flow on the floor, 

 thus preventing the wrecking of the con- 

 densing apparatus. New castings can re- 

 place the broken one at once. Such ex- 

 travagant handling of the material would 

 not be possible under the usual slow de- 

 liveries with stoneware. This freedom 

 from risk of damage to condensers, and the 

 making of condensers themselves of this 

 material, enables stills to carry a heavier 

 charge and operate at greater speed. 

 Where the old equipment charged 2,000 

 pounds once or twice in 24 hours these war- 

 time stills operate on 4,000 pounds of nitre 

 plus 4,000 pounds of sulphuric acid, charg- 

 ing three times per 24 hours. The alloy is 

 somewhat brittle, ibut very much less so than 

 chemical stoneware. It is easy to see these 

 silicon-iron alloys are a boon to the acid 

 industries and thousands of tons of cast- 

 ing are in use and new chemical processes 

 are possible and now in operation, too, 

 which could not exist before, because of 

 lack of suitable material of which to con- 

 struct apparatus. Some of these new proc- 

 esses are having a decided vakie in the Al- 

 lies' campaigns. No single development in 

 many decades has had as much influence as 

 this one has and will have, for it is only in 

 its infancy. 



I need not weary you with other illustra- 

 tions of progress, though much has been ac- 

 complished in many lines and radically new 

 chemical processes developed. The most 

 wonderful and greatest chemical works I 

 have ever seen have been erected in this 

 country since the war began and the best 

 of them were coal-tar dye and synthetic or- 

 ganic chemical works. Reasonable progress 

 has been made in American laboratory 

 glass and porcelain. After the war we are 



