Document RaE6Ldqy1Dn8KZopQpY8GkkeX

*_____________________ _______ THF. CHAMELEON' May, 1927 A TRIP THROUGH THE White I.cad Stack Steaming Under Full Load. The habit of taking the familiar commodities for granted, which we use more or less every day, deprives us of many a most interesting experience. The weeds of the field, despised because they are weeds, are most fascinating to a botanist. The growing of wheat and the making of flour is a most engrossing study, but because flour is so common we overlook its interesting history. White Lead is another such neglected commodity which rewards an investigator most richly. Sherwin-Williams are one of the very large makers of White Lead .in the country. The amount of White Lead used in making SWP and our other prepared paints would make a most impressive volume even if we didn't sell a pound of our famous ODP White Lead. Its manufacture begins back in our mines at Magdalena, New Mexico. These mines produce a very wide variety of ores. There are veins which yield silver ores, others which are rich in copper, still other veins are richer in zinc or in lead and some which give us lead and zinc combined. We will go into this more fully in a later issue on our mines. ... c _ -nr ! s:itMCTMnS-nt ',,nrt'ro'hu'ts The pictures on these pages tell a fairly complete story of ccrta*n Parts ^ the process of making ODP White Lead. Much is missing, however, which is highly important. Up a flight of stairs, over a jack knife bridge, through a tin door and you stop in the twilight of the stack house of the White Lead plant. You are on a balcony which holds you suspended over a seemingly endless void. As your eyes become accustomed to the dim light you discern mountains of tan bark extending down through the center of a great barnlike wooden structure with hugh stalls flanking either side. A tangy smell cuts into the con sciousness of your nostrils and you wonder whether you like it or not. A dampness per vades and a man is cutting fanciful curves through the air with a large hose. You are in as different a world from Doc Van Stone's Lacquer Plant at the other end of the lot as a little Dutch village would he in contrast to 42nd and Broadway, New York. Call it primitive, basic, fundamental or whatever you wish, the making of Old Dutch Process White Lead goes back to the shadowy beginnings of paint mak ing with a process which persists until today, a process requiring the purest of corroders, lead, handfi!Iing and loading of stacks and Nature's own sweet time of changing metallic lead buckles into white lead carbonate 90 to 120 davs. Loading in the metal buckles. Lead is received at the White Lead plant in the form of pigs or bars which zveigh loo ' pounds apiece. They arc fed into the fur* nace at the left and emerge in liquid form zvhich pours info woJf/itr on the traveling belt, goes up over the ladder, by zvhich time the molten metal is cooled and falls in a prctccl-like disc in the heap at the right, ft is these discs, called buckles, zvhich arc shozvn filling the corrod ing pots belozv. -- `The lead buckles uozv prepare to say farewell to their metallic form. At the bottom of these pots is dilute acetic acid in a small zeell. The acid does not touch the buckle until vaporised by the heat of the fermenting tan bark. There are thirteen layers of pots in- a stack. liaeh tier is covered zvith a double s h e a t h i n g of boards and is tucked azvay under a blanket of tan bark a foot and half thick. A wooden vent permits the generated steam to escape as it zvorks its way up through the stack. The heat at the mouth of the vent zvoitld burn the hand. Tan bark and boards removed to show corroded lead. 007-SWP-53056 :` ' '" " -'` M;iv, ] 927 THE CHAMELEON WHITE LEAD PLANT -CHICAGO When the corroded lead buckles are taken from the stack they are crushed and miM-il with water. Then the long process of washing, screening and purifying begins. I he lead must first pass through a silk screen which carries 200 threads to the inch. II would seem that so fine a screen as this would remove everything that was remov.d.lr and it does. There are no particles of tan bark, uucorroded lead or foreign sub i.iint which get by the screen, which is on a vibrating table and fairly gives one the liners to watch it, and yet from the screen the lead must float through 20 vats of water l i- lore ii emerges fully purified and capable of passing the rigid tests of the inspector's .li -X. This makes certain, twenty times over, that there is no possibility of any acid i rmaiiiing. any contamination of tan bark, and it is quite certain that the lead which in-. Ilo.iied in the water through 20 tubs is going to be just about the last word in I'Urnrss. I hr finishing steps of drying the lead in steam-heated pans to drive off the water and 'h. subsequent regrinding with refined linseed oil can be readily enough understood. I here are refinements through every step of manufacture, however, which cannot be splained in so limited a discussion, but which make Sherwin-Williams ODP White l.r.ul a favorite with the painter. It does not get hard in the package, it is easy to break up and mix into paint, it is very white and easy working under the brush. 9 c .................. ' M^W^. ttA w .T ^ " -^ ^ Tgg, , , ,^y , ' ,, ;r .'' ifhih' Lead is filled by . Kihl. The bucket rests upon ir.'/V and is filled with one hi me nf the lever. A dash of ml with a putty knife adds the r,rssury touch to make the ale no down. The man at the it puls in the printed direction ' . i i for making While Lead 'aiut uith ODP which is dl l' ' sd in a waxed envelope. 11 f machine forces on and lamps the self-scaling cover. tm Anderson is Filler, John Anderson is Capper. The craneman is Jose Castellan The large amount of tan bark used and the ex treme weight of the lead makes the use of this powerful traveling hoist car indispensable. It is tracked on overhead rails to reach every point in the large building. Red Lead and Litharge arc made by causing the lead to combine with oxy gen under great heat. The pig lead is roasted in these furnaces for three days by which time it has changed to a bright yel low powder, which is litharge. At this time the furnace requires close at tention, for the litharge soon begins to change to red lead. If the roasting is continued up to nine days, the change to red lead becomes complete. Sherwin-Williams Guarantee "This package is warranted to contain noth ing but strictly pure White Lead, ground in strictly pure linseed oil, and we will pay one ounce of gold for every pound of adulteration that it may be found to contain." Rather a comprehensive guarantee, as the reader will agree, and yet we have every con fidence in the absolute purity and supreme quality of our ODP White Lead that we don't hesitate for a moment in going the limit to assure the user of that quality. Red Lead and Litharge An entire book could be written about these two most interesting products. They are used in making such divergent products as glass ware and storage batteries, rubber products and varnish, used in oil refining and in linoleum, etc. All these departments come under the super vision of Mr. S. W. Stevens, our General Superintendent of Pigment Products Manufac ture. Mr. Stevens came with us in 1910. He is a graduate of the Royal School of Mines, London, as Metallurgical Engineer. His two hobbies are golf and a reported fondness for working 24 hours a day. The portrait is not entirely characteristic because his pipe is miss ing. / Elmer W. O'Rourke is foreman 007-SWP-53057 - ' aN !>f ` uLl-