Document baOJ4YooqX4BwQod0Do4g6wz0

1 pioneers decided to build their first production plane in western North Carolina, near Asheville. Several fac tors prompted this decision--accessibilitv to rate materials and markets, ;,j,-;il climate, abundance of pure water, and an ample supply of Capa ble labor. By 1940 Enka was pro vidingjobs tor nearly3000 people, and its annual production of 23,000,000 lb was four times the first year's output. At the outbreak of World War If, F.nka quickly seared itself to produc tion of high-tenacity yarns requested by rhe United States Government. Enka rayon was used in airplane and truck tires, self-sealing tanks and hose, cargo parachutes, and other essential wartime items. After the war, the company ex panded even more. Since the Enka tAsheville) plant had grown to its full captivity, plans were drawn in 1946 for a second plant eight miles south of Morristown, Tennessee, in a community called Lowland. Equip ped with the industry's most modern machinery, the Lowland plant began operations early in 1948. This plant specializes in the high-tcnacity yarns which are used not only in auto mobile tires, but in high-pressure hose, fan and conveyor, belts, com press! >rdiaphragms, and other miscellaneous items which must endure rough treatment. Superior fabrics are also woven from Enka rayon by Anierica's foremost weaving and knitting mills. Rayon yarn made by the viscose process consists of regenerated cellu lose, derived from refined bleached spruce, pine, and hemlock wood pulp, or from cotton linters. The cellulose is delivered to the plant by the pulp manufacturer in rectangular white sheets resembling large desk blotters. Caustic soda is used in a soaking press. Now called alkali cellulose, the material is dropped through a chute to a shredder where cellulose fibers are turned into a mass of small fluffy particles. These1'white crumbs" are aged for about two days and are then placed in a churn and treated with liquid carbon disulfide. The white crumbs are thus changed to orange crumbs and the latter are dissolved in dilute caustic soda. The resultant solution is viscose, a goldenbrown sticky viscous liquid with the consistency of honey or lubricating oil. After the viscose is filtered and aged, it is spun through a gold and platinum spinneret which is perfo rated with anywhere from 18 to 720 microscopically small holes of from two- to three-thousandths of an inch v--. One oj three Elliott 300-hp turbines which are direct-con nected to three boiler-Jeed pumps serving the fire boilers. POWERFAX. SPRING 19S4 PAGE 7