Wednesday, September 22, 2004
The Green Monster
Note: To see 2 reviews of a book in which I explain digital, TV, & wireless
(and the reviewers say it's unusually easy to read and understand ! )
click here:
Reviews
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THE GREEN MONSTER
(Reported as a "True stories from the field" footnote in my textbook "Organic Additives And Ceramic Processing," Kluwer Academic Publishers, Boston, 1996, Chapter 8, page 225.)
In the 1980s, the biggest printed circuit factory in the world was in Richmond, VA, owned by AT&T (at that time, the biggest company in the world). A serious problem of poor "wetting" developed in a huge copper plating tank, resulting in the rejection of expensive products. This factory was only marginally profitable ordinarily, and with the low yield it became a huge money loss for AT&T. The plant manager had been told that his factory would be shut down, permanently, if this was not fixed, but the workers had not yet been told.
A nonionic detergent (Triton 101) was tried by the author in a laboratory size tank, and it solved the problem. Stirring was typically done in plating tanks by having some air bubbling upwards, so there was a small amount of foam. The author and his loyal technician went to Richmond and added the detergent, scaling up the amount in proportion to the tank volumes, lab versus production. It turned out that the detergent was not very soluble, so it mostly collected on the top surface of the plating solution, which called for an "area" scale-up proportional to the square of lab tank width, versus the square of the production tank width, not the cubic "volume" scale-up that we actually used. Excess nonionic detergent caused the entire tankload of very poisonous, green copper sulfate solution to foam up over the side of the huge tank, like a green monster in a horror movie.
Fortunately, it all went down into the safety floor drain.
Unfortunately, the piping had mistakenly been directed (by the plumbers, a long time ago) to the sanitary waste treatment plant instead of its chemical counterpart, and the copper killed all the beneficial bacteria in the sand filters. Then it continued out the sewer pipe and contaminated the James River, a popular fishing site. With no operable waste treatment, the factory had to be closed and the workers furloughed without pay. Upon returning to the research laboratory, the author's loyal technician told the lab manager, "Dan always said 'If you have to fail, fail big. Then they can't let you sink, and they have to give you another chance.' And he did fail big --- we shut down the biggest printed circuit plant in the world, and we polluted the James River fishery!"
During a frantic week of experiments, the correct amount of detergent was used, the problem was solved, and now the plant is still running (under different ownership). However, the factory workers only seemed to care about the loss of a week's pay, since they hadn't been told about the mass layoffs if we had failed. There are some plant workers in Richmond that the author still would not like to meet face to face in a dark alley.
For the next "war story" in this series, click on:
"Texas Fire and Spoiled Cars"
-----------------------------------------
For Dan's resume ("CV"), click on:
" Dan's CV "
(and the reviewers say it's unusually easy to read and understand ! )
click here:
Reviews
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
.
THE GREEN MONSTER
(Reported as a "True stories from the field" footnote in my textbook "Organic Additives And Ceramic Processing," Kluwer Academic Publishers, Boston, 1996, Chapter 8, page 225.)
In the 1980s, the biggest printed circuit factory in the world was in Richmond, VA, owned by AT&T (at that time, the biggest company in the world). A serious problem of poor "wetting" developed in a huge copper plating tank, resulting in the rejection of expensive products. This factory was only marginally profitable ordinarily, and with the low yield it became a huge money loss for AT&T. The plant manager had been told that his factory would be shut down, permanently, if this was not fixed, but the workers had not yet been told.
A nonionic detergent (Triton 101) was tried by the author in a laboratory size tank, and it solved the problem. Stirring was typically done in plating tanks by having some air bubbling upwards, so there was a small amount of foam. The author and his loyal technician went to Richmond and added the detergent, scaling up the amount in proportion to the tank volumes, lab versus production. It turned out that the detergent was not very soluble, so it mostly collected on the top surface of the plating solution, which called for an "area" scale-up proportional to the square of lab tank width, versus the square of the production tank width, not the cubic "volume" scale-up that we actually used. Excess nonionic detergent caused the entire tankload of very poisonous, green copper sulfate solution to foam up over the side of the huge tank, like a green monster in a horror movie.
Fortunately, it all went down into the safety floor drain.
Unfortunately, the piping had mistakenly been directed (by the plumbers, a long time ago) to the sanitary waste treatment plant instead of its chemical counterpart, and the copper killed all the beneficial bacteria in the sand filters. Then it continued out the sewer pipe and contaminated the James River, a popular fishing site. With no operable waste treatment, the factory had to be closed and the workers furloughed without pay. Upon returning to the research laboratory, the author's loyal technician told the lab manager, "Dan always said 'If you have to fail, fail big. Then they can't let you sink, and they have to give you another chance.' And he did fail big --- we shut down the biggest printed circuit plant in the world, and we polluted the James River fishery!"
During a frantic week of experiments, the correct amount of detergent was used, the problem was solved, and now the plant is still running (under different ownership). However, the factory workers only seemed to care about the loss of a week's pay, since they hadn't been told about the mass layoffs if we had failed. There are some plant workers in Richmond that the author still would not like to meet face to face in a dark alley.
For the next "war story" in this series, click on:
"Texas Fire and Spoiled Cars"
-----------------------------------------
For Dan's resume ("CV"), click on:
" Dan's CV "
