This is a list of team members who have made contributions to date:
Stewart Alsop
Tom Burrow
Iain Jack
Mike Perry
Glyn Raven
Jim Rowan
Ted Richards (Annual Reports)
Kunihiko Tozaki
Pat White (Technical Director and Research Manager)
Also
David Pike (ex Greenwood Mills - USA)
Calvin Woodings (Admin)
Please add any recollections or observations which would be of interest to our readers as a comment at the end of this page. It will be transferred to a Post and Folder as appropriate.
8 comments:
I was the engineer responsible for the pilot plant in Lockhust lane and would be happy to contribute what I can remember of this project.
Mike Perry
mandmperry@tiscali.co.uk
Thanks Mike, I've added you to the list and look forward to whatever you can write. Commenting is easiest and if you make a long comment I can upgrade it to a Post. If you can do something like Stewart Alsop (for a start) that would be marvellous! If you prefer to email it that's fine too. I have no problem cutting and pasting. Cheers! Calvin (cw@nonwoven.co.uk)
Calvin, I don't really understand how this blog works, but here are the 4 patents where I'm named as co-inventor ...
IMPROVEMENT IN COMMINUTING WOOD PULP SHEETING
United States Patent WO/1994/028233 Issued May 20, 1994
Inventors: Iain Jack, Gary Gary
Wood pulp sheeting used as feedstock in a cellulosic fibre production plant is comminuted by hooking laminated platelets of wood pulp from a pluri-layer web of such sheeting and agitating the platelets in a fan generating a conveying gas stream to delaminate the platelets and individually separate them into torn pieces of wood pulp sheeting.
PUMPING OF CELLULOSE CONTAINING MIXTURES
United States Patent WO/1994/028216 Issued May 20, 1994
Inventors: Iain Jack, Gary Gray
This invention relates to a method of conveying a cellulose containing mixture having a paste or slurry like consistency. In particular, but not exclusively, the mixture comprises cellulose, amine oxide and water. The invention also relates to a system of conveying a cellulose containing liquid mixture.
PREMIX STORAGE HOPPER
United States Patent PCT/GB1994/001099 Issued May 20, 1994
Inventors: Iain Jack, Mike Quigley, Gary Gray
A premix storage hopper for storing a hot, viscous, paste-like mixture containing cellulose dispersed in a solution of tertiary amine oxide and water, comprises a vertical container having a central shaft rotatable about a vertical axis and carrying stirring members and heating means for heating side walls of the container. The invention also relates to a method of storing the cellulose-based...more
IMPROVEMENTS IN AND RELATING TO THE MANUFACTURE OF FEEDSTOCK FOR A PROCESSING OPERATION
United States Patent PCT/GB1994/001103 Issued May 20, 1994
Inventors: Iain Jack, Phil Urwin
A method of making feedstock from material supplied in rolls of flexible sheet material which comprises the steps of creating a pluri-layer web of 'n' different layers of sheet material, each layer being selected with regard to some known parameter property of the sheet material whereby the pluri-layer web has an aggregate value of the selected parameter which lies within a chosen range of values...more
Thanks Iain for a welcome contribution. I'll leave these as a Comment for now and add them to the patents folder one at a time later. The problem is that there is so much material I'm tending to post stuff as it catches my eye, with the earliest taking priority, and trying to keep to a "one post a day" (and 1 hour a day!) average. Looking at the "hits" we're getting its the personal recollections that do best, so I think we need more like Stewart Alsop's and Glyn Raven's memories if we can get them.
Calvin, I will try and put together a few recollections in due course. Here's my earlier post on Facebook
"The process and mechanical design for the original pilot plant was carried out by myself and Mike Perry respectively. I have many memories of the money-no object approach at the time. Particularly trying to modify an old demin water plant with Pete Laity to form the first solvent purification plant, disinterring the world's oldest Z-blade mixer for premix production, and the very "hands on" approach to pulp shredding (sheets torn up during lab tea breaks) and premix feeding (snowballs drop into an airlock by Ruth). Also went to Switzerland with Pat to carry out the first continuous dope making trial at List (but that's a whole other story!)
I was the engineer responsible for the construction of the pilot plants built in the ASF Lab. I remember working with Pat White the major driving force on the project. Without Pat I’m sure that Tencel would have remained a laboratory curiosity. I think we started off with a mutual distrust of each other but as our working relationship continued this grew into respect. I admired his abilities very much and his willingness to experiment. (more to come in a Post)
Gentlemen,
David M. Pike of DPG ENTERPRISES, INC. here. I can help as I was the first person to size 100% Tencel at the old Geeenwood Mills - Lindale Plant - Lindale Ga. location in 1993 & 1995 and 65/35 tencel/cotton in 1995. Email me at davidmpike@dpgenterprises.com and I will assist. I was working with SEYDEL-WOOLLEY & CO. INC. at the time and still have all the technical papers from the slashing of the yarns on an old West Point Foundry slasher #4 with West Point Foundry 863 Equi-Squeeze boxes/ medium pressure (5 ton) for research by Courtalds out of Axis, Alabama plant.
I helped manufacture, in Coventry, by filament winding, a tube of PEEK and glass fibre that was needed for the Alabama factory to make Tencel. We were told that the plant could not start up without this tube. I think it was to go in the flow line prior to the spinnerette and was part of a metal detector system. It had to be non-metallic yet very chemically resistant and strong. No other material could fulfil the requirements at the time, and almost nobody world-wide had the technology to make this unique structure. If this is of interest I could try to recall some more information about how hard the job was.... Jim Rowan
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