Pick And Shovel

ALCOA OPENS 2ND CHEMICAL PLANT UNIT

The new Chemical Products Plant of Aluminum Company of America here in Bauxite is 50% complete, with two of the four production units in operation.

Carl R. Stout, Manager of Refining Division, announced that operation of the second production unit of the plant began May 17 coincident with the opening of National Chemical Progress Week, sponsored by Manufacturing Chemists' Association.

In his announcement, Mr. Stout said: "These new and enlarged facilities demonstrate our faith both in the dynamic aspects of the chemicals market and in the wide horizons open to chemicals producers and users alike."

The newly-operating Chemical Products Plant unit will produce specially-calcined aluminas. Alumina hydrate (Al2O3 · 3H2O), the basic material used, is procured from the adjacent Alumina Refining Plant.

The hydrate, in the form of slurry, is pumped to the second unit where it is washed and filtered to remove impurities.

After a second washing stage, the hydrate is fed to rotary kilns in the form of "filter cake." In the kilns, critical control of time and temperature provides differing crystals and particle growth during calcination. From the kilns, the aluminas go to a series of 600,000-pound bulk storage bins.

THIRD PLANT JUNE FIRST

Some of the alumina is shipped to customers from bulk storage. The remaining will be processed further in the third plant unit - scheduled for first operation about June 1 -- which will consist of grinding and blending equipment for specially-calcined aluminas.

Aluminas will be blended, or both ground and blended, in the third unit. Modern facilities—such as carload lot blenders—will be used to insure that calcined aluminas have maximum consistency in particle size, and maximum uniformity of properties.

Throughout the two new units, the most modern handling techniques are employed wherever practical. Extensive use is made of pneumatic and vibrating conveyors.

The calcined aluminas produced vary in crystal and particle size between approximately 1/2 and 15 microns, and in particle size ranging to 150 microns. The differing sizes and forms of particles are responsible
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for the properties of the various finished products. Such properties as shrinkage on firing to form electrical insulators and refractories, ability to be wet by oils to form metal polishing blocks, and degree of abrasiveness, are thus controlled by the processing.

The chemicals which will be processed in the two new Chemical Products Plant units all fall within the "A" series of Alcoa aluminas. This series consists of a group of highly uniform calcined aluminas, which differ in particle size, type of crystal, and soda content. Because such properties as resistance to extremely high temperatures and hardness close to that of the diamond, these aluminas have extremely broad applications. Some of these uses are: as fused abrasives such as grinding wheels and emery paper; in ceramic products such as tile, chinaware, enamels, and heat-resisting glass; and as an electrical insulator in spark plugs and supports for electric heating elements. There are three aluminas specially prepared as polishing grade products, used in hard metal polishes and in grease block abrasives.

The original Chemical Products Plant unit, completed in April, supplies another "family" of aluminas: Hydrated Aluminas, C-30 Series. The fourth unit, scheduled for operation during the summer, will produce still another group of alumina chemicals, Tabular Aluminas.