Manufacture of specialty surface active agents requires complex chemistry but can be carried out in standard process vessels using relatively simple procedures. Process Chemicals Co. makes over 300 different products, including surfactants of all three major types-anionic, cationic, and nonionic.Process Chemicals makes relatively small amounts of each of its products, thus has many process vessels, each as versatile as possible. Its reactors are either stainless steel or glass-lined. Analytical control is by physical and chemi cal properties and by use tests, such as Launder-Ometer, as well. A major manufacturing problem is efficient control of inventories of raw materials and intermediates.
An investigation of the principles of catalyzed crystalliza tion of glass, stemming from earlier development of photo sensitive glasses, has led to a new field of glass technology and a new class of materials called glass-ceramics. CorningGlass Works has adopted the trade-name Pyroceram for the new material.Glass-ceramics are fine-grained crystalline materials made from a wide range of special glasses containing nucleat ing agents, by a controlled process of cooling and reheating. The manufacturing process has the advantages of low cost, versatile glass-melting and fabrication, while the products have unique and useful combinations of physical, chemical, and electrical properties leading to applications beyond the capabilities of most glasses and ceramics.