Alexander Parkes
Alexander Parkes ( born December 29, 1813 in Birmingham, † June 29, 1890 in Dulwich, England ) was a metallurgist and inventor who invented, among other things, the celluloid.
Life
He was the son of a manufacturer of brass locks, brass foundry was filed with the Messenger and Sons apprenticed and worked for George and Henry Elkington, who had patented the electroplating process. Parkes was used in the casting department and soon became interested in the recently discovered electroplating. In 1841 he received his first patent for electroplating delicate works of art. 1850, he developed and patented the Parkes process. In 1855, he developed Parkesine, the first thermoplastic material, for in London, he received a prize at the World Expo 1862.
In 1866 he founded The Parkesine Company in Hackney Wick, London, for mass production. However, he had no success because Parkesine was expensive to produce, prone to cracking, and was highly flammable. His partner Daniel Spill it developed further, calling it in an improved form Xylonite. This led to a patent dispute with John Wesley Hyatt, the developer of celluloid in the U.S. in 1870., The Court ruled that Parkes, the inventor was.
He had more than 80, according to other sources 46 patents, mainly for metallurgy.
With his first wife he had eight children with his second wife twelve children.
Parkes process
In the smelting of lead ore produced impure, also containing silver bullion. This is treated with about 2 % of zinc, which takes the silver itself and the surface of the lead forms a foam which can be skimmed off. Said foam containing zinc, lead and silver. The zinc is evaporated. Lead and silver remain in a 1:1 ratio. Then the Kupellation done. The lead-silver mixture is mixed and heated with air, wherein the lead is oxidized and is discharged through channels. Sometime tears on the last layer of lead and silver look peeps out. (Later was in anode plates poured refining by electrolysis. )
Weblink
- Alexander Parkes - Materials Man and polymath (in English)