The Tray Test Column

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For a good part of the time I was in chemical engineering research, the experimental facilities were situated at various places — the tray test column for example was in the pilot plant area at Emeryville while other experiments and tests were done at the Berkeley lab — a facility that Shell rented for several years in the 1950s. When Shell purchased the old Western Electric building across the street from the original Shell N building, they converted the building into labs and offices and the chemical engineering department was allotted unified and improved facilities.

At considerable expense the tray test column was moved to a location outside the new lab facilities, but to my recollection it was never actually operated again in its new location. By then fractionation research had progressed to the point that any further simulator tests were passé. I have a few mementoes of the column which had played such an important part in my work.

The original column was rectangular in cross section (about 3 feet by 5 feet) and had glass panels for the sides of three trays so that a clear visual picture of the air/water contact and flow could be observed. These panels, then, were as large as slightly less than 3 feet by 5 feet. They were thick plate glass, polished etc on each side so that the image viewed through them would be clear for photography of the operating tray. Although the pressure in the column was not high (max perhaps 12 inches to 18 inches of water column) it was high enough that a material such as glass the size of the panels needed to be rather thick to withstand the pressure and the panels were 3/4 inch thick. I wasn’t in on the planning of the column construction but the glass panels must have cost a mint.

The panels were sealed against the flat sides of the column by a gasket between the panel and the column with external pressure applied along the panel edges by a heavy metal strip. The strip was of course also gasketed against the glass and the pressure was applied by bolts attached to the column and passing through the metal strip. Even though every effort had been made to have the sides of the column flat and the use of the gaskets softened minor irregularities on the column sides, the process of tighetning the hold down metal strips was a tricky process. It was easy to apply uneven pressure via the hold down bolts so that a torque would be applied on the glass panel and it would crack.

Eventually, they were replaced in whole or in part by 1/2-inch thick Plexiglas panels which worked well. One of the broken glass panels had an end broken so that a recoverable piece approximately 3 feet by 4 feet could be cut from it and, since the panel was unusable in its broken state and since the use of the Plexiglas panels had been adopted, I asked for the broken panel and was given it. Eventually I converted it into a glass top coffee table. To do this I had to have the broken edge repaired and Ray knew someone who would attempt the task; the repair wasn’t totally perfect but it was quite good and so it is now part of the coffee table downstairs here. The glass piece is heavy; I doubt that I could ever lift it by myself and certainly not at this stage in my life.

The other memento I have of the column is a stainless steel bubble cap which presently sits on the fireplace mantel downstairs. When the research on the column started the caps were standard devices placed on the trays in most fractionation columns. They varied in size and design and the one I have is a design that Shell developed for its own use. Eventually the research led into other types of contacting trays and trays with bubble caps fell into disuse, except for very special applications. The unit at Emeryville had enough of these caps for three test trays and when they became obsolete I acquired one of them as a memento.

When I wrote about the coffee table, I was reminded that the wood in it was also salvaged material. When we lived at 411 Bonnie Drive we had as next door neighbors Claude and Grace Weeks; Grace was one of the D’Addiego clan, one member of which was in the house razing business. Claude mentioned to me that this latter individual was tearing down an old house in Berkeley, where the Baptist(?) divinity school was expanding and that the living/dining area in this old house was oak paneled, and anyone who wanted to could go there and take whatever wood was desired. So I went and the room was indeed a treasure trove to a salvage-minded person.

I think I was one of the first scroungers to investigate the room, but I made the mistake of limiting my attention to the ornate moulding. After I was home and had reflected for a day or so, I realized that I should have taken a supply of the paneling itself — which consisted of 3/4-inch thick oak pieces, about 10 to 12 inches wide and maybe 5 to 6 feet long. So I went back but most of the paneling have been taken; I did gather up from what was left and the supply I got has served me well over the years — I still have oddments left. It was from this second visit lumber that I made the legs and frame for the coffee table.

I have also used this oak lumber for making an extension of the sides of the Victorian bedroom set that Jean acquired from her folks, so that the bed was long enough for a mattress of queen size length (but of course, not queen size width) and, most recently for the legs of he sane table I made for when both Palma’s and Laurel’s were visiting here over the Fourth of July a couple of years back. The moulding has largely been used up for various picture frames.

The tray test column was also the basis for my becoming involved with an individual from the service engineering department, who came to be known as “Machinist Brown.” He was a portly, faintly obnoxious character who was assigned to do some mechanical work on the column. The column had been in use for some [time] when this work was being done and in various places in the column there were small accumulations of liquid mercury [soot?]. This mercury had its source from the various mercury manometers attached to the column for pressure difference measurements; these had been on occasion out-ranged so that the manometers had “blown” thus discharging the mercury into the column.

I suppose an effort was made to recover what could be recovered but inevitably some remained. I suppose that environmental regulations would now require a thorough de-contamination of the apparatus, but in those days a much more tolerant policy and attitude was in effect, both as far as Shell and the government was concerned. Liquid mercury is pretty harmless in my opinion, but I suppose in a poorly ventilated place the vapor pressure might be enough to result in possible injurious air concentrations.

Anyway, Machinist Brown was wearing an ornate gold ring when he was working on the column and the ring chanced to come in contact with some of the residual mercury, and of course the mercury immediately amalgamated with the gold and the ring turned white. Why he was wearing such a valuable ring when he was engaged in mechanical work is beyond me, but it was probably a clue to his character. When he saw what had happened to his ring he complained loudly and the event came noticeably to the attention of the chemical engineering personnel. I don’t know what the eventual outcome of the affair was, but we had no further relations with Machinist Brown, both at his and our instigation.