Re: Use the Sherman anti-trust act
Poly(vinyl chloride) is the plastic known at the hardware store as PVC. This is the PVC from which pipes are made, and PVC pipe is everywhere. The plumbing in your house is probably PVC pipe, unless it's an older house. PVC pipe is what rural high schools with small budgets use to make goal posts for their football fields. But there's more to PVC than just pipe. The "vinyl" siding used on houses is made of poly(vinyl chloride). Inside the house, PVC is used to make linoleum for the floor. In the seventies, PVC was often used to make vinyl car tops. <br />PVC is useful because it resists two things that hate each other: fire and water. Because of its water resistance it's used to make raincoats and shower curtains, and of course, water pipes. It has flame resistance, too, because it contains chlorine. When you try to burn PVC, chlorine atoms are released, and chlorine atoms inhibit combustion. <br /><br />Structurally, PVC is a vinyl polymer. (well, duh!) It's similar to polyethylene, but on every other carbon in the backbone chain, one of the hydrogen atoms is replaced with a chlorine atom. It's produced by the free radical polymerization of vinyl chloride. <br /><br />History:<br /><br />So in 1912 one German chemist, Fritz Klatte decided to try to do something with it, and reacted some acetylene with hydrochloric acid (HCl). Now, this reaction will produce vinyl chloride, but at that time no one knew what to do with it, so he put it on the shelf, where it polymerized over time. Not knowing what to do with the PVC he had just invented, he told his bosses at his company, Greisheim Electron, who had the material patented in Germany. They never figured out a use for PVC, and in 1925 their patent expired. <br /><br />Wouldn't you know it, in 1926 the very next year, an American chemist, Waldo Semon was working at B.F. Goodrich when he independently invented PVC. But unlike the earlier chemists, it dawned on him that this new material would make a perfect shower curtain. He and his bosses at B.F. Goodrich patented PVC in the United States (Klatte's bosses apparently never filed for a patent outside Germany). Tons of new uses for this wonderful waterproof material followed, and PVC was a smash hit the second time around. <br /><br />Other polymers used as plastics include: <br /><br /><br />Polyethylene <br />Polypropylene <br />Polycarbonate <br />Polystyrene <br />Polyesters <br />Nylon <br />Poly(methyl methacrylate) <br /><br />Source:
http://www.pslc.ws/macrog/pvc.htm <br /><br />_______________________________________________________________<br /><br />Even when you are trying to be smart you are are ???????????? PVC is what is known as a thermoplastic. I just have to laugh.
I know, I used to think that way . . . <br /><br />Conservatives are those who have figured out that all of the supposed complex solutions do nothing but cause inaction.
