Decelith

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Logo of the Decelith brand of the former Eilenburg celluloid factory, protected in 1958 . This logo was already in use for record production in the 1930s.

Decelith (compound from the acronym of the company name De suction Ce lluloid factory and of ancient Greek λίθος lithos , German , stone ' ) is the trade name of a thermoplastic resin on PVC basis, whose production was recorded 1936th In its early days, the name was particularly popular thanks to the Decelith sound foil , the first German “vinyl record”. In addition, semi-finished products made from Decelith were and are the starting material for a large number of different production goods. During the GDR era, the slogan was Decelith from Eilenburgin use for promotional purposes and made the product widely known. The patent holder was initially the German Celluloid Factory in Eilenburg as part of the IG Farben concern. The successor company Eilenburger Celluloid-Werk (ECW) stuck to this brand name. To this day, PVC compounds are manufactured in Eilenburg under the name Decelith by the successor company Polyplast Compound Werk (PCW GmbH).

history

With the patent specification No. 655950 at the Reich Patent Office , the German Celluloid Factory in Eilenburg patented the process for the production of uniform foils and panels from polyvinyl compounds on March 11, 1934. On December 3, 1935, the Decelith trademark was registered by the DCF. The new type of Decelith was initially launched on the market as a semi-finished product in the form of foils, sheets and pipes as well as hoses mixed with plasticizers .

An unused blank Decelith record, as it was produced until 1945. The date stamp “23. Oct. 1948 “is not related to the production and must have been applied afterwards.

The production of vinyl records turned out to be groundbreaking . The first attempts at a vinyl record based on PVC were undertaken in 1930 by the British RCA Records , but these were commercially unsuccessful. The natural substance shellac , which was mainly used until then, was more expensive compared to PVC and had to be imported. Against the background of the desired economic autarky of Nazi Germany , synthetic plastic was able to prevail early on for record production. In addition, the decelith plate was also technically convincing: it was suitable for a wide frequency range, had a low distortion factor and was resistant to aging and largely insensitive to moisture ("tropicalized"), in particular to shellac.

The Decelith self-cut foil was presented at the Great German Radio Exhibition in 1936 (according to other sources in 1939) in Berlin. It consisted of a hardened, elastic carrier and was coated on both sides with a soft, dark absorbent layer. A patent was granted on March 4, 1939 (patent number 731516) for the process invented by Kurt Thinius for the production of recording discs. Another patent certificate from the Reich Patent Office on the process of making records (patent number 725712) is dated February 7, 1941.

Decelith records made it possible to produce small editions and were therefore referred to as self-recording records . The production was done in the formats 30, 25 and 20 centimeters, whereby the 30 cm plate allowed a sound recording of about four minutes. They were used, among other things, by the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft (RRG; z. B. in Zeitfunk for the production of a "sounding newspaper" and for the production of archive recordings), by the Wehrmacht (among other things as " talking field post ") and for home use and were used throughout the empire.

At the end of the Second World War, the DCF manufactured panes of transparent decelith as a makeshift solution for missing window glass, as well as decelith shoe soles to replace the rubber soles otherwise used. After the end of the war, among other things, the record production section was completely dismantled and not rebuilt on the orders of the Soviet military administration . The decelith plates were still in use on the radio until the 1950s, when they were replaced by the cheaper magnetic tapes . Decelith plates were sometimes used commercially until the 1960s.

The production of Decelith semi-finished products, on the other hand, was further expanded despite partial dismantling. With the Crepe Decelith developed in 1950, an attempt was made to develop a replacement for the usual rubber tires on bicycles. However, due to serious technical defects, production was quickly discontinued. A Decelith adhesive, which was also developed in GDR times, turned out to be carcinogenic due to the evaporation of solvents and was withdrawn from the market. In 1960 the company, now trading as Eilenburger Celluloid-Werk (ECW), brought Decelith granules onto the market for the first time. The product range grew to include around 200 different types of granulate. Decelith was used in practically all areas of life, for example the ECW supplied consumer goods production, construction, the electrical and automotive industries, the agricultural and food industries, as well as the packaging industry and shipbuilding. The ECW also produced various consumer goods itself (cf. consumer goods production in the GDR ).

After the fall of the Wall in 1989, only the compound production or the blending of raw materials for further shaping processing survived in Eilenburg. In 2006, the Polyplast Müller Group acquired the trademark rights to Decelith with the purchase of the Eilenburger Compound plant and has since operated as Polyplast Compound Plant (PCW) at the old location of the DCF and the ECW. Today Decelith is the trade name for rigid and soft PVC mixtures, which are used in a variety of ways, including in the construction, electrical and automotive industries. Corresponding granulate also serves as a starting material for the growing record market .

Decelith in art and other areas of application

As a supplement to the wood engraving , the graphic artist Siegfried Ratzlaff developed the decelith stitch technique. The Decelith plates required for this are no longer produced today.

The material was also used to seal railway tunnels.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Wilhelm Pape , Max Sengebusch (arrangement): Concise dictionary of the Greek language . 3rd edition, 6th impression. Vieweg & Sohn, Braunschweig 1914 ( zeno.org [accessed November 2, 2020]).
  2. ↑ https://www.pcw.gmbh/de/produkte/decelith-pvc-compounds/ PVC product range from PCW GmbH, accessed on November 2, 2020
  3. ↑ Dr. Gerd Sachert, Andreas Flegel, Adrian Bircken: Decelith from Eilenburg from minute 3:30 (accessed on November 2, 2020)
  4. ↑ Nadine Bretz: On the restoration and archiving of the decelith plate inventory of the multimedia collections (Universalmuseum Joanneum) , Bachelor thesis (2013), p. 14 (accessed on November 2, 2020)
  5. ↑ Udo Hinkel: A forgotten medium: Phonopost in the Second World War (1940-1944) , Master's thesis at the Institute for Literary Studies at the University of Karlsruhe (1998), p. 36 (accessed on November 2, 2020)
  6. ↑ a b c o. A .: Where the vinyl record was once invented in Leipziger Volkszeitung , 12./13. September 2020, page 37
  7. ↑ Dr. Gerd Sachert, Andreas Flegel, Adrian Bircken: Decelith from Eilenburg from minute 3:30 (accessed on November 2, 2020)
  8. ^ Wolfgang Beuche: The industrial history of Eilenburg. Part I: 1803-1950. Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2008, ISBN 978-3-8370-5843-7 , page 61f.
  9. ↑ Digitized version of the patent specification in the forum grammophon-platten.de (accessed on November 2, 2020)
  10. ↑ Novel self-recording record. In:  Helios. Trade journal for electrical engineering / Helios. Export magazine for electrical engineering , September 27, 1936, p. 31 (online at ANNO ).Template: ANNO / Maintenance / hel
  11. ↑ Nadine Bretz: On the restoration and archiving of the decelith plate inventory of the multimedia collections (Universalmuseum Joanneum) , Bachelor thesis (2013), p. 19 (accessed on November 2, 2020)
  12. ↑ The "Tönende Zeitung" is printed. In:  Kleine Volks-Zeitung , July 24, 1938, p. 17 (online at ANNO ).Template: ANNO / Maintenance / kvz
  13. ^ Sound Recording of the German Radio. In:  Helios. Trade journal for electrical engineering / Helios. Export-Zeitschrift für Elektrotechnik , March 6, 1938, p. 107 (online at ANNO ).Template: ANNO / Maintenance / hel
  14. ↑ Self-recording label - Decelith on the page grammophon-platten.de (accessed on October 7, 2020)
  15. ^ Wolfgang Beuche: The industrial history of Eilenburg. Part I: 1803-1950. Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2008, ISBN 978-3-8370-5843-7 , page 73
  16. ↑ Nadine Bretz: On the restoration and archiving of the decelith plate inventory of the multimedia collections (Universalmuseum Joanneum) , Bachelor thesis (2013), p. 20 (accessed on November 2, 2020)
  17. ↑ Decelith sound foils on the website of the museum in Grafenschloss Diez (accessed on November 2, 2020)
  18. ^ Wolfgang Beuche: The industrial history of Eilenburg. Part I: 1803-1950. Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2008, ISBN 978-3-8370-5843-7 , page 75
  19. ^ Wolfgang Beuche: The industrial history of Eilenburg. Part II: 1950-1989. Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2009, ISBN 978-3-8391-3043-8 , page 34
  20. ↑ Decelith® PVC Compounds on the PCW GmbH website (accessed October 7, 2020)
  21. ↑ Plastic in the railway tunnel. In:  Free Voices. German Kärntner Landes-Zeitung / Free votes. Southern German-Alpine daily newspaper. Deutsche Kärntner Landeszeitung , April 5, 1938, p. 8 (online at ANNO ).Template: ANNO / Maintenance / fst