Marvin Pipkin

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Marvin Pipkin (Nov. 18, 1889 - Jan. 7, 1977), American chemist and inventor of two processes for inside frosting of incandescent lamp bulbs.

Born near Lakeland, Florida, Pipkin attended Alabama Polytechnic Institute and received a Batchelor of Science degree in Chemical Engineering in 1913 and a Master's in 1915. In 1917 Pipkin enlisted in the US Army [1] and was assigned work on gas masks. His wartime work was at the General Electric Nela Park laboratory in Cleveland where he remained after the war.

In 1925 Pipkin developed a process for etching the inside of a lamp bulb with acid, using a two-step process so that the lamp would not be excessively weakened. In 1947 a silica coating process also invented by Pipkin replaced the etching. [2]

Pipkin retired back to Lakeland in 1954, and died of cancer in 1977.

[edit] Patents

  • (U.S. Patent No. 1,687,510)
  • (U.S. Patent No. 2,545,896)

[edit] References

Pipkin biography retrieved 2006 June 27

  1. ^ http://fpc.dos.state.fl.us/memory/Collections/WWI/card.cfm?intOurDocID=21959 Marvin Pipkin's induction card retrieved March 21, 2008
  2. ^ Incandescent Lamps, General Electric Technical Publication TP 110,Nela Park, 1964 page 3