BULK AND COMMERCIAL PRODUCTION

Apart from poly(phenylene sulfide) (P(PS)), which was produced in bulk long before the field of CPs was established and the dopability of P(PS) was understood (see Chapter 14 for a description of the bulk production process for P(PS)), P(ANi), and to a lesser extent, some of the poly(3-alkyl thiophenes), have been the major CPs which have been bulk produced and marketed. 

P(ANi) has been marketed for some time as a chemically polymerized, proprietary-sulfonate-doped CP under the tradename Versicon, Originally produced by the Allied Signal Corp. based in Morristown, NJ, USA, the product line was taken over in the mid-1990 s by the High Performance Materials division of Monsanto Co., St. Louis, MO, USA. 

Around April 1998, Monsanto sold the product line to Ormecon Chemie, a subsidiary of Zipperling Kessler, based in Ammersbek (near Hamburg), Germany. As of this writing, this firm continues to produce bulk Versicon. The PVC dispersion, called Incoblend , is claimed to be injection-moldable. Neste Oy, Helsinki, Finland, and Hexcel Corp., also test marketed P(ANi) and P(3AT) powders for example one of the product lines of Neste Oy included poly(3-octyl thiophene) chemically polymerized using FeCla and with a weight-average MWt of ca. 89,000 [157]. 

As of 1996, the production plant at Monsanto was still pilot-scale. Typical properties of Versicon were Compacted powder conductivity 4 S/cm, moisture 4% w/w, particle size 3 - 100 /i, density 1.36 g/cc, surface area 5-20 m /g. Also produced on a pilot scale by Monsanto was a soluble P(ANi) , a green liquid which is a blend of 50% colloidal P(ANi), 40% xylenes and 10% butyl cellulose. P(ANi) was at one time also marketed by AmeriChem, Inc., Cleveland, OH, USA, in collaboration with Monsanto, and by PolySciences Inc., Pittsburgh, PA, USA. Other dispersions of P(ANi) in PVC, Nylon-12, and other thermoplastics were also, in the mid-1990 s, in the test marketing stage in collaboration with Zipperling Kessler Co.. 

Several other companies have bulk produced CPs in house, to be marketed as products Milliken Research Corp, Spartanburg, SC, USA, P(Py)-coated textiles for microwave absorption, electrostatic dissipation and related uses Echema Co. has produced conductive electrodes incorporating P(ANi) Bridgestone-Seiko, Japan, and Siemens, Germany, have attempted unsuccessfully to market CP-based batteries BASF, Ludwigshaven, Germany, also attempted unsuccessfully to market several CP (P(Py), P(ANi)) products such as films, particulate fillers and batteries Matsushita Co., Higashimita, Japan, apparently still markets P(Py)-based Al-electrolytic 

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