Thomas, I cant believe that after a 4 year hiatus I re-subscribed to ccp4bb for the sole purpose of making a post on the history and evolution of foam Dewars at the ALS! Until a few days ago I had been living life blissfully unaware of the foam Dewar thread. Then for some reason you began copying me on e-mails you were sending to Berkeley Lab /BCSB management about this thread. Since Ive not worked in the Lab/BCSB for a number of years Ive absolutely no idea why you felt I should be copied on these e-mails. My initial reaction was to just shake my head in wonder. But, given how earnestly you are demanding clarity on the history of foam dewars at the ALS, I now feel obligated to post my recollections of this work. Even though Im totally convinced that no one else in the world really cares! I initiated the search for a safe alternative to glass vacuum Dewars after watching one roll off a bench and implode when it hit the floor. This resulted in the razor sharp glass shards being embedded in surfaces remarkably far from the spot where the Dewar hit the floor. Clearly, continued use of these Dewars was a serious accident waiting to happen, and it was only going to be a short time before an ALS User got badly injured. Consequently, I was highly motivated that we work towards developing a safe replacement. A number of people worked on early Dewar designs, most notably James Holton and George Meigs. As was the case with Jon Spear, I dont believe any of these people were in your group at that time. The initial prototypes were manufactured from stainless steel, and worked but not very well. I think James Holton started work on making Dewars from some kind of foam material, or at least suggested it. Jon Spears initial purple foam Dewar was made from a yoga block he bought from a local drug store. I immediately adopted these Dewars as the replacement for glass in all of the BCSB beamlines since they were relatively cheap, had excellent thermal properties and remained relatively frost free even after extended use. To this day I cant understand why anyone is still taking the risk inherent in using glass vacuum Dewars where there are much safer alternatives on the market. Hopefully this clears up any confusion, and I dont get any more e-mail about it. ..its feels like Im back in 2003! Apologies to everyone who read this post, even though they care not a jot about the history of foam Dewars at the ALS. Cheers, Gerry
