A SHORT HISTORY OF PHILITE

Richard Schoevaart

The Philips Company (“Royal Philips”) in Eindhoven, Holland, was one of many factories in the world that exploited Leo Baekeland’s invention.

At present we know Philips as a manufacturer of a wide range of electrical and electronic products, but originally it was an electric light bulb factory.

After its foundation, in 1891, it grew very quickly and it soon became one the largest light bulb manufacturers in the world. This rapid expansion caused an increasing need for independence from suppliers of raw materials and components. This is even more understandable, when one realises the isolated position of the neutral Netherlands during World War I.

Gerard Philips, one of the founders (Philips was a real family company), considered self-sufficiency to be of extreme importance. He hired skilful contractors to enable Philips to make their own machinery (which was quite uncommon for a lamp factory at the time). The factory strived for the ability to make everything themselves.

As a result, Philips started their own glassworks for the light bulbs, their own porcelain factory, and their own bakelite factory in 1923, which was dictated by a growing need for bakelite: after WW I Philips had started to produce radio valves, radio mains sets, and all kinds of radio parts. From 1926 on they would produce complete radio sets as well.

“PHILITE”, the brand name, was actually regular bakelite (moulded phenol-formaldehyde), based on the process invented by Leo Baekeland. However, the brand name “Bakelite” was still protected at the time, and when employees of the Philite factory mentioned the word “bakelite” they risked a 25 cent fine!

A human resources manager who visited technical colleges and universities for recruiting purposes remembers that even round 1980 (Philite production had ceased by then!) he was urged not to mention the “B”word. When asked about the difference between Philite and bakelite, he could “hide” behind the fact that it was a company secret. The difference wouldn’t have been so much the basic process as the recipes of the numerous variations for all kinds of special applications.

At first moulding powder was imported ready-made from Belgium. It’s known that Philips was a client of Ebena manufacturers in Wijneghem (Belgium), who were already very experienced in using bakelite and other moulding products, like copal resin, so it’s not unlikely that the knowledge acquired there was used by Philips for improving their own manufacturing processes. For manufacturing bakelite, like for the other basic materials, it was important to control the process, so that the compound could match the demands of the finished product precisely. After some time Philips managed to manufacture their own high quality moulding powders. One step further was pre-pressing the moulding powder into tablets which contained the exact amount of material for a certain product. This would save material and it was less dusty.

The Philite factory differed somewhat from the other divisions of the company. A distinct atmosphere prevailed. One of the reasons was the working in three shifts, unlike the rest of the company: the machinery (the presses) and the tools for making Philite were so expensive that the products would become far too expensive if the equipment couldn’t be used continuously. The process itself was very low in noise. The most striking sound was the cleaning of the moulds with compressed air.

Making moulds for thermosetting plastics is not an easy job. They are made from very tough steel, which is understandable if one realizes the high pressure resistance the press needs to have. Moreover, mould making requires a lot of handwork. At first, good mould makers with Philips were foreigners (mainly Germans, and some from Czechoslovakia and Hungary). The change came with the founding by Philips of the “Jongens Nijverheidsschool” (the Industry School for boys) in 1928, a school with universally valid diplomas. This way Philips also strived to develop their own highly qualified staff. So after 1928 the moulds were manufactured in their own tool workshop, which was part of the machine factory.

Although many very different products were made in the Philite factory, for construction industry as well as household purposes, the manufacturing of radio parts was core business: fronts, backs, bottoms, lids and complete housings were made, not to forget the speakers.

The first speaker introduced by Philips was the famous dish-shaped one, made in Philite, the 2003 in 1925.  Philips was probably the first company in the world to build a speaker into a bakelite (Philite) housing.

The Speakers were issued in several vibrant colourings. The colour effect was achieved by placing some coloured moulding powder by hand in the mould before the actual pressing took place. The revolutionary design (the looks as well as the technical part) changed the dish speaker from users’ object to ornamental object. Eventually the dish was issued in three sizes. The largest was at that time world record holder being the largest moulded piece of bakelite.

Shortly after the dish a cheaper model was put into the market to serve the less wealthy part of the public. The technical specifications were the same, but the housing was restricted to a heptagonal Philite edge, which left the paper cone unprotected.

In the early years of selling radios (1926-1930), Philips hardly calculated the real cost prices, since initially the margins of profit were very high. Things changed radically when the economic world crisis struck, which after some time would affect Philips as well: in 1930 some 750 people were employed at the Philite factory, from a total of 28,000 worldwide. When in 1931 orders slumped and sales started to decrease, people had to be fired in order to secure the company. In 1933 the number of staff had diminished to 16,000 worldwide, and at the Philite factory to 450.

In order to keep the presses going during the crisis, Philite was obliged to start making all kinds of non-company specific products. Very soon the diversity was so huge, that customers couldn’t tell any connection between the new and the core products. As a consequence, for the first time much effort was put into developing good documentation, attractive advertising leaflets and catalogues, something that hadn’t been necessary up until then.

The non-specific articles proved to be very successful. Several items which already appeared in the 1931 catalogue were still being made in the late 1950s such as the two illustrated below!

A very interesting Philite product (this one was also stimulated by the crisis-related search for new products) was the rotary dry shaver, the Philishave. The Philite housing served as a motor frame and handle at the same time, and the result was nice and compact cigar-shaped apparatus. The Philishave came into the market in 1939, with one shaving head. For some time it was only moderately successful, but it became a smash hit when in the late 1940s very ergonomically shaped models in white ureaformaldehyde were issued. The white urea two headed shaver, issued in 1951, was the basis for the growth to being the biggest manufacturer of electric shavers that Philips eventually would become.

The Philishave was a nice example of development activities, targeted at articles for daily use. But Philips was also constantly busy in very different fields, like for instance X-ray research: it was one of Philips presidents, Anton Philips’ ambition to have the whole

Dutch population X-rayed for tuberculosis, which was one of the most dangerous endemic diseases at the time. The quality demands for the products Philips had to make for the Röntgen factory were extremely high. They were Philite parts that were to be resistant to extremely high voltages. The mouldings needed to be very dense and homogenous, without the tiniest crack or other irregularity. It speaks for itself that the labourers needed to be extremely skillful and careful.

During World War II the company was challenged to define an attitude against the occupying powers. One had to compromise between keeping the company together, and trying to contribute to the German war effort as little as possible. Philips was responsible for 19.000 employees (and their families) in The Netherlands, and one had to try and make the German occupation bearable for them. There dilemma was which production was to be interrupted and which was to be continued, not to mention that there was a continuous threat of staff being deported to Germany.

After some time the factory was able to produce articles (for instance radio valves), which passed the Germans’ quality tests, but had a considerably shorter lifespan than the regular ones.

Frits Philips even managed to arrange an assembly line for Philishaves in the Dutch concentration camp Vught, so that imprisoned Philips employees became more indispensable, preventing them from deportation.

The Philite plant survived the war undamaged as it wasn’t a strategic bombing target for the allies, because no essential parts for German telecommunication were produced there.

Although part of the city of Eindhoven’s population owed prosperity to the Philite factory, the opinions weren’t always that positive: a weblog exists on which Eindhoven residents reminisce the Philite factory. The general opinion is that it always smelled bad (especially the phenol odour must have been unbearable). Moreover, when the wind blew from the “wrong” direction, white laundry was contaminated by little dark coloured particles, coming from the Philite plant.

After the war Philips (and thus Philite) flourished, but the products, although of high quality, were less striking than those of the pre-war “heyday” period. The looks of radio cabinets were more sober than their predecessors. Furthermore large numbers of household objects of simple looking design, like toilet seats and door handles, were produced n the 1970s the Philite factory became part of  “Philips PMF” (Philips Plastics and Metalware Factories), and the Philite brand ceased to exist.

Although the of thermosetting plastics’ days seemed to be numbered (as many thermoplastics were cheaper and less production-extensive), certain “niches” remained exclusive territory for duroplastics, like the phenolics, urea- and melamine- formaldehyde. We are referring to materials in which good electrical insulation and heat resistance are both present.

So nowadays Philips still makes thermosetting plastics, but their applications are usually (literally) out of sight: we can find them under the hood in cars, or in electronic equipment.

And the exuberant designs from Philite’s heyday? They enjoy lots of attention from an increasing number of collectors.

Bibliography:

-A. Horowitz, A. van Dam and W.H. van der Mei: “Het Electrisch Scheerapparaat “Philishave””. Philips Technisch Tijdschrift, December 1939, pp. 367-371.

-Philips, Frits, 1976: “45 Jaar met Philips” (3^rd printing, 1979). A. Donker, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

-Various authors, 1981: “Bakeliet. Techniek, Vormgeving, Gebruik”. Catalogue for bakelite exhibition in Museum Boymans van Beuningen, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.

-Various authors, 1987: “Ebena 1921-1931. Articles de fantaisie et articles industriels. Sammlung Kölsch”. Catalogue for exhibitions of the Kölsch Collection in Antwerp (Belgium) and Düsseldorf, Germany in 1987.

-Guus Bekooy, S. Derks, J. Haneveer and F van der Put, 1991: “Philips Honderd”. Europese Bibliotheek b.v., Zaltbommel, The Netherlands