Kaylo (Owens-Illinois)

Kaylo was a pipe covering and block insulation from the Kaylo Division of Owens-Illinois Glass Co.^1,2 A 1952 draft of the company's pamphlet "Handling Kaylo Products" describes it as a solid formed by a chemical reaction of lime, white sand and water, "with fibers added to give toughness," and says the name came from the engineers' "K" factor for heat loss.³ The light grade, about 10 lb per cubic foot, was used for pipe, vessel and flat block insulation; the heavy grade, about 20 lb, for roof tile, doors, core material and wall panels.³

How it began

The same draft says Owens-Illinois first turned to the material in 1938 and started a pilot operation in 1942.³ In February 1943 the company's director of research, U. E. Bowes, wrote to the Saranac Laboratory about a new hydrous calcium silicate "in the pilot plant stage," meant for interior structural uses and as industrial insulation for pipe; the letter does not name it, but it is the material that became Kaylo.⁴ Saranac's director, Leroy U. Gardner, answered in March that what they had taken for synthetic asbestos in it "proved to be chrysotile which had been added as a reenforcing agent."⁵

When and where it was made

An insurance company's 1981 list of asbestos products, compiled from other companies' answers in lawsuits, gives Owens-Illinois's Kaylo as made from 1948 to 1958.¹ In December 1948, an Owens-Illinois letter said a subsidiary, the American Structural Products Company, made Kaylo, "a light-weight, white insulating tile or slab."⁶ The U.S. military's list of approved pipe insulation named the Kaylo Division's plants at Berlin and Sayreville, New Jersey, in December 1951; by the November 1958 edition it named only Berlin, under Owens-Corning.² An Aetna insurance survey of the Berlin plant in April and May 1958 still called it the Owens-Illinois Kaylo Division.⁷

A December 1953 equipment dealer's ad in Asbestos magazine offered machinery "purchased and installed new in 1948" by the Owens-Illinois Kaylo Division, to be inspected at its premises in Sayreville.⁸ In 1955 and 1956, the magazine named E. C. Shuman of the Kaylo Division of Owens-Illinois as a speaker on calcium silicate insulation and as an officer of an ASTM insulation committee.^9,10 In May 1959, Philip Carey announced a hire who had been a regional sales manager of "The Kaylo Division of Owens Illinois Glass."¹¹

What it was made of

Owens-Illinois's December 1948 letter lists Kaylo's raw materials as silica flour, diatomaceous earth, hydrated lime and asbestos.⁶ A 1952 company research report says Kaylo dust consists of a hydrous calcium silicate and asbestos.¹²

The sources disagree about the fiber. A September 1948 letter from W. G. Hazard of Owens-Illinois put Kaylo at 15 to 20 percent asbestos "of the amosite and chrysotile varieties," and said more recent Kaylo dust may have held a greater ratio of amosite to chrysotile.¹³ The Saranac Laboratory's 1951 survey of the Kaylo plant listed both amosite and chrysotile among the raw materials, along with tripoli, and describes the opening of a 200 lb. bag of "amosite long-fiber asbestos" there.¹⁴ In 1954, W. C. Taylor of Owens-Illinois's research division computed from chemical and x-ray analyses that Kaylo held 19.8 percent asbestos, all of it chrysotile, and wrote that all the competing products except Kaylo contained amosite.¹⁵ His October 1954 comparison of pipe coverings gave Kaylo's fiber length as short, 3/8" at most, and his June report noted that "the chrysotile fraction in all cases except Kaylo is of a grade finer than #4."¹⁵ The insurer's 1981 list gives 15-25 percent asbestos.¹

Later years: Kaylo under Owens-Corning.

Pictures

How Kaylo (Owens-Illinois) looked: labels, photographs and catalog pages from our library. Each picture has its own page and library number, so it can be cited on its own.

• Product photograph: KAYLO PIPE INSULATION (OWENS-ILLINOIS GLASS COMPANY)Product photograph · ACL Doc 15162
• Package: Kaylo pipe insulation carton (Owens-Illinois Glass Company)Label or package · ACL Doc 20682
• Package: Kaylo Heat Insulation carton (Owens-Corning Fiberglas / Owens-Illinois)Label or package · ACL Doc 20680
• Package: Kaylo pipe insulation carton (Owens-Illinois Glass Company) (2)Label or package · ACL Doc 20681

Asbestos claims

If you or a family member worked with or around Kaylo (Owens-Illinois) and later developed mesothelioma or another asbestos disease, a claim may be paid by the Owens-Illinois Asbestos Personal Injury Trust. Free case review.

What each document says

Every statement about Kaylo (Owens-Illinois) in the documents, in each document's own words.

Kind of product

We list Kaylo (Owens-Illinois) with pipe covering and block insulation, from how the documents describe its form. That page explains how such products exposed workers.

Trades that worked with products like it: Insulators and Insulation Workers, Pipefitters and Plumbers.

Pipe covering and block insulation by other makers (276)

Thermobestos · Superex (Johns-Manville) · Careytemp (Philip Carey) · Kaylo (Owens-Corning) · Unibestos (Union Asbestos & Rubber Co.) · K-20 (Combustion Engineering) · K-fac (U.S. Gypsum) · K-fac 19 (U.S. Gypsum) · Kaiser M. (Combustion Engineering) · Kalfelt (Atlas Asbestos) · Kalsil (Atlas Asbestos) · Kay-Therm (Keasbey & Mattison) · Kaylo 10 (Owens-Corning) · Kaylo 20 (Owens-Corning) · Kaylo-klad (Owens-Corning) · Kaytherm (Nicolet) · Lasco (Lynch Asbestos) · Lennolite (Philip Carey) · LK (AC&S) · LK (Armstrong Cork) · and 256 more: all pipe covering and block insulation

See also

• Kaylo in the Lexicon
• Kaylo exposure and claims
• Owens-Illinois: the company's history, documents, people, products and plants
• Owens-Illinois on our products page: what the documents say about the company's asbestos products, with sources

References

1. The Travelers Insurance Company's Product Information Booklet for Its Asbestos Seminar (1980–1981) (April 30, 1981), p. 6.
2. Military Qualified Products List (1951–1995) (December 3, 1951), p. 1.
3. Curtis W. Howard to George R. White Proposing the "Handling Kaylo Products" Pamphlet (December 9, 1952), p. 2.
4. U. E. Bowes to Leroy U. Gardner Asking Saranac to Test a Hydrous Calcium Silicate (February 12, 1943), p. 1.
5. Leroy U. Gardner to U. E. Bowes on Asbestos in the Synthetic Insulation (March 12, 1943), p. 1.
6. W. G. Hazard of Owens-Illinois to the Industrial Hygiene Foundation on Studying Kaylo Dust (December 14, 1948), p. 1.
7. Aetna Life Affiliated Companies, Dust Survey of Owens-Illinois's Kaylo Plant at Berlin, New Jersey (April 28, 1958), p. 2.
8. Asbestos Magazine, 1953, December 1953 (December 1, 1953), p. 35.
9. Asbestos Magazine, 1955, February 1955 (February 1, 1955), p. 16.
10. Asbestos Magazine, 1956, August 1956 (August 1, 1956), p. 54.
11. Asbestos Magazine, 1959, May 1959 (May 1, 1959), p. 48.
12. Owens-Illinois, Hydrous Calcium Silicates Part V, Physical and Chemical Properties of Kaylo Products, Excerpt (October 15, 1952), p. 2.
13. W. G. Hazard to Arthur J. Vorwald on the Composition of Kaylo (September 21, 1948), pp. 1–2.
14. Saranac Laboratory, Report of Industrial Hygiene Survey of the Owens-Illinois Kaylo Division Plant (1951), Report, May 29, 1951 (clearer partial copy, from page 4) (May 29, 1951), pp. 8, 13.
15. W. C. Taylor of Owens-Illinois on Asbestos in Kaylo and Competing Calcium Silicate Insulations (June 8, 1954), pp. 1–4.
16. Sourcebook on Asbestos Diseases: Medical, Legal, and Engineering Aspects, Volume Two (1986), p. 88. Not yet published in our library.