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General Secretary’s Report and President’s Column GENERAL SECRETARY’S REPORT Dear Members


This year seems to be flying by, we are already planning the conference and training day, this week we have had to pay for the hotel, it seems a little like when you book a holiday, you pay a deposit and then when you pay the balance your holiday is here then suddenly it’s all over. This year is a little like that. The conference is still a few months away but now we are starting to pay it will suddenly be on us, and by the time I have sorted all the invoices, it will be Christmas and the year will have gone.


We have had some issues with the post and some new members have not received their certificates or they have arrived damaged, if anyone has not had their certificate please contact me by email, then I will arrange a replacement to be sent.


This journal is early so that we can send it to unitecr, Aachen and to the conference in India, This is part of our marketing as we try to raise the profile of our institute around the world, if any member is visiting any of the above it would be nice to know if the journals have been put in position where all can see it. This is an expensive exercise as we will print almost double our usual quantity of journals and then we have to pay to transport them to the various conferences,


but for our advertisers we reach a much wider audience and we hope to increase our membership.


We are now using sage pay to create our invoices which means advertisers and members can pay using a much more secure method which also shows on our books to match invoices which helps us identify which payments have been made. This certainly makes our system much easier to manage.


Our journal team are looking for technical papers for future issues, if anyone has a paper then please send it to me and I will pass it to the journal team. Our journal team does a great job, they are always looking for advertising and technical papers and all seem to be harder to obtain than they used to be, so please help. It is more important than ever that we produce a good journal with more of our members being based overseas and UK members not attending branch meetings as they used to do, the journal is the main method of contact with our membership.


It is important that bookings for the conference and training day are completed as soon as possible as I said earlier we are already making payments to the hotel and we do want to provide a good service which means booking the correct amount of food and space that we will need, without any waste or extra cost to the institute, so please book early.


Jayne Woodhead


General Secretary & Treasurer Institute of Refractories Engineers


PRESIDENT’S COLUMN


Dear Members and Colleagues


Today I was speaking with an equipment supplier who described his industry as close knit which could be both good and challenging in


equal measure.


meet new people (more on people in a minute), see new places and experience new things and adventures. For me, as sad as this sounds, this industry of ours provides similar levels of diversity which is one of the most fascinating things about refractories.


There


is perhaps an element of this in our own industry for which I am very grateful. It helps provided a diversity


that you simply don’t get in many other industries. In refractories we are surrounded by diversity. Every day we


September 2017 Issue


Think about it. The number of raw materials alone, the types, chemistries, forms, sizes, densities are many and varied. How those raw materials are produced and processed also has a massive impact on their use in refractories and their end use.


The combinations of those raw materials in refractory


products is mind boggling and adds another rich layer of diversity and complication from single raw material products to those with many ingredients.


So if we have such a plethora of raw materials, and products ENGINEER THE REFRACTORIES 3


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