Vacuum Web Coating

Bernard Henry

On Monday 19^th February I attended the funeral of Bernard Henry and thought that I would pen this note for those who knew Bernard but were unable to attend.

The first tribute to Bernard and an indication of how positively he impacted so many lives is that there must have been over 400 people attending the funeral including some who flew in from abroad.  Towards the end of the service there was a Eulogy given by four people, each representing a different part of his life.  First was given by Christine MacTaggart, Bernard’s sister-in-law, who talked about Bernard’s early life at home and school where he always excelled at sports. Many of us know about his sprinting prowess but Bernard was an all round sportsman. He was offered a contract with Chelsea Football Club at an early age but his Mother refused to sign, as they could not promise he would have a secure job. At school he was not allowed to take key exams because it was felt that he would fail them as he spent too much time at sports. Bernard confounded them all by going to a sixth form college and passing 9 subjects and from this went on to complete his schooling and the on to University and to complete Bachelor, Masters and Doctoral Degrees. Throughout all of this academic achievement he continued his sporting activities.  This sporting theme was continued by Linford Christie, the Olympic Gold Medallist and family friend, who talked about Bernard, a training companion and personal friend.  Tim Linley, an athlete at Oxford Cricket Academy, gave a further insight into Bernard who helped to encourage, motivate and train others to help them all improve and achieve sporting goals.  Bernard also helped in the fitness training of rowing crews and was so inspirational that they named a new boat in his honour much to Bernard’s surprise.  He also described Bernard’s work towards the ‘Street Olympics’ that he was involved in as a way of making sport more accessible to everybody.  Professor Chris Grovenor from Oxford University gave the final part of the eulogy giving a picture of the Bernard in his working environment as a scientist of quality and highlighting the messages of condolence that were continuing to flood in from all over the world from the many people that Bernard had met through his work and presentations at numerous conferences.

Bernard had compartmentalized his life so that his family had very little knowledge of his working life or his work friends little knowledge of his sporting activities and vice versa.  What did come across from everybody was that Bernard had a tremendous work ethic in all that he did. Underlying all of this was his family and faith.  Throughout the service and eulogy the repeating themes were how key to his life were his family, friends and faith.  He rarely talked about his faith instead he believed that his actions should demonstrate his commitment and beliefs.  I think all of us can recognise that, as in his other activities, he achieved this with his open, friendly, respectful nature that never criticised others but only looked for the good in everybody.  Bernard was a true gentleman in every sense of the word.

As Bernard did compartmentalize his life so much his family do not know much of his working life. If any of you have photographs and/or have anecdotes of your meetings with Bernard over the years I am sure the family would welcome being sent a copy of the photographs or a note to hear of your memories.  It is only with his passing that they are beginning to understand the respect and warmth with which Bernard was held by so many people.  If you want to send anything if you could send it via the funeral directors, the address given below.

Bernard Henry Memorial Fund

            

The Bernard Henry Memorial Fund is being set up to continue Bernard’s inspirational work to encourage participation an achievement in sport, particularly amongst underprivileged children.

If you wish to make a donation please make your cheque payable to Bernard Henry Memorial Fund, and send it to the funeral directors.

Ryan & Daughter

6, South Ealing Road

London

W5 4QA

UK

Bernard Henry

It is with huge sadness that I have to report the sudden death of Bernard Henry this last weekend. 

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The funeral will take place on Monday 19th February at 12 noon at the Lady of Lourdes Church, Acton High Street, Acton, London

 

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Bernard was an Associate Director of Research of Nanocomposites in the Dept of Materials at the Oxford University in the UK.  Within the world of vacuum coating he was extremely well known for his work to provide a fundamental understanding to how barrier materials really worked and what could be done to improve them.

I met Bernard regularly at many of the vacuum coating conferences where he was a regular contributor to the programmes. His papers were always of the highest standard, attracting large audiences.  He was also enthusiastic enough to join the organising committees to help in the work of finding papers for both the Society of Vacuum Coaters (SVC) and the Association of Industrial Metallizers Coaters And Laminators (AIMCAL).  He also passed on his knowledge and experience as an Instructor of courses for both the SVC and AIMCAL.

Over and above all this Bernard was a happy, friendly person, easily recognised and who everybody was delighted to have in their company.   His death has been a shock to all of us who knew him and he will be sorely missed.

Question re. correlation of film thickness and Optical Density

The question was as follows.

Can you please let me know about the correlation between the optical density and thickness of polymeric packaging materials?

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The answer was as follows.

The Optical Density (OD) is a measure of how much light passes though the material. The higher the OD number the less light is transmitted. The measure of OD is on a logarithmic scale and so OD 1 is 10% transmittance, OD 2 is 1% transmittance, OD 3 is 0.1% transmittance, etc. Thus for an aluminium coating as the thickness of the coating increases the OD is expected to increase too.  As the aluminium coating thickness is only nanometers in thickness it is very thin by comparison to the overall packaging thickness, the substrate thickness being the dominant thickness.  It is common for packaging materials to be laminated and/or printed.  It then depends on what is laminated to the metallized film as to if there is a significant change to the OD. Similarly with the printing, it is common for the inks to add to the overall thickness. With inks it then depends on the opacity of the ink along with the ink thickness as to if it adds significantly to the overall OD.

If you are only interested in the relationship between the aluminium coating thickness and the OD then the 3^rd Edn of the Metallizing Technical Reference book that AIMCAL (www.aimcal.org) sells for $25 to members & $35 to non-members (+ post and packaging) contains some tables of aluminium thickness vs. OD both theoretical and from a production metallizer.