section_path: Personal interests/Interest in materials science and engineering
section_name: Interest in materials science and engineering
paragraph_text: Interest in materials science and engineering
  
  Henry Ford had a long-held interest in materials science and engineering. He enthusiastically described his company's adoption of vanadium steel alloys and subsequent metallurgic R&D work.
  
  Ford also had a long-standing interest in plastics developed from agricultural products, particularly soybeans. He cultivated a relationship with George Washington Carver for this purpose. Soybean-based plastics were used in Ford automobiles throughout the 1930s in plastic parts such as car horns, in paint and other components. The project culminated in 1942, when Ford patented an automobile made almost entirely of plastic, attached to a tubular welded frame. It weighed 30% less than a steel car and was said to be able to withstand blows ten times greater than steel. It ran on grain alcohol (ethanol) instead of gasoline. The design never caught on.
  
  Ford was interested in engineered woods ("Better wood can be made than is grown") (at this time plywood and particle board were little more than experimental ideas); corn as a fuel source, via both corn oil and ethanol; and the potential uses of cotton. Ford was instrumental in developing charcoal briquets, under the brand name " Kingsford ". His brother-in-law, Edward G. Kingsford, used wood scraps from the Ford factory to make the briquets.
  
  In 1927, Ford partnered with Thomas Edison and Harvey Samuel Firestone (each contributing $25,000) to create the Edison Botanic Research Corp. in Fort Myers, Florida to seek a native source of rubber.
  
  Ford was a prolific inventor and was awarded 161 U.S. patents.