The flash point is an important indicator of the flammability of a chemical. For safety purposes, many data compilations report the lowest value and not the most likely. This practice, combined with improper documentation and poor data storage methods, has resulted in compilations filled with fire-hazard data that are inconsistent with related properties and between members of homologous chemical series. In this study, the flash points reported in the DIPPR 801 database and more than 1,400 other literature values were critically reviewed based on measurement method, inter-property relations, and trends in chemical series. New measurements for seven compounds illustrate the differences between experimental flash points and data commonly found in fire-hazard compilations. With a critically reviewed set of experimental data, published predictive methods for the flash point were evaluated for accuracy.

The structure of cadmium selenide has been determined from X-ray intensity data obtained with extendedface crystals. The wurtzite parameter u was found to be 0.37679_ 0.00012. Comparison of the intensities of equivalent reflexions provided a test for the internal consistency of the measurements. Equivalent reflexions in two specimens differed on average by 1.4 and 0"6% from the mean measured intensity, attesting to the high internal consistency of measurements from extended-face crystals. Comparison of 36 structure factors derived from data obtained from both specimens showed their average deviation from the mean to be 0"9%. An attempted least-squares refinement of the dispersion corrections of both atoms from observed Bijvoet ratios failed, presumably on account of correlation. When the dispersion corrections of one atom were held constant, it did prove possible to refine the dispersion corrections of the other atom.