S84 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



[June i, 1906. 



THE INDIA-RUBBER TRADE IN GREAT BRITAIN. 



By Our Regular Correspondent. 



IN recent months two references have been made in these 

 notes to British firms who have added Balata belting 

 to their existing manufactures. On the Continent also, 

 especially in Germany, several firms have gone in for 

 the business, so although the position of the Messrs. Dick, 

 of Glasgow, as the principal producers, may not 

 BALATA j^^ seriously threatened, vet thev must assuredly 



BELTING. , , ,. ■', ,- ■... _, 



be feeling the increased competition, there is 

 no doubt that Balata belting is increasing in popularity ; 

 though it is not suitable for hot situations, it is certainly 

 superior to leather where continuous damp has to be reck- 

 oned with and the facility with which joints can be made 

 yielding a smooth surface has popularized the belt for dyna- 

 mo running. With regard to the price of the raw material, 

 it does not seem that the new business will bring about much 

 change. For some years the demand has not kept pace with 

 the amount the merchants in the Guianas and \enezuela 

 wished to put on the market, and when a friend of mine 

 wrote from Venezuela two years ago to ask what was the mat- 

 ter with the trade I could only suggest that the decline in 

 the solid gutta golf ball might have a good deal to do with 

 it. It was suggested to me that the slackness in the subma- 

 rine cable industry might have had to do with it, but unless 

 I am much mistaken I don 't think that Balata figures much in 

 this class of work. Although there seems to be plenty of the 

 raw material available, the difliculties in the way of its 

 exploitation are such that the price is unlikely to show any 

 real diminution from what has ruled for so long. If I am 

 correctly informed the stuff cannot be gathered, and sold at 

 a profit in England at less than i.j. -^d. per pound, so it may 

 be taken that this represents the bottom price and that anj- 

 change will be in the upward direction. From some figures 

 at my disposal I understand that in Dutch Guiana, where 

 tapping the trees is in vogue, the mean daily collection of 

 one man is 7 gallons of latex, yielding 4 pounds of Balata 

 per gallon : at \s. jd. per pound this works out at £2 45. 4*/. 

 I don't know how much of this goes to the actual gatherer, 

 but I suppose that the cnix of the matter lies with him 

 w-hether he gets enough to tempt him to undertake work 

 which is associated with such difficulties and dangers. 



At the fifth International Congress of Applied Chemistry, 

 held in Berlin, the subject of rubber analysis was brought 



forward by the late Dr. Weber. At the recent 



^°'*^ congress held in Rome, in April, it is seen that 



RUBBER ^.^^ mantle of the departed has fallen upon Dr. E. 



Marckwald, of Berlin, the subject of whose paper, 

 done into English, was the actual condition of the analytical 

 chemistry of rubber, including its derivatives and manufac- 

 tured goods. Pending the publication of the paper, I must 

 perforce content myself with a brief reference to it. Judging 

 by the numerous scientific articles that have appeared in the 

 Gummi-Zeititng (Dresden) during the last jear or two, it is 

 clear that the pioneer work done by Ilenriques and Weber 

 has attracted quite a number of German chemists who will 

 have to fight out among themselves the question as to which 

 the layman is to consider as the greatest authority. =^The 

 Editor of Tire and Molor (New York) recently impressed upon 



his readers the fact that no one man was an expert in all 

 branches of the rubber trade. No doubt this is true though 

 the statement may not prove particularly palatable to the 

 rubber e.xpert in practice who is spreading his net far and wide 

 to catch business. I see that Dr. W. A. Caspa' i, late chemist 

 at the National Physical Laboratory, has commenced prac- 

 tice as a consultant in London. It is of course the ignorance 

 of a humble journalist and no reflection whatever upon the 

 doctor referred to that his name in connection with the sub- 

 jects of this Journal was new to me until his paper on Balata 

 and its resins was published in the Journal of the Society of 

 Chemical Industry. Apropos of the National Physical Lab- 

 oratory I may say that owing to the strong representations 

 made by the Institute of Chemistry, the practice of under- 

 taking ordinary professional work is to be discontinued. It 

 was obviouslj' unfair that an institution supported by public 

 funds and intended specially for research and the standardi- 

 zation of instruments should enter into competition with 

 professional chemists. ^^Following the lead of the late Dr. 

 Weber and Mr. Heyl-Dia, Dr. Meyer, late chemist to the St. 

 Helens Rubber Co. has taken up a post at an American 

 rubber factory. It would appear that there are more pros- 

 pects for the rubber chemist in America than in England 

 though the British factories seem to aflord good training 

 grounds. 



As was not unexpected, the Anglo-Sicilian Sulphur com- 



panj' will shortly come to an end. Its action in reducing 



the output in Sicily and in regulating prices has 



SULPHUR j^gj ^ gooA effect upon the industry, which it is 

 now to be feared has somewhat troublous times 

 before it. The direct cause of the above development is of 

 course the utilization of the immertse sulphur deposits in 

 Louisiana, whereby the demand of America, which has al- 

 ways been Sicily's largest customer, will be fully met. More- 

 over, it is quite possible that .America may do an export 

 business. .-Vnother large customer for Sicilian sulphur is 

 Scandinavia, in connection with the sulphite cellulose trade, 

 and it seems probable that this business will largely decrease, 

 owing to the use of Norwegian pjrites instead of sulphur. 

 Whether or not the rubber trade will benefit by the break 

 up of the Anglo-Sicilian compau}' it is difficult to saj' at 

 present, but I should the tendency must be towards lower 

 prices, though, of course, it is quite possible that America 

 and Sicily will come to some arrangement to prevent disas- 

 trous competition. 



PERH.'iPS those who were involved in the recent trouble in 



Russia will think my headline rather too mild. Certainly 



the state of affairs at the big Prowodnik-Riga 



THE UPSET j^jjjijgj. ^-orks as related to me by one who was 



IN RUSSIA. . 



there at the time was alarming enough, though 

 so many other events of the sort were happening in the 

 councry at the same time that no detailed notice has ap- 

 peared in the English press. It appears that at the out- 

 break of disaffection troops, mostly Cossacks, were quartered 

 within the confines of the works and, owing doubtless to 

 race hatred between the workmen, who are Litheranians, and 

 the Cossacks, as much as to anything else, the soldiers to 



