August i, 10:5.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



381 



The India Rubber Trade in Great Britain. 



By Our Rcf^ular Corrcspundciit. 



THE Universal washing machine, patented and manufac- 

 tured by Messrs. Werner, Pfleiderer & Perkins, Limited, 



engineers o£ Peterborough, England,* seems destined to 

 effect a revolution in the ^vashing rooms of rubber works. By 

 the courtesy of the management of one of our large rubber 



NEW RUBBER factories I recently had tlie opportunity 



WASHING of seeing the machine at work, both in 



MACHINE. Para rubber and Assare scrap. Speak- 



ing generally, the machine kneads the rubber between two deeply 

 grooved rollers set about one inch apart, the action being rather 

 Ukc that of a masticator. Water, hot or cold, flows on the rubber 

 from a perforated pipe, and is run off at the bottom of the ma- 

 chine with the sand and dirt, either continuously or at intervals. 

 Where much wood is present, as in the case of Assare scrap, 

 this is floated ofif by filling up with water, which takes the wood 

 with it over the sides of the vessel which encloses the rolls. 

 There are two main points about the new machine as regards its 

 superiority over the ordinary washing rolls : these are saving of 

 time and labor and the production of a rubber of superior 

 strength. With regard to the first point, this is perhaps more 

 marked in the case of inferior rubber than with Para, from 

 which so little impurity has to be removed. A batch of about 

 100 pounds of fine rubber was washed in 20 minutes, and a 

 similar quantity of very woody Assare scrap in 40 minutes, the 

 latter representing a very great saving of time and labor. More- 

 over, the rubber is capable of being sheeted much more easily 

 than where ordinary rolls are used. Rubber as it comes from 

 the machine is in the lump form and requires sheeting on the 

 rolls before going to the drying chambers, so that the adoption 

 of this machine does not mean the scrapping of all tlie present 

 plant of the washing department. Turning to the quality of the 

 washed rubber, I do not know what the patentees of the machine 

 claim in this direction, and I have had no opportunity of 

 forming a reliable opinion of my own. The manager, however, 

 of the Works I visited was emphatic that washing by the new 

 process improved the strength of the rubber about 20 per cent. 

 If this opinion is generally upheld it is of course a matter of 

 considerable importance. Xo doubt the decreased period of time 

 during which the rubber is under treatment and the alteration in 

 the incidence of the stresses to which it is subjected are responsi- 

 ble for the improvement in the strength, and we would therefore 

 expect the improvement to be more pronounced with the low 



THE 

 CAB TIRE, 



♦Universal Rubber Washer. 



[Made by Werner, Pfleiderer & Perkins, Limited, Peterborougli, England.] 



grade dirty rubber than in the case of Para. In these days of 

 increasing unemployment it is not altogether satisfactory to find 

 that the new machine effects a reduction in the labor bill, 

 though those who are business men pure and simple will doubt- 

 less look at the matter in a different light. So far only one or 

 two of these machines have been installed, but I hear of several 

 which are on order for rubber works of importance. 



In connection with a certain process for removing cab tires, to 

 which I recently referred, it has been pointed out to me that 

 the matter has lost a good deal of its 

 importance because the cab tire is 

 doomed, owing to the competition of 

 the taxicab. Whatever the future, near or remote, may bring 

 in its train, the cab tire is by no means e.vtinct yet, nor is the 

 trade in it in a moribund condition. With regard to its origin 

 it may not be generally known that it was first made and 

 applied by the Earl of Shrewsbury, who started a small works 

 at Weston under the management of Mr. William Oliver, who 

 had been with Messrs. Charles Macintosh & Co., Limited. This 

 was about 25 years ago. The name of Shrewsbury has since 

 been well known in connection with the Shrewsbury-Challincr 

 Wheel and Tire Co., of .Ardwick, Manchester. 



The fact that this domestic accessory has been described in 



the French Chamber as murderous, and .that a bill for the 



abolition of its sale in France has 



FEEDING BOTTLE ^^^^^ jj^ g^.^^ fgading, will not be re- 



TUBING. . , , , • , , L 



ceived altogether with complacency by 

 the few manufacturers in England who have hitherto done a 

 considerable business with the article in France. It has certainly 

 taken some time to arrive at the point of prohibition, though 1 

 believe the medical profession in other countries besides France 

 have long condemned it from a hygienic point of view. I have 

 no qualification to speak on nursery topics, but I presume there 

 must be some alternative device. This is, of cour.se, one of 

 those cases where a liberal application of carbolic acid or other 

 germicide would hardly be applicable. To judge by our slow 

 progress in emulating other nations in legislation against food 

 antiseptics, it will be sonic time before the use of this tubing is 

 illegal in England. 



Whether there is any real foundation for the statement or 



not, I am unable to express any opinion of value, but it is said 



that the recent steady advance is due 



HIGH PRICE j^ market manipulation bv interested 



OF RUBBER. . , , , ^ . , 



parties far more than to legitimate trade 

 demand. It certainly seems curious that while nearly all raw 

 materials have been on the down grade for some time, rubber 

 should continue to rise. It is not, however, quite alone in this 

 respect, I may point out, because leather has followed the same 

 course. Of course the higher the price of the raw rublicr 

 the more inducement there is for the public to invest in new 

 plantations, and those which have been brought out in the last 

 few months have certainly gone off very well. The same com- 

 plaint of market manipulation has been made on previous occa- 

 sions, as many will remember, and it generally brings a dis- 

 claimer that any such action is impossible. Although trade gen- 

 erally, especially in the textile industries, remains bad, this need 

 not affect the demand for tires, and the extent to which the 

 taxicab is now being utilized in Great P.ritain may easily account 

 for an increased demand for rubber. .Another comparatively new 

 and rapidly developing use is for rubber tiling, now so much 

 in evidence in steamships. With regard to the price of manu- 

 factured goods, it was only to be expected that this would be 



