264 



IHE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



[May 



1905. 



TIRE 

 NOTES. 



a considerable rise in market value. New companies continue 

 to be brought out, Stock Exchange quotations being applied 

 for, and no doubt we shall soon see some such speculation in 

 rubber shares as characterized the evolution of the Kaffir min- 

 ing market. Planters do not feel any apprehension lest the 

 present high price of rubber should show a diminution, and 

 certainly if the figures given to me are accurate it is clear that 

 the drop in price would have to be a very considerable one be- 

 fore the possibilities of paying a 10 per cent, dividend are 

 wiped out. 



The Continental Tyre and Rubber Co. (Great Britain), 

 Limited, has recently been registered in London with a stated 



capital of ^{jio.ooo. Though the articles refer 

 MOTOR to the manufacture of tires it is probable that 



the concern will be limited to the sale of the 



tires made at Hannover. There is nothing 

 to be heard about the projected English Michelin company. 

 In the meanwhile motor car builders in this country have been 

 somewhat surprised by the receipt of a circular from the Mich- 

 elin firm at Clermont-Ferrand seeking to impose somewhat 

 severe restrictions upon dealers in their tires. Space does not 

 permit of my giving the restrictions in detail and I will con- 

 tent myself with a word as to the efTect of the circular. As a 

 rule it has bet n strongly objected to as out of all reason, now 

 that the tire monopoly has fallen through. I understand that 

 those who accepted the agreement generally ran their pens 

 through some of the clauses, and that these deletions were ac- 

 cepted by the tire firm. — There can be no doubt of the large- 

 ly increased demand of rubber for motor omnibus tires; these 

 vehicles are being largely adopted and have undoubtedly come 

 to stay, though one cannot speak as confidently with regard to 

 all the companies which are being brought out to work them. 

 As the tire equipment of a vehicle costs about £\oo, it will be 

 recognized that there is plenty of business in store for the tire 

 makers. By the way, a word of explanation on the railway 

 motor development may not be superfluous. The railway com- 

 panies are now on branch lines adopting the steam motor; this, 

 it should be understood, is a railway coach and steam engine 

 on one set ol wheels and runson the line like an ordinary train. 

 Naturally this development does not involve the use of rubber 

 tires; where these come in is in connection with the motor 

 'buses which the companies use as feeders to their lines in 

 places where railway accommodation is absent or inadequate 

 for the needs of the district. 



Amidst the plethora of patents and processes for dealing 

 with waste rubber are many which apparently have had their 



day and passed into desuetude. One such has 

 ^ reference to the utilization of old buflers for the 



WASTE RUBBER j.- / j ,., jc- ^i 



REMINISCENCE pfoouction of cord and thread. Some twelve 

 years ago a small Manchester firm of waste rub- 

 ber dealers bought up a large stock of old railway bufTers and 

 cut them into rectangular pieces to serve as the core for pack- 

 ings of the Tuck pattern. Their difficulty was to get a contin- 

 uous length of cord and they put the matter into the hands of 

 an engineer who finally devised a certain type of tool which 

 enabled the buffers to be cut into cord of diameter as low as 

 yj inch. The larger diameter stuff was used as packing core 

 and the smaller it is stated for elastic side boots, though I 

 must say I am somewhat sceptical as to how far this latter ap- 

 plication came into use. At any rate the firm in question 

 seem to have made a good thing of the business as they after- 

 wards blossomed out into a more pretentious line of business 

 in connection with it. Of course old rubber was procurable on 

 more easy terms twelve years ago than at present and the prof- 

 its on its sale were correspondingly greater. In contradistinc- 



tion to what appertains generally to old rubber the more 

 heavily compounded buffers were found more valuable for the 

 purpose than those containing the purest rubber, the latter pre- 

 senting difficulties in the way of cutting into thread. 



Having lately been concerned in some attempts which are 



being made to utilize the waste material of the West Indian 



banana industry, I have re-read with some in-' 



BANANA terest the few lines on musa or banana rubber in 



RUBBER. 



Mr. Pearson's book. The author states that this 

 rubber is not yet on the market, though the process for its pro- 

 duction has been patented in England by Mr. Otto Zurcher, of 

 Kingston, Jamaica. I understand from a gentleman who has 

 lived in Jamaica that Mr. Zurcher is a German chemist who 

 acted for some time as manager of the tobacco estate of the 

 Hon. Evelyn Ellis, a scion of the British nobility at Montpelier. 

 I am not altogether surprised that banana rubber is not to be 

 found on the market and it would take a good deal to convince 

 me that it has any commercial value. In connection with this 

 patent it is interesting to note that the individual who has 

 been engaged in recent years in exploiting a secret chemical 

 process for obtaining rubber from West Indian fibers referred 

 specially to the fibrous bark of the plantain — practically the 

 same plant as the banana — as a useful and plentiful source 

 from which to derive his rubber. 



It is with some little surprise that I note the departure of 

 Mr. J. W. O. Walker from the post of manager of the Dunlop 

 Rubber Co.'s factory at Etchells, Birming- 

 ham. After some years in a subordinate 

 capacity at Messrs. Charles Macintosh & Co.'s works, Mr. Wal- 

 ker went to Glasgow to the factory of Messrs. George McLel- 

 lan & Co., where he rose to be manager. Four or five years 

 ago he went to the Dunlop company works under an agree- 

 ment for a term of years which it may be presumed has recent- 

 ly expired. Mr. Walker has again gone to Manchester to super- 

 intend the rubber department of Messrs. F. Reddaway & Co.'s 

 belting mills. His old place at Birmingham, I understand, has 

 not yet been filled. 



MR. J. W. O. WALKER. 



UNDER THE BAN OF THE LAW. 



IN a suit brought by a firm of Frankfort o/M. against a cus- 

 tomer at Mannheim, for failure to accept certain rubber 

 goods ordered, the Mannheim court sustained the customer, 

 on the ground that the transaction involved a contract in vio- 

 lation of good morals, and was therefore illegal. A similar 

 case tried in Strassburg resulted in a like decision. Comment- 

 ing upon these cases, the Gumnii-Zeitung asserts that the 

 articles thus brought under the ban of the law are more largely 

 sold by apothecaries on the prescriptions of physicians than 

 otherwise, and that the court has gone too far in assuming all 

 use of articles thus having the warrant of sanitary science to 

 be immoral. The Giivimi-Zeiiung suggests that the prohibi- 

 tion of the public offer of goods for which a demand exists will 

 open the door to a clandestine trade in which dishonest deal- 

 ers may be expected to figure, while reputable makers will see 

 a decline of business. 



An act of the United States congress, dated February S, 1905, 

 imposes a heavy penalty for the carrying of certain classes of 

 goods, by express companies or otherwise, from one state to 

 another, or the delivery to or acceptance from any common 

 carrier of such goods, which have been or are to be conveyed 

 from state to state, or the importation or exportation of goods 

 of the prohibited classes, the scope of the law plainly bringing 

 within the prohibition the subjects of the recent judicial de- 

 cisions in Germany. 



