June 



[904.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



303 



THE INDIA-RUBBER TRADE IN GREAT BRITAIN. 



By Our Regular Correspondent. 



THE enhanced prices which have been the necessary con- 

 sequent of the high price of rubber cannot be consid- 

 ered to have had much effect upon the volume of 

 trade. People who want rubber goods buy them even 

 it they grumble at the price. As far as the ordinary trade is 

 concerned the unanimity prevailing amongst pro- 



rise in ducers has made the rise in prices easily accom- 



prices , . , . 



of goods pl'shed and f understand from the American 



houses which do business in London that, though 

 they own no allegiance to our association of manufacturers, 

 their prices have been raised to a practically corresponding 

 degree in accordance with instructions from America. Where 

 grumbling is chiefly heard is in the card cloth manufacture, as 

 makers are unable to advance their prices in accord with the 

 price of rubber, there being no effective combination to this 

 end. 



It is understood that the India Rubber Manufacturers' As- 

 sociation are considering the subject of fire assurance, presum- 

 ably with the intention of making represen- 

 insurance of tations on the subject to the insurance com- 



RUBBER FACTORIES. _ . . J , 



panies. Certainly there is room for some 

 such action, because there is a tendency to overestimate the 

 risks attaching to such insurances. Of course it depends 

 largely on the precise nature of the manufacture carried on, 

 and it is quite antagonistic to the facts to associate the proof- 

 ing and purely mechanical branches in the same category as 

 regards risk. As far as really disastrous fires are concerned, it 

 would appear that these have in late years been limited to 

 small establishments for the sorting or reclaiming of waste 

 rubber. Your newspaper reporter, however, does not stop to 

 particularize, and fires in such works are duly chronicled in the 

 press as if the unfortunate affair related to a rubber factory of 

 the North British magnitude. That the insurance companies 

 take a strong view of the risks associated with waste rubber deal- 

 ing and manipulation is clear from the inability of one concern, 

 which was burnt out some months ago, to effect another insur- 

 ance, though by the state of the books it was quite clear that 

 there had been no inducement whatever to an act of incen- 

 diarism. Although the risk where solvents are not used is 

 really but small, it certainly seems to be the fact that waste 

 rubber, especially ground crumb, is apt on occasions to become 

 overheated and may break into spontaneous combustion. My 

 experience shows me that this fact is not sufficiently known to 

 those who deal in such material, and it would be time well 

 spent to take frequent tests with a thermometer to ascertain if 

 the temperature of any body of material is above the average. 

 This sort of testing I may say is regularly carried out on the 

 coal stacks at the British dockyards where spontaneous com- 

 bustion is always to be apprehended. 



Franz Clouth, in his book on the rubber manufacture, 

 laments the fact that the German pays so much less for his rub- 

 ber goods than do the Americans, the consequence 

 mining De i n g that the German manufacturers have to 



MACHINERY. , & . , . .. ., , , , , 



make inferior articles. I have been reminded ol 

 this statement more than once lately in connection with the 

 inspection of dressing plant for metal mines. Certain types of 

 vanners, as I believe I have stated on a previous occasion, have 

 their surface composed of India-rubber and a great disparity is 

 noticeable between the quality of the rubber on American 



made machines and on those of German make. The machines 

 I compared were not of the same type, but that does not matter ; 

 I merely wish to emphasize that with regard to his rubber sur- 

 face the German uses a highly compounded mixing which in 

 practice cracks and oxidizes very much sooner than the more 

 elastic rubber to be seen on machines of American origin. My 

 strictures are confined to the rubber alone; I am not saying 

 anything about the relative merits of the metal or woodwork. 

 It may be contended that metal mines are often sold up long 

 before the machinery has time to wear out, and that therefore 

 rubber with a long life is not necessary; but arguments of this 

 sort do not invalidate the comparison which I have made be- 

 tween German and American procedure. 



The recent increase in the use of electricity for lighting and 



haulage purposes in collieries is proving a substantial source 



of new business to cable manufacturers. Steam 



electrical haulage from the working faces to the bottom 



MATTERS. ,,.,■■_• ji 1 j i_ 



of the shaft is being rapidly replaced by elec- 

 tricity, the current in the great majority of cases being sent 

 down the shaft. The value of the cables required for a single 

 colliery may easily be in the neighborhood of ,£1500. Different 

 engineers have their own ideas, of course, as to cables, but the 

 paper insulation of the British Insulated and Helsby cables 

 have been adopted most largely, as far as my personal knowl- 

 edge extends. It is found that the damp atmosphere of the 

 mine acts upon the lead covering, and for this reason, as well 

 as for mechanical protection, the lead is given a protective 

 coating of hemp and iron. Cables such as these have a long 

 life in the mine shaft, really the only source of danger being 

 from an accidental fall of the cage.==Just as rubber strip is 

 used in jointing rubber cables, the Callender company manufac- 

 ture their " Bitite" strip sold in coils in boxes ready for use by 

 mains engineers. When this is warmed and applied to the 

 Bitite insulated cable, the two may be pressed into a homo- 

 geneous mass, the joint being thus made without the use of 

 any solvent, as in the case of rubber. It should be noted that 

 the Bitite insulation though a pitch product is of quite a dif- 

 ferent nature to the pitch filling up the troughs in which the 

 cables are laid. This latter is ordinary bitumen, as may be coal 

 tar pitch which has not undergone any special process of man- 

 ufacture. With regard to the supply of bitumen, it has been 

 said that Callender's have a monopoly of the product of the 

 Trinidad lake ; it is open to doubt, however, if this is so, and 

 anyhow the discovery in recent years of similar lakes in Vene- 

 zuela tends to diminish the value of the acquisition. Certainly 

 a good deal of the pitch they use in laying street mains comes 

 from British tar distilleries. 



The subject of the improvement of cotton belting has long 

 been uppermost in the mind of this firm — if a limited company 

 can be said to have a mind. The latest pat- 

 ent 9944 (1903) seems to indicate that a 

 previous process on machinery for which a 

 good deal of money had been spent, has been found inapplic- 

 able or inefficient. In the former patent a solution of Gutta- 

 percha was forced into the interstices of the woven belting by 

 means of vacuum plant, while in the new one strands of Gutta- 

 percha or Balata are to be interspersed among the warp or weft 

 threads, the woven belting being afterwards heated and pressed 

 so as to force the melted or softened substance thoroughly 



G. BANHAM &. CO., 

 LIMITED. 



