1918.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



The Rubber Trade in Great Britain, 



By Our Regular Correspondent. 



WHEN I had the privilege the other day of seeing a review 

 of American troops — and what big crowds they attracted 

 — I was wondering how many of them came from Akron 

 and other homes of the rubber industry. This inquisitive trait 

 of mine cannot, of course, be satisfied, but at any rate I have 

 been satisfied upon one point, and that is that the American sol- 

 dier can smile, for I saw one in the act. The solemnity of the 

 American when marching has been much commented on in 

 Britain, though at the same tmie it can hardly be said that the 

 business on which he or any other soldier is engaged is a laugh- 

 ing matter. 



There is nothing new to be said about raw rubber, except that 

 the gloom is deepening on the faces of shareholders who have 

 become accustomed to SO per cent dividends. Interest has cen- 

 tered a good deal around certain low-grade qualities which are 

 in demand for special purposes. Pontianak, for instance, is dif- 

 ficult to obtain and odd lots of such brands as accra flake have 

 come upon the market to take its place, having been rescued 

 from ihe oblivion which is their norma! due. .\s so much of 

 the rubber work in progress is of good quality for government 

 purposes the dilficulty of getting hold of low-grade rubber has 

 not caused much inconvenience. 



So far as the details of the proposed luxury tax have been 

 made pubhc, there is not much to perturb the rubber trade. A 

 mackintosh is not a luxury unless it costs more than $24.20, which 

 is a much higher price than is usually paid. Of course, even in 

 peace-time one could pay as much for a special article marketed 

 by one or two noted London firms, but these were mainly sold 

 to officers and sportsmen, and as such purchasers will now buy 

 them for service purposes they will not pay the tax. Water- 

 proof clodiing generally, as purchased in the shops, has shown 

 a great rise in the last year, owing mainly to the rise in textiles 

 and labor costs, and it may be said generally that the retail price 

 of a -ear ago is the wholesale price of to-day. Thus the men's 

 popular woven twill mackintosh has gone up from $5.08 to $8.47. 

 The cloth in these garments has gone up from 18 cents per .'tingle 

 yard to 60 cents. 



Lawn tennis balls are in short supply this summer, the price 



being up SO per cent. Many dealers are sold out and are unable 



to replenish their stocks. This is due to shortage of labor in the 



rubber works for this and other non-essential goods. 



RUBBER SUBSTITUTE. 



In recent correspondence I referred to an impending famine 

 in substitutes, owing to the failure of supply of vegetable oils. 

 This contretemps, however, seems to have been averted, as rub- 

 ber manufacturers are still able to get fair supplies. The mod- 

 ern method of neutralizing any free acid by addition of alkalies 

 or alkaline earths, of course increases the weight of substitutes 

 obtainable from a given weight of oil, and it is not surprising 

 that under present conditions the amount of mineral matter thus 

 introduced for this specific purpose shows a tendency to increase. 

 I am referring now to ordinary oil substitute. We have also 

 on the market some special substitutes containing much larger 

 amounts of some inert mineral matter. I fail to see the advan- 

 tage of buying them, unless the price paid is pro rata to their 

 organic matter content. If the full price of ordinary substitute 

 IS paid, it seems to be one of those cases not uncommon in the 

 rubber trade, where the price paid depends largely upon the de- 

 gree of credulity with which the vaunted virtues of the par- 

 ticular material are received. With regard to the use of oil 

 substitute the general position is abnormal. For one thing, we 



have first-quality rubber at 48 cents per pound, and substitute at 

 18 or 20 cents, so that the inducement to its use is by no means 

 so strong as when rubber was higher and substitute half its pres- 

 ent price. Again, the proofing works, which have always been 

 the largest consumers, are now very largely and in some cases 

 entirely engaged on government work in which the use of sub- 

 stitute is barred. There is now little opportunity for the manu- 

 facture of the cheap waterproof clothing in which so much sub- 

 stitute commonly masquerades as rubber. A large quantity of 

 substitute has always been tised in cheap goods of this sort in 

 preference to mineral matter, because of the suppleness it gives 

 to the goods. As this class of work has never attained the 

 dimensions in America that it has in Britain, and vice versa, as 

 regards the manufacturer of galoshes, we have here an explana- 

 tion of the greater use of substitute in Britain than in America, 

 as also of the larger use of reclaimed rubber in America than in 

 Britain. With the present stupendous army requirement in 

 America the position is of course materially altered, and as some 

 at least of the American army clothing specifications call for the 

 use of substitute, we may take it that its use will be more gen- 

 eral in American practice than it has been in the past. I may 

 remark in conclusion that this paragraph w^as written before I 

 had read the interesting article on rubber substitute by Andre 

 Dubosc in the July issue of The Ixdi.\ Rubber World. At pres- 

 ent we hear only of white and brown substitutes, but I can 

 remember the time when white substitute was called Scott's and 

 brown substitute was always called French substitute, as it was 

 only procurable from Lufbury & Chardonnier, whose works were 

 at Chauny. 



BITUMINOUS BODIES. 



That versatile journal of America. "Metallurgical and Chemi- 

 cal Engineering," which is rather fond of changing its title, has 

 also had an article on rubber substitutes, by Andrew H. King. 

 I have read with special interest the portion relating to asphallic 

 materials, which are better understood as regards use with rub- 

 ber in America than in Europe. During the last year or so, 

 presumably owing to shipping difficulties, there has been dif- 

 ficulty in getting supplies of M R or other American bodies of 

 like nature, and various substitutes have been tried. England 

 has plenty of cheap pitch, but it is not at all popular in the rub- 

 ber trade, owing to its smell when heated. Moreover, it contains 

 varying proportions of free carbon, which aflect its tenacity as 

 a binding material The scarcity of M R, and also of that popu- 

 lar body petroleum pitch, has led to experiments being made to 

 improve the properties of coal-tar pitch so as to enable it to be 

 used with rubber. These experiments, however, as far as I am 

 familiar with them, have not had any success, mainly, I think, 

 because the new products still retained the familiar smell. Mr. 

 King draws attention to the fact that M R containing Gilsonite 

 combines with sulphur and only dissolves to a limited extent 

 in the ordinary solvents used in rubber analysis, thus making 

 impossible a correct estimate of the rubber per cent. I am not 

 sure that this applies only when Gilsonite is present. Anyhow, 

 the whole subject of the analysis of rubber containing asphaltic 

 bodies is a complicated one, and sympathy is due to Ihe chemist 

 who undertakes such work light-heartedly, unless he has had 

 pre\ ious experience. Much the same may be said of the analysis 

 of these asphaltic bodies alone. It is by no means easy to say 

 whether one sample is as good as another, or whether deliv- 

 eries are up to sample. Too much reliance should not be laid 

 on analytical results in the case of material of this sort, and at 



