May 1, 1915. 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



461 



The India Rubber Trade in Great Britain. 



By Our Regular Correspondent. 



THE new bill passed by Parliament in March giving the gov- 

 ernment power to take over and control works manu- 

 facturing munitions of war is an innovation of considerable 

 importance to those concerned. The main objects are to cx- 

 pedite production and to deal drastically with strikes among 

 workmen. One of the means taken to obviate strikes is to 

 limit ;iic pi oi firms on war-office work to 10 pet cent. 



aho\e their ordinary profits, the men having Rot the idea that, 

 though thej themselves are earning increased n,^i\ the masters 

 are rapidh piling up fortunes; which is by no means universally 

 the case S.i far 1 do not hear of any rubber works being 

 affected by the bill, though manufacturers acknowledge that its 

 provisions applj equally to such goods as motor tiro as t" 

 guns, explosives and motor wagons. At the time of writing 

 the superman— to use a current term— who is to act as general 

 manager under the bill has not yet been appointed. What is 

 known in America as a '"hustler" is I. .111- looked for, and it 

 seems that J.0OO or 3.000 have -em in applications fur tin po 



situ .11 



The general agitation for a rise in wages t.. meet the 2.- pet 

 cent, increase in the con of provisions has extended to the 

 rubber trade, and what is known as a war bonus has been 

 granted in most of the rubber factories in the Glasgow' and 

 Manchester districts. Negotiations with the manufacturers have 

 been carried on by Mr. H. H. Duke, the organizer of the Amal- 

 gamated Sbcietj of India Rubber Workers, whose office is in 

 Manchester, and it is pleasant to be able to record with what 

 amicability these have been conducted compared with cer- 

 tain proceedings in the past. Not that such negotiations have 

 been necessary in all cases, because I know of instances where 

 the war bonus was granted immediately the rise in the cost of 

 living took place, or at any rate was generally recognized. 



From all accounts the rubber and tin export committee is car- 

 rying ..n it- functions as far as rubber i- concerned to the sat- 

 isfaction of those concerned with the embargo. With regard to 

 trade, now tiiat the government seems to have placed all its 

 important orders, there is a tendency to expect slack times 

 when these are worked off. The rush for solvent naphtha led 

 to a rise of about 3d. per gallon, to Is. 5</.. a price which cannot 

 be considered excessive. There i- no reason, however, to ex- 

 po 1 any shortage in the article, although a larger amount of 

 pure xylol is new being produced in connection with the color 

 industrj . 



Ihe main difficulty with regard to business other than gov- 

 ernment business at the moment is in connection with the rail- 

 waj companies, great delays being experienced by manufacturers 

 both in getting their supplies and in forwarding finished goods. 

 Very little detail has been allowed to leak out regarding the 

 movement of troops, but this has been on a large scale, with 

 the result that general goods traffic has been greatly disor- 

 ganized. 



With regard to rubber chemicals, the one which seems to be 

 most affected a; the present time is golden sulphide of anti- 

 mony. One cau-c of this is the shutting .if of the German and 

 French supplies, and another is the great rise in the price of 

 the metal, to nearly £90 per ton, Russian demand having a good 

 deal to do with this. Though there are a number of sellers 

 of golden sulphide in England, I believe I am right in saying 

 that there are only two actual manufacturers, and the state of 

 affairs in America seems to be much the same. The British mak- 

 ers have been inundated with orders, which they have been 

 quite unable to rill at the moment. They are enlarging their 



plants, and. all things considered, it cannot be contended that the 

 rise of 4</ per pound is at all excessive. Golden sulphide is on 

 the list of absolute contraband, as it is one of the materials used 

 in fuses. 



PLANT VTION RUBBER. 



An interesting and important statement was made at the Lon- 

 don Rubber Exhibition conference by Mr. W. V Williams, of 

 the North British Rubber Co., Limited, to the effect that he had 

 not found smoked plantation rubber to be superior in any wa> 

 to unsmoked. A- much undoubtedly depends upon the partic- 

 ular brands of rubber he experimented with, it is quite possible 

 that other manufacturers may have come to the opposite con- 

 clusion, though it is pretty generally conceded that the various 

 method, ad. pied for smoking plantation rubber after coagula- 

 tion are only a poor imitation of the well known method car- 

 ried out on the Amazon with fine rubber. It would certainly be 

 of general interest t.. know how far Mr. Williams' statement re- 

 ceives general support. 



While mi tin- topic of the quality of rubber, perhaps I may 

 mention one of the results I have obtained from some atmos- 

 pheric tests of raw rubber. Various samples of raw rubber 

 were hung up on the garden wall for 17 months, experiencing 

 frost, sun, rain, etc. One result 1 have obtained has. 1 must 

 confess somewhat surprised me. The resin content of the 

 hard fine Para sample increased from 2.5 per cent, to 15.5 per 

 cent., while one sample of smoked plantation rubber showed only 

 5 per cent, resin against 4 per cent, originally, and another sam- 

 ple from a different source gave a very similar result. 1 he 

 origin of the plantation samples is unknown to me. 1 am not 

 putting these results forward as a contribution to our scientific 

 literature, as the experiment was not carried out with any special 

 precautions, but as there is no reason to doubt their substantial 

 accuracy, I think it is only fair that they should see the light. 

 A manufacturer with whom I discussed the matter said that 

 he would have expected the fine hard to give the better results, 

 and expressed the opinion that this would be so if a com- 

 pounded and vulcanized sheet of each had been exposed to the 

 same condition-. 



RUBBER AND HYGIENE. 



In a recent bulletin from the United States Hygienic Labora- 

 tory ( Xo. 9b, 1914), special reference is made to the composi- 

 tion of the rubber in nursing nipples and teething rings, one of 

 the conclusions arrived at being that rubber containing antimony 

 is undesirable in article- for infants. What surprises me most 

 about the analyses is the presence of clay, zinc oxide, magnesia 

 and various compounds, and it would be interesting to know 

 whether these goods are produced in America, or whether they 

 are of Teutonic origin. In England it has always been cus- 

 tomary to use pure vulcanized rubber for these goods, the main 

 change which has taken place in the manufacture in the last 

 40 years being the substitution of the seamless teat made from 

 rubber solution for the teat which was made from cut sheet 

 and jointed by pressure on a mandrel. The use of silicates or 

 metallic oxides was never thought of. nor was the black color 

 due to any added material, being the natural result of the sul- 

 phur bath. Perhaps one ought to mention the production a 

 few years ago of transparent teats by the Leyland & Birmingham 

 Rubber Co., Limited, these being made from a special brand of 

 Ceylon plantation rubber. These teats, as also many of the 

 ordinary seamless variety, were vulcanized by the cold cure 

 proce-- 



