THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



[June 1, 1915. 



The India Rubber Trade in Great Britain. 



By Our Regular Correspondent. 



GENI R \i. Kl M VRKS. 



Ternmenl orders having to a large extent 

 11 was expected thai the rubber trade 

 the tire branch would experience a somewhat 



time. This however, has nol been the case, thi pi ■ 



works, and more especiallj the mechanical rubber works. 

 where slackness has been noticeable during the winter, now 

 ting business as being decidedlj brisk. The shortagi ol 

 labor has resulted in thi i incut of women on work in 



times exclusively handled by men. 

 For the time being, the question ol a special tax upon 

 manufacturers largely engaged in government contracts has 

 been abandoned, though the matter was expected to find ref- 

 erence in the budget Considering the uniform and coin- 

 rubber, the announcement of a 10 per 

 ance in prices by the Silvertown company has caused 

 lite the rise in wages and in the price ol 

 The action ol the India Rubber Manufac- 

 ition is now being awaited with interest. 



OUTPUT OF TIR] S. 

 I have been asked by your Editorial Department if I can 

 givi the number of pneumatic tires and also solid tires manu- 

 factured in anj recent year in England and France. No 

 doubt individual manufacturers know their own outputs, but 

 they keep such knowledge to themselves, in accord with the 

 cy which char their general procedure. By way 



i if any information on the point was obtainable. I 

 put the query to a rubber works manager, asking for a rough 

 estimate, and his reply was 2,000 pneumatic tires and 1.000 

 solid tires per working day for Great Britain. These seem 

 large figures and no doubt if others care to support or revise 

 them the editor will be pleased to find room for corre- 

 spondence on the subject. 



AMERICAN TIRES. 

 B. F. Goodrich Co., Limited, is rapidly adding to its 

 provincial depots in Great Britain, the Glasgow and Man- 

 ter establishments being now followed by others at Bris- 

 tol and Leeds, with more to come, it is understood. A few 

 months ago I referred to the establishment of the Firestone 

 Tire Co., Limited, in London, doubtless in friendly rivalry. 

 The increased use of American pneumatic tire- is shown by 

 their common occurrence with Michelins, Dunlops, etc.. in 

 reclaimers' yards. 



DENTAL RUBBER. 

 - far as I can gather, the war has not interfered with the 

 lies of dental rubber, as these come very largely from 

 rica, supplemented by the products of one or two home 

 This is one of the few branches in which German 

 petition has been absent, a fact which may have some- 

 thing to do with the high prices charged to British dentists. 

 A prominent practitioner who has some satisfactory invest- 

 ments in rubber plantation companies complains that though 

 the prices were raised by American suppliers of dental rubber 

 to conform to the lis. 6d. per pound level of raw rubber, 

 they have not yet been reduced and the fact that the Ameri- 

 can products arc still bought speal - fi r their high quality. 

 ourse ten years ago dentists did not follow the course of 

 the raw rubber market, but things are now different, so many 

 of them Inning monetary interests therein. 



The latest variety of American dental dam or thin pure 



which is in great favor in this country, is practically 



less ■ the ordinary brown color of cut or spread 



sheet, i Ibviously, this is made of the colorless rubber pro- 

 duced from plantation latex by the method described at the 



first London rubber exhibition by Mr. KeKvay Bamber. I 

 understand that similar sheet is not as yet obtainable in Eng- 

 land, though 1 know that such rubbei was used for certain 

 purposes a few years ago by one of our important rubber 

 works producing surgical goods. 



With regard to the manufacture of rubber goods for sports, 

 the summer season bids fair to be as bad as the past winter. 

 County cricket has been abandoned, many of the palatial 

 pavilions being now utilized as Red Cross hospitals, and 

 ordinary club cricket will be much curtailed. There are to 

 be no lawn tennis tournaments, and though the game will be 

 played at clubs and private houses, this will mean a great falling 

 off in the demand for balls, especially as very few of the clubs 

 will play matches. As sporting goods are made by a number 

 of rubber works now fully engaged in other branches, it rannot 

 i said that the) will feel the loss of trade to the same extent 

 as the wholesale and retail houses which specialize in such goods. 



NEW ISSUES. 



Xew undertakings have been few and far between in the 

 last nine months. On April 12, however, the Searle Rubber 

 Co. Limited, was registered, with a capital of £12,000, includ- 

 ing 4,000 5 per cent, cumulative preference shares. An agree- 

 ment has been adopted with the Searle Unburstable Inner 

 Tube Co., Limited, relating to a license for the manufacture 

 of these tubes. The new company is an offshoot or subsidiary 

 of the older one which will continue its existence and trade 

 in the tubes as before. The Searle tube is of rubber rein- 

 forced with canvas and has been on view for two or three 

 years at motor shows. It has proved its utility in motor tires 

 in withstanding rupture from shock and it is immune from 

 many of the attacks which mean disaster to the ordinary 

 inner tube, though of course it can be cut by anything suffi- 

 ciently sharp which it may encounter on the road. 



An important step has been taken towards the fulfilment 

 of the project to lay sections of rubber street paving in Lon- 

 don and elsewhere. L'nder the auspices of the Rubber Grow- 

 i rs \ssociation a company has been registered with a capital 

 of £9(1.000 to acquire certain patents and to apply them to 

 road paving. The system in question consists of rubber 

 capped hardwood blocks, so made as to key into each other. 

 A small section has been under trial in London for more than 

 a year, and has received the highest commendations of the 

 local surveyor. Primarily, the object of the sponsors of the 

 undertaking is to further the consumption of plantation rub- 

 ber, although the scheme obviously has great commercial 

 possibilities. The company will presumably carry on its 

 operations with subsidies of rubber from the plantation com- 

 panies, each concern guaranteeing to contribute a certain an- 

 nual per centage of its crop at what is approximately the 

 prime cost. Such cash as may be required will be provided 

 by the issue of preference shares amounting to £20,000. The 

 company could hardly make a better start with its paving 

 scheme than to re-lay the section of roadway which Lon- 

 doners conceive to be the very center and hub of the universe, 

 namely, the road in front of the Bank of England, Royal Ex- 

 change and Mansion House, where eight thoroughfares con- 

 verge as spokes into the hub of a wheel. 



The Government-backed British Dyes, Limited, has gone to 

 allotment and manufacture is now in the initial stages. 

 This big project will alter the tar distilling industry of Great 

 Britain to some extent, and it may be that the days of cheap 



