CAOUTCHOUC MANUFACTURES. 



CAOUTCHOUC MANUFACTURES. 



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larger quantity of fragments at once, and to produce a more homo- 

 geneous substance. The heating was now effected in metal vessels, 

 surrounded by high-pressure steam. The caoutchouc was made into 

 blocks, which were cut into thin slices by an ingenious but simple 

 apparatus. It was now found that these sheets were soluble in good 

 oil of turpentine, producing a thick liquid, which promised to be of 

 great value in the arts. 



1823. Mr. Hancock procured a patent, in 1823, for a mode of com- 

 bining caoutchouc with pitch, tar, and other substances, either in the 

 mastication or by means of the solution. The compound was spread 

 out by means of a hot iron protected by a damp cloth, and the sheets 

 thus produced were used as an under-sheathing for ships beneath the 

 copper. This manufacture was taken up by other firms, and many 

 improvements made. 



1824. The easy production of a solution of caoutchouc soon led to 

 important extensions. It was now found that the elastic pieces could 

 be fastened to gloves, &c., by cementing with this solution instead of 

 by sewing. The upper and under-leathers of boots and shoes were 

 rendered waterproof by cementing in this way thin sheets of caout- 

 chouc. Further applications of the caoutchouc, now rendered prac- 

 ticable, were to the edges of ' noiseless ' wheels, the surfaces of rollers 

 and cylinders, the cushions of billiard-tables, tubes and pipes, catheters 

 and bougies, gas-bags, experimental balloons, and washers or collars for 

 stop-cocks. Mr. Hancock obtained from America a small quantity of 

 caoutchouc in its liquid or creamy state, and he took out a patent in 

 1824, for making a kind of artificial leather by its aid ; he mixed the 

 cream with felt, carded cotton, hair, hemp, or flax, dried and pressed 

 it, and produced strong and tough sheets of a substance suitable for 

 boot-soles, hose or water-pipes, straps for machines, harness, and other 

 purpoees, all waterproof, and free from stickiness of surface. In this 

 year the name of Macintosh came into the trade. Mr. Charles Mac- 

 intosh, of Glasgow, took out a patent for the double waterproof cloth, 

 which has had such a world-wide reputation. Two layers of cotton or 

 other cloth were cemented together with a solution of caoutchouc, and 

 then pressed so closely and evenly as to preclude the passage of air or 

 water. 



1825. The two inventors, Hancock and Macintosh, entered into a 

 working agreement in 1825, concerning then- respective patents. 

 Macintosh made his own particular solutions at Glasgow ; Hancock, his 

 in London ; a new factory was built at Manchester for the manufacture 

 of waterproof cloth, while Hancock carried on other departments in 

 the metropolis. Captain (afterwards Sir John) Franklin had several 

 boat-coverings, four life preservers, eighteen bags for cork beds, and 

 four pillows, made of Macintosh's waterproof cloth, for one of his 

 Arctic expeditions; and the great service rendered by these articles 

 tended to increase the reputation of the new material. In this year 

 Mr. Hancock obtained another patent for making artificial leather, by 

 using the caoutchouc solution instead of the native cream or sap. He 

 procured flat fleeces of carded cotton wool, and pressed each fleece 

 between two layers of cloth moistened with solution ; by varying the 

 process he could produce sheets of any thickness, and any degree of 

 toughness ; and they could have other qualities imparted to them by 

 mixing the solution with resin, size, glue, ochre, pumice, or whiting. 

 These sheets of go-called artificial leather came much into use for the 

 backs of cards for carding-cotton, for blankets in calico-printing, for 

 deckel straps in paper-making, and for machine-straps. The double 

 textures, made of two different kinds by Macintosh and Hancock, be- 

 came extensively manufactured into air-beds, bolsters, pillows, cushions, 

 mattresses, swimming belts, life preservers, and surgical bandages ; the 

 outer surfaces were of jean, jeanet, cambric, silk, kid, or morocco; 

 and the hollow spaces within were inflated by means of bellows 

 acting through a valve or stop-cock. Another patent was taken out 

 this year for a mode of applying the caoutchouc solution to ropes and 

 cordage. 



1826. As it was found that tailors either could not or would not 

 make up garments in a proper way from the waterproof cloth, Macin- 

 tosh and Hancock were driven to take up this department themselves, 

 and to establish shops for the sale of the garments ; from this time 

 the use of such garments by travellers and sea-faring men spread very 

 rapidly. 



1827. Many manufacturers had by this time entered the trade, 

 gone of them devoting then- ingenuity to articles which had not been 

 attempted by Macintosh and Hancock. India-rubber shoes afforded a 

 special example of this kind. 



1828. Hancock next established a working arrangement with a firm 

 at Paris, sending over solution, sheets, workmen, and machinery, and 

 leaving the Parisians to manufacture such articles as seemed most 

 likely to find a market. 



1830. In 1830 Hancock sent an agent out to Para in Brazil, to 

 instruct the natives in the best mode of collecting and shipping the 

 gum in a liquid state ; he still hoped to make some useful discoveries 

 and inventions in this direction ; but he ultimately found that the solu- 

 tion, as prepared by himself, wag more commercially useful than the 

 original sap. 



1831. About this time, the elastic properties of caoutchouc became 

 more than ever valued, by the production of woven goods having 

 caoutchouc either in the warp or weft. For such purposes a compound 

 thread was formed, having a centre or core of caoutchouc, with an 



envelope of cotton or worsted twisted round it. The method is said 

 to have been first practised at Vienna, from whence it extended to 

 Paris, and thence to this country. The bottle-shaped masses of caout- 

 chouc were, in the first instance, cut up into slips. This used in the 

 first instance to be done by cutting up the bottle with scissors, and 

 then separating the layers of which it is formed ; another plan was to 

 soften the bottle, inflate it by a forcing-pump to the requisite degree 

 of thinness, and then cut it ; but the method finally employed was to 

 soften the bottle in hot water, cut it into two halves, press it between 

 two iron plates till it assumed a flat form, and cut the discs or pieces 

 thus produced into ribbons, by a cutter working spirally from the 

 circumference of the disc towards the centre. The ribbons so prepared 

 were next cut into filaments or threads of the desired width, by passing 

 them through a machine having a number of cutting edges. The 

 threads were softened in warm water, and stretched by a winding 

 machine to many times their original length ; and being kept in that 

 tended state till cool, they did not spring back again when released. 

 They were then attached to a braiding-machine, and sheathed with 

 threads of cotton, silk, linen, or other material. The threads so 

 sheathed were used as ' warp ' or long threads, and were woven into 

 the kind of textile fabric required. A heated iron passed over the 

 woven goods caused the caoutchouc to relax, corrugated the sheathing, 

 and gave to the whole a great elasticity and power of yielding without 

 fracture. If the caoutchouc thread were sheathed while in the natural 

 state, it could not afterwards be stretched without breaking the 

 sheathing ; and it was for this reason that the sheathing was applied to 

 a'stretched thread of the inner material. Sometimes the compound 

 threads sheathed in this way were used as alternate warps only, some- 

 times both for warp and weft ; and various other modifications were 

 adopted according to the purpose to which the woven material was to 

 be applied. Gloves began very soon to be made at Leicester and 

 Nottingham with caoutchouc knitted into the wrist ; and stockings 

 with the same material at the top, to serve in lieu of garters. 



1833. By the year 1833 civil engineers and manufacturers had 

 become accustomed to the use of a large number of articles made of 

 caoutchouc, including gas-bags for repairing main-pipes, pump buckets, 

 plug-ball valves, hydraulic ram packing, buffer-rings, cylinders of tubes 

 of various diameters, hose-pipes, machine-bands, fire-engine hose, nialt- 

 iiig shoes (" anti-grain crushers "), gig spring blocks, &c. 



1835. Steam machinery became now necessary for working up the 

 vast quantity of caoutchouc used at the Manchester factories ; and 

 many London firms also carried on the manufacture on a considerable 

 scale. Another patent was obtained by Hancock for improving his 

 air-beds and cushions ; by corrugating the outer casing of cotton or 

 canvas, the cushions were rendered more soft, yielding, and elastic. 

 A year or two afterwards he obtained another patent for applying the 

 caoutchouc to clqth in a dough-like state instead of a solution, pro- 

 ducing results more useful for certain purposes. And another, by the 

 same indefatigable inventor, bore relation to the production of wide 

 sheets of any length and width ; cloth was used, but only to spread 

 the caoutchouc upon, and was susceptible of separation by a preliminary 

 preparation in a particular way. 



1840. By this year the Manchester factoiy of Messrs. Macintosh 

 and Co., often produced four thousand square yards of waterproof cloth 

 per day, so large was the demand for the various purposes above 

 indicated. Large air-proof vessels, like flat-bottomed boats, were made 

 as substitutes for metal pontoons in military operations. Numerous 

 other uses rendered necessary the means of masticating the caoutchouc 

 more rapidly than ever ; and a new masticator was made capable of 

 treating 200 Ibs. at once. This quantity was cast into a smooth, solid, 

 homogeneous block, six feet long by one foot wide, and seven inches 

 deep, ready to be cut and shaped into any desired forms. 



1841. About this time Mr. Brockedon devised an ingenious mode 

 of making a substitute for corks, more equable than corks are usually 

 found to be. In the first place, fibres of wool were felted or worked 

 into an oblong rod or solid cylinder ; this rod was cut up into pieces 

 the proper lengths for corks, and the corks so made were coated with 

 a thin sheeting of caoutchouc. 



1842. In this year a remarkable and important improvement was 

 made by the admixture of sulphur with caoutchouc. Manufacturers 

 had been much perplexed by three defects in the ordinary gum, its 

 clammy adhesiveness, its liability to be affected by change of tempera- 

 ture, and its sensitiveness to the effects of oil and grease. Of these, 

 the second is the worst ; the substance becoming hardened by cold and 

 relaxed by heat. In 1842, an agent from Mr. Goodyear, an American 

 inventor, brought to England a few specimens of caoutchouc which 

 had been so treated ay to lose these defects ; he wished to negociate 

 for the sale of his invention ; but as the process was kept secret, 

 English manufacturers declined to treat. Mr. Hancock deemed it 

 quite fair, commercially and morally, to try to discover by his own 

 experiments how such an effect could be produced. After much time 

 and trouble, he devised a mode of combining sulphur with caoutchouc, 

 producing a compound possessing very curious and important pro- 

 perties. Mr. Brockedon suggested the name ' vulcanisation ' for this 

 process, and hence originated Vulcanised India Rubber. Mr. Hancock 

 obtained a patent for this in 1843; and an English patent was also 

 granted to Mr. Goodyear in 1844. The two patents were worked 

 without interruption for eleven years; but in 1855, an action was 



