and Magazine of the Ceylon Agricultural Society. \&t 



SINGAPORE RUBBER FACTORY: AT 

 PASIR PANJANG. 



A DUTCH ENTERPRISE. 

 The Netherlands Guttapercha Company, 

 Limited, can claim to have established the only 

 rubber factory East of Suez, and to be develop- 

 ing, at Pasir Panjang, an industry that gives 

 every promise of being carried to a most 

 successful issue. Some four years ago, the old 

 guttapercha factory there was being worked at 

 a profit until the Marconi system of wireless 

 telegraphy threatened to have serious effects 

 upon the manufacture of cables, and reduced 

 prices to- a minimum. The stagnation in 

 cable rates continued in consequence of the 

 factories in London advising the guttapercha 

 merchants of their decision to suspend, so far 

 as possible, for a time, the manufacture of 

 cables. Apparently, the Marconi system has 

 not brought about the disaster then expected, 

 as the Netherlands Guttapercha Company, 

 Limited, have, this week, recommenced work, 

 and will shortly be sending to London gutta 

 leaf to be refined for use in cables. 



The Ckude Rubbek. 



Adjoining the building in which their secret 

 process of manufacture is conducted are the 

 works devoted to the preparation ot rubber for 

 the market. The industry is one of particular 

 interest, though it is probably the one least 

 known to the public generally. Large quanti- 

 ties of raw Para, in different grades, 

 come in from the F.M.S. and the Straits 

 Settlements, where, in forms of biscuits, 

 sheets, or scrap it is placed in a ware- 

 house, dark, cool and dry. Here it is labelled 

 distinctly and made ready for preparation. The 

 first stage of the biscuits, or round pads of 

 crude rubber, is the washing and mastication 

 of the lumps of rubber, which are fed into 

 heavy serrated rollers upon which cold water is 

 sprayed continually. Having been thus ground 

 into a pulp, the rubber is passed out in long, 

 thin sheets, which are hung on racks ready to 

 be placed in the vacuum drying machine. In 

 some factories, these sheets are hung for days 

 in hot rooms, but the machine has been found 

 • to answer thoroughly, in every respect, the 

 requirements of the manufactures. Rubber can 

 be dried at Pasir Panjang in two hours instead 

 of in two months, the management, however, 

 recognising that the more inferior the quality 

 of rubber the longer it takes for the sheets to be 

 dried thoroughly. At a time, nine plates of 

 rubber can be placed in the machine, which has 

 a drying area of 150 square feet. 



Compounds. 



An air pump creates the vacuum required, and 

 within a couple of hours or so, the moisture, 

 which is necessary to prevent air bubbles and 

 blisters when the rubber reaches the vulcanising 

 stage, has all been extracted. When thoroughly 

 dried, workmen take the plates away to the 

 laboratory, and the different ingredients are 

 added, according to the compound required for 

 the article to be manufactured. In some cases, 

 it is sulphuret of antimony, in others, sulphur, 

 or chalk, red lead, magnesia, and so forth. The 



tray of ingredients is taken to the mixing ma- 

 chine, and, after being thoroughly mixed 

 into a substance much resembling a stiff 

 dough, the compound is rolled, and re-rolled, 

 through calendering machines, which have 

 very large cylinder rollers of highly tem- 

 pered steel, with a surface like glass. The 

 compound is fed between rollers adjusted to 

 press the rubber into the required thickness. 

 When sufficiently mixed, the rubber compound 

 is taken to the tables for cutting, moulding, 

 weighing, and so forth, and when shaped and 

 formed, a batch of goods is sent to the vulcani- 

 sers and cured. 



Rubber Tyres. 



At present, the Netherlands Guttapercha Com- 

 pany have an extensive business in the manu- 

 facture of solid tyres for carriages, motor cars 

 and rickshas. Of late, the demand of rubber 

 in connection with automobilism has grown 

 enormously, while tyres for rickshas are 

 being sought after more frequently. Ano- 

 ther branch of rubber manufacture to which 

 the company have devoted much atten- 

 tion is in the way of tubing for use on railways, 

 such as buffers, brake tubes, cushions and the 

 like, while the demand for the manufactured 

 articles in many other forms is increasing. 



Space precludes our describing the different 

 modes of manufacturing the various articles, 

 though the method of making a ricksha tyre is 

 especially interesting, and, shortly, is as follows : 



The unvulcanised compound of rubber, on be- 

 ing taken from the mixing machine, is cut into a 

 strip and re-wound onto a roller. This is adjusted 

 to a machine into which the rubber is fed, and 

 forced on a spiral screw through a mould of the 

 shape required. A long tube of unvulcanised 

 rubber is forced out slowly, and laid on frames, 

 which are sent to the vulcanising chamber for 

 the final process. Orders for hundreds of feet 

 of tyring reach the firm, whose general agents 

 for the sale in Southern and Eastern Asia and 

 in Australia are Messrs. Hooglandt and Com- 

 pany, and they ship frequently to Bangkok, 

 Manila, Bombay and other Eastern ports. 



The factory is under the direct personal 

 management of Mr L A van Rijn. This direct 

 management ensures good workmanship, and as 

 only the highest grade of material is used, there 

 is every possibility of the Singapore Rubber 

 Works developing on a large scale and bringing 

 considerable reputation to Singapore in the in- 

 dustrial rubber world. — Straits Times, July 7. 



RUBBER EXPERIMENTS ON THE NILE 



The most recent commercial development 

 of the Soudan has been the establishment of 

 experimental india-rubber farms along the 

 Nile, which, according to official information, 

 bid fair to be a very important success. The 

 rubber is grown in a wild state from plants 

 which resemble creepers more than trees, but 

 the southern regions of the White Nile seem 

 favourable to tree-growing prospects. — Pioneer, 

 July 9. 



