latex was obtained, the latex was coagulated m less than hve 
minutes by adding acetic acid ami stirring. Hie coagulated mass 
was picked out, squeezed together by hand and throw 
machine, and after passing through the rollers a number of times 
it was converted into rolled and w ashed sheets which were dr ed in 
less than three days in the open air With a calcium chloride 
drying chamber and using dried air they could have ee 
and ready to pack in 48 hours. 
But the use of a washing machine driven by an "engine is not 
by any means confined to freshly coagulated latex. In ea JpS 
with scrap and dirty rubber its efficiency is very marked. I he 
scrap is cleaned, machanical impurities are ejected, dirt and mu 
are washed away and- the scrap is finally turned out m a form 
precisely similar to that taken by the first class rubber and in a 
stateof purity which is only a trifle inferior to' it. With rubbe 
from Ficus elastica or Rambong the machine deals in a similai 
manner, and an easy and simple method of treatment o his 
hitherto intractable latex is made possible Great d fficult , ha 
been found in dealing with rambong up to the present because it 
cannot be coagulated in sheets in the same way as can Para rub- 
ber If, however, the thick latex be churned, beaten or violently 
shaken, it coagulates in a great lump, and to treat this lump m the 
old way, to dry and render it fit for export has been a matter of 
o-reat difficulty and of many months. The lumps however may 
Treated at once with the washing machine and thin. sheets produced, 
which are clean and which rapidly dry without difficulty. 
The use of machinery in dealing with latex and preparing mar- 
ketable rubber is, I am convinced, a necessity and the almost un - 
versal adoption of it on rubber plantation of any size is only a 
matter of time. At present the trouble and labour involved in 
preparing “biscuits” by hand has scarcely made itself felt simply 
because so little rubber has been prepared. 
In the immediate future this will be changed, for each pound of 
rubber hitherto prepared there will be fifty, and some change ill ie 
system of preparation to cope with this increased output will be 
necessity At present a form ot rubber is prepared— the biscuit 
which can only be regarded as a transition type. It must be re- 
membered that all rubber has sooner or later to pass thro "S . 
the washing machine, it has to be made into crepe work or washed 
rubber. . , . 
To pass from the latex to this washed rubber through the biscuit 
form is taking one step down and then one and a half steps up 
The same result can be obtained by one single process, by the 
use of a washing machine on the latex directly it is coagulated a d 
the labour and trouble is only half a step compared to that in- 
volved in making fine “biscuits. 
The widespread adoption of this mechanical method ot treating 
rubber will be a very distinct step in the advance towards scientific 
rubber growing and preparation, and the debt which the whole of 
