RUBBER GOODS
In England, the chief markets for raw rubber, wild and plantation, are
London and Liverpool. The other principal importers are the United
States, France, Italy, Belgium, and Russia. The making of rubber goods
is an important industry in all these countries. America is well ahead
as the biggest importer and manufacturer. Germany and Austria also
have some fine factories, and both were big importers of raw rubber in
pre-war days.
Rubber passes through many hands during its long journey to market.
First it has to be sent to the chief port of the district where it
is obtained. In Brazil this means a long journey by river direct to
Para, or to Para via Manaos, with a break of journey at that busy
up-country river port. Some of the Brazilian rubber has to be taken
250 miles in open boats, along a course that contains many stretches
of dangerous rapids, and is blocked by a number of falls. It then has
to go on by steamer for 500 miles before it gets to Para. And some of
the Brazilian pelles are made into rafts, which are taken downstream
to the nearest point where the pelles can be transferred to a steamer.
In Ceylon, the principal distribution depôt is the port of Colombo;
in Malaya, most of the rubber leaves home via Singapore or Port
Swettenham. Plantation rubber travels in packing-cases to local ports
by rail, by river in little Noah’s Ark boats thatched with palm-leaves,
or by road in bullock-carts. Both wild and plantation rubber get a
break of journey at some local port, where there are warehouses in
which the material can be stored in order that it may be submitted to
a searching examination. It has to be weighed, sampled, and sorted
according to quality. Plantation rubber can be very easily sampled
and graded, because its form is such that it can be easily handled
and seen through. But much of the wild product is sent to market in
bulky masses. It is hard work cutting through the samples which are
selected to undergo the test of seeing whether they are as good through
and through as they are on the surface, or whether they contain any
makeweight, such as bits of old iron or rope.
When the time comes for the raw material to continue its journey
to market, it is put aboard an ocean-going steamer, which takes it
overseas to the port where it is to be sold. Here again it is received
into a warehouse. Once more it is weighed and sampled. The samples are
sent to manufacturers, with a catalogue, stating that so many pounds
of rubber, corresponding to such or such a sample, will be sold by
auction on a certain date at a certain market. The rubber itself, in
its packing-cases or sackcloth covering, is taken down to vaults, where
it is stored until it is claimed by whoever buys it at the auction.
Vaults are used as storage quarters for raw rubber in order that
the material may be kept in an even temperature; for not until that
material is within a rubber goods factory is it made climate-proof by
vulcanization.
We can stand outside any rubber goods factory and watch the material
being taken within its doors; that is to say, we can see big boxes
and bulky canvas packages being taken in, and we know now that their
contents consist of rubber pelles, crêpe, sheets, biscuits, or blocks,
which were once white milk, and are now a solid material that is
yellow, brown, grey or black in colour.
[Illustration:
_C. W. Kerr & Co., Kandy, Ceylon_
MAKING CRÊPE RUBBER ON A CEYLON ESTATE. _Page 83_]
To see what comes out of such factories we need only look around us
at the common objects of everyday life. In the streets there are
motor-cars, taxicabs, omnibuses, and bicycles running on wheels that
have rubber tyres. On a wet day most of the people outdoors are wearing
macintoshes, whilst some of them are further protected against the
rain by galoshes; even on a fine day, rubber is worn a very great deal
outdoors in the form of boot-and-shoe-heel protectors. In the house
there are rubber washers on the taps, rubber rings on the stoppers of
the ginger-beer bottles within the pantry, a teapot on the kitchen
dresser has been mended with a rubber spout, and the children are
playing with rubber balls, dolls, and toy balloons. In the hospital
the doctors use surgical instruments that have important parts made of
rubber, and many of the patients are provided with rubber necessaries,
such as elastic stockings, made of rubber thread, for bad legs,
and false teeth on a plate of vulcanite, which is chiefly rubber.
Travellers take rubber baths and rubber cushions about with them.
Golfers play with rubber balls. Machinery would be at a standstill
without rubber belting. What an inconvenient world this must have been
to live in less than a hundred years ago, when anything made of rubber
was a novelty! And there is no telling how much more comfortable and
convenient rubber may make life in days not so very long ahead.
Knowing the form in which rubber goes into the manufacturer’s
possession, and a few, at any rate, of the many forms in which it next
makes a public appearance, we are naturally very anxious to learn how
such transformations take place. It is impossible for me to take you
over a rubber goods factory, much as I should like to do so. All such
establishments keep very strictly to the rule of “No admittance except
on business.” There are secrets to be hidden, not from the public, but
from a rival manufacturer. You must quite understand that no offence
is meant to you personally when no exception can be made in anyone’s
favour in case some rival’s friend should slip through.
You need not be very disappointed--enough is known of the way rubber
goods are made to satisfy much of your curiosity.
The manufacturer must always bear in mind that he must fulfil two
important conditions: first, his goods must serve the purpose for which
they are intended, and next, the price which customers will pay has
to be taken into consideration, with the idea of producing the best
wearing article that can be made for the money.
According to the use to which rubber is to be put, it has to be mixed
with certain other materials, to make a material that is neither too
heavy nor too light, too hard nor too soft, too tough nor too elastic,
to fulfil its purpose. And according to the price at which the goods
are to be sold, certain other materials must be mixed with the rubber.
It is with regard to the proportions in which such mixings are made
that the manufacturers have secrets of their own which they specially
want to guard. The compounding materials consist of such things as
zinc oxide, white lead, and magnesia. Always to the “dough,” “mixing,”
or “batch,” as the compound is called, some sulphur is added to bring
about vulcanization. A colouring ingredient is also put into some of
the dough, according to the taste and fancy of customers for whom goods
are going to be made. The dough is worked smooth, and is then put into
moulds shaped like the required articles, or built up into shape and
form. The goods are generally vulcanized by steam heat. Much skill,
together with great care and patience, goes to the making of all rubber
goods; and when such goods have to be canvas backed, or to be made of a
material that is bodily a mixture of thread and rubber, the process of
manufacture calls for particularly good workmanship.
Printed in Great Britain by Messrs. Billing and Sons, Ltd., Guildford
[Illustration:
_R. B. Lodge, Enfield_
SAMPLING BOLIVIAN RUBBER AT BULL WHARF, LONDON. _Page 86_]
Transcribers’ Notes:
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a
predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not
changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced
quotation marks retained.
List of Illustrations: The page number for Illustration 16 was
hand-written as “76”, which is the page it faces in the book; and “On
the cover” was crossed out. A different edition of this book included
neither this illustration nor the cover.