CHEMICAL ICE

Evening Star, Issue 20128, 19 March 1929, Page 6

CHEMICAL ICE

AS USED AT HOLLYWOOD lee skating in the movie-dramas i* not done on ice at all. T lie Hollywood climate is too balmy. Chemists have come io the rescue, ami photographer s “ hypo ” has been substituted, we are told bv Science Service’s ‘Daily News Bulletin’ (Washington). It says:— “ For example, the motion picture director is desirous of staging a supposed Canadian championship skating tournament. Following the suggestion of Professor Arthur A. Maas, industrial chemist of the University <•! Southern California, he now buys a lon. or two of hypo. The chemical ix spread about "the promises, groomed, with a hot iron, cooled, and is ready for the skaters. All of the lanc.y stunts done on ice seem equally wed .performed on hypo, and the movio patron doesn’t Know the difference.' Hypo is known to chemists as a compound of sodium thiosulfate with * considerable quantity of water. Au normal temperature it is a dry, glassy, but somewhat soli solid of much the same texture as icc. “ Unlike ice, however, it melts at IH degrees instead of .‘52. At the elevated temperature it dissolves in its own water of crystallisation, and easily applied to tho surtace which is to represent a frozen hike. Under tho pressure of the running skate, hypo' is scored much as icc. Semi-transpar-ent flakes and grains fly into the air, during the course of the movie drama. ; Under ihe eye of Hie camera the dp-,; lusion i* almost perfect. At the end of the day a gentle sprinkling, followed, bv a hot iron, restores the fake ice to its juris tine lustre. “ The use of the crystalline thiasnlfate lias been proposed for amusement rinks, but would likely have too stiltj a competition from artificial ice as now, employed. On the vaudeville stage, as well as in tbe movies, it has been sue-' ccssful. ft is possible that some new; ami cheaper material of moderately high melting point may be brought forth to displace ice. thus eliminating the high cost of refrigeration.”