TAR BRAND PROBLEMS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVII, Issue 214, 24 August 1927, Page 8

TAR BRAND PROBLEMS

NEW PREPARATION DISCOVERED. A disco very of the utmost importance to the woollen industry has been made after several years’ research by the chemists of the British Research Association for the Woollen an,d Worsted Industries at the laboratories of the association at Headingly, Leeds. This takes the form of a new brand ing fluid—a substitute for tar as a material for marking sheep. And the new preparation is now on view at the association’s exhibition in London. The substitute will cost the farmer no more than tar and possibly less. It is a durable colouring matter capable of resisting the climate, but at the same time it can be scoured from the fleece, thus avoiding the damage and waste to the fleeces and the finished goods caused by the use of tar. Mr Arnold Frobisher • (secretary) said that they had been working on the problem for some years. During the past two seasons they had experimented with the new fluid in this country, and within the last few mouths there had been signs of success. It was necessary for the preparation to answer two tests —that it should/ withstand the weather and that it should be scoured out of the wool by ordinary commercial methods. ANSWERS BOTH TESTS. It had answered, these two tests in this country, and the work had been very successful. Final experiments were now being carried out in South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand, and there was every reason to believe that these would be successful. It is understood that there is no question of applying for patents in

foreign countries. Mr Frobisher said the preparation is of such a nature that the ordinary firms who sell sheep dip, etc., would be able to make it. And it would also be possible to send out the recipe to the farmers in the Dominion, who would be able to make the fluid themselves. He pointed out that it was not de sirable to impose a royalty on sales. 'That would increase the cost of the preparation, whereas they wanted to make it as cheap as possible in order to encourage the farmers to use it instead of tar. By encouraging them the ultimate saving in raw material and finished product would be enormous—obviously much greater than any royalty on sales.