WASTE RUBBER

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 64, Issue 4563, 22 April 1942, Page 4

WASTE RUBBER

COLLECTION TO BE MADE IN NEW ZEALAND

Shortly the collection of old rubber will begin in New Zealand. Of the world’s ruuber supply, 85 per cent normally comes from Malaya, and that source is not now available to the Allies. Mr V. S- Noton, Wellington representative of Reid (N.Z.) Rubber Mills, Ltd., Auckland, said the other day that new plant had been installed at the New Zealand mill for processing again old rubber, and it would be working in a few days. No use had hitherto been made’ of old rubber in New Zealand, because there had been no plant to deal with it. The secondhand rubber would be used not for the manufacture of articles that required a high quality of rubber, but for making hard rubber articles, such as storage battery cases, and other goods. Its use would relieve the demand foi raw rubber. Tyre re-treaders had been asked some months ago to save the rubber they stripped off tyres under repair, and that had been collected, but there was no market for such things as old tyres because the freight made their cost at the mill too high. The waste materials organisation would probably be able to arrange the collection of waste rubber satisfactorily, because of its official position. It would probably be favoured with special freight rates. The greatest source, of old rubber is discarded motor vehicle tyres which hitherto have been used as bumpers on launches and on jetties, or have been dumped on tips, or burned. When a car tyre is new it is 60 per cent rubber. Rubber from almost any other worn-out vehicle can be used.

Remarking that he knew rubber tyres were being burned in furnaces in New Zealand, Mr Noton said emphatically that it was “ a sin ” for that to be done to-day. He pointed out that a big proportion of the New Zealand mill’s operations was war work. An officer of the New Zealand Council for the Reclamation of Waste Materials said an announcement on the collection of rubber would be made within a few days. Investigations had been made and an indication from the mill of the kinds of rubber that were required was awaited. He explained that in asking for materials to be saved one had to be specific. People who had old rubber keep it till they were told xtfhat to do with it.