 industry, which was suddenly forced to scrap old equipment and hurriedly reorganize to meet new demands. Plastics have already caused a similar re-gearing of basic industries, and undoubtedly will cause more.
Cellulose, which exploded paint theories and makes excellent plastics, is a marvelously versatile substance. It goes into the manufacture of such widely separated things as raincoats, cements, substitutes for leather, and the film which makes the modern motion picture possible. Into Cellophane it goesâ€”and in a decade enough Cel-ophane has been manufactured to encircle the earth with a band 200 miles wide. It makes rayon, and a rayon cord as strong as structural steel of the same cross-section promises to double the life of automobile tires. Such things don’t just happen; they are brought about by ceaseless, untiring research.
The laboratory has changed rubber from a sticky, ungovernable substance into a tough and sturdy one; it has transformed the tire from a mental and physical hazard into something seldom given a thought. Yet in automobiles it is generally the rubber parts that require replacement first; chemical tougheners have worked wonders, but there is still room for improvement.
It may seem strange that the Dupont laboratories, largely instrumental in bringing rubber to its present dependability, should now be engaged in perfecting synthetic rubber. Artificial rubber has long been the ardent dream of many a chemist. Why aim for a substitute when the natural product is so cheap and so much improved? The answer is largely an economic one. America gets its rubber from abroad. During the past decade, through foreign manipulation, rubber’s price has gone as high as $1.29 a pound. Chemists saw that challenge. If they could do the impossibleâ€”produce synthetic rubber at a reasonable priceâ€”they could free the country from its dependence on foreign supply.
Research has done just that, using acetylene as a raw material. Dupont chemists, aided by the work of a Notre Dame professor, Father J. A. Nieuwland, have made artificial rubber that excels the natural product in many respects. Called “Duprene,” this substance is already being manufactured on a commercial scale. An acre of rubber trees yields approximately 500 pounds of rubber in 500 years; but an acre-large factory can turn out 200 tons of man-made rubber in five hours! And the raw materials, including sulphur, salt and natural gas, are well-nigh inexhaustible. Natural rubber’s weaknessâ€”its deterioration from contact with heat, oil, acids and alkaloids, is largely removed in “Duprene.” Though it now costs a $1 a pound, six times the price of rubber, “Duprene” has already found a market in gaskets, tubing, and many other uses where rubber is exposed to chemical decay.
To those who remember camphor as a smelly substance applied in treating colds, it may be a surprise to know that camphor is an essential ingredient in pyroxylin plastics and safety glass. The only source of natural camphor is the Japanese island of Formosa. In short, we were long dependent on one small spot on the globe, subject to the vagaries of shipping, tariff, and the possibility of war, for an important product.
It is under these circumstances that research works at its best. No time is wasted in devising substitutes for natural products when they are cheap and plentiful. But let there be a threat of scarcity or high price, and immediately all the guns of science are pointed at a synthetic. So it was with camphor. In 1934, after over $3,000,000 had been spent in various laboratories in a vain hunt for artificial camphor, chemists of the Newport Company derived an excellent synthetic from American turpentine. This new synthetic is now helping make the nine million pounds of safety glass the automobile industry will require in 1936.
The cunning sandwich of materials that compose safety glass is a strange union of man’s newest with man’s oldest chemical achievement. Glass goes far back into ancient history. Yet the effort expended by plastic research is matched by the glass chemist’s consta