
The firsts news we have in Europe about rubber date back to 1500, when some Spanish coming from “New World” told about a substance that natives extracted from a tree that grew up in the rainforest. They also called it “bleeding tree” well know as caouthchouc.
This substance did not employed soon in Europe production, as working was very difficult because of its sensibility in change of temperature. Its peculiar capabilities were still unknown.
It was only at the beginning of the 1800 that started the exploitation of rubber, imported from South America plantations.
The first employment was on waterproof cloths: it was discovered that coal-naphtha has the properties of release rubber to make itself liquid.
The waterproof cloths were realized by the application of a layer of rubber between two layers of material.
In 1950 an English man called Thomas Hancock discovered a process that will changed the history on utilization of rubber called grinding that consisted in tearing the block of unrefined rubber by the using of sharpened objects.
The result was simpler to work then unrefined rubber.
Few years later was discovered a process called “ vulcanization” that gave to rubber more stability during thermal changes and that allowed itself to preserve his properties.
At the beginning of 1800 scientists discovered the empirical formula and the molecular sequence of rubber and started the foundation of firsts synthetic rubbers.
In 1910 some Russian chemicals synthesized the polybutadiene giving start to Russian synthetic rubber industries. In the same years in Germany was synthesized and started up to the production of “melitica” rubber and after few years the rubber based on “copolimeri of stirene and butadiene”.
At the same time, in the United States started the production of synthetic rubber and its employment gets to the world by replacing natural rubber.
To synthetic rubbers were addicted oil, coal, and other substances with the intent of make rubber more malleable for every use.
The benefit of synthetic rubber compared to natural rubber were essentially two: purity and workability. The firsts news we have in Europe about rubber date back to 1500, when some Spanish coming from “New World” told about a substance that natives extracted from a tree that grew up in the rainforest. They also called it “bleeding tree” well know as caouthchouc.
This substance did not employed soon in Europe production, as working was very difficult because of its sensibility in change of temperature. Its peculiar capabilities were still unknown.
It was only at the beginning of the 1800 that started the exploitation of rubber, imported from South America plantations.
The first employment was on waterproof cloths: it was discovered that coal-naphtha has the properties of release rubber to make itself liquid.
The waterproof cloths were realized by the application of a layer of rubber between two layers of material.
In 1950 an English man called Thomas Hancock discovered a process that will changed the history on utilization of rubber called grinding that consisted in tearing the block of unrefined rubber by the using of sharpened objects.
The result was simpler to work then unrefined rubber.
Few years later was discovered a process called “ vulcanization” that gave to rubber more stability during thermal changes and that allowed itself to preserve his properties.
At the beginning of 1800 scientists discovered the empirical formula and the molecular sequence of rubber and started the foundation of firsts synthetic rubbers.
In 1910 some Russian chemicals synthesized the polybutadiene giving start to Russian synthetic rubber industries. In the same years in Germany was synthesized and started up to the production of “melitica” rubber and after few years the rubber based on “copolimeri of stirene and butadiene”.
At the same time, in the United States started the production of synthetic rubber and its employment gets to the world by replacing natural rubber.
To synthetic rubbers were addicted oil, coal, and other substances with the intent of make rubber more malleable for every use.
The benefit of synthetic rubber compared to natural rubber were essentially two: purity and workability.
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History of the rubber - Italy version
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