Cost effective new bleaching agent for rubber industry
A new brand of latex bleaching agent has been introduced from this
month for sole crepe and crepe manufacturing in the rubber industry.
The new product was developed from basic raw materials by the
undergraduates of the University of Peradeniya at the Laboratory of C
and T Worldwide (Pvt) Ltd., where they underwent industrial training.
Though the brand is new, it is the same chemical that has been used
for the last three to four decades in Sri Lanka. It was modified in the
1980s by a leading rubber technologist, who made it water soluble to
make the treatment of latex easier.
It took nearly seven years to perfect this product, to make it
user-friendly and commercially viable. Being a locally manufactured
product, this will be more beneficial to the plantation companies as a
way of reducing production costs.
The Head of the Department of Chemistry, University of Peradeniya had
guided students to undergo training at the laboratory under the special
inspection of the Senior Professor of Chemistry and the
Academic-in-Charge of the instruments laboratory at the University of
Sri Jayewardenepura, where all sophisticated analysis reports were
carried out and obtained. Plantation Industries Minister Mahinda
Samarasinghe, staff of the Rubber Research Institute and several
plantation companies assisted the students in the project. |