Evening Republican, Volume 59, Number 87, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 May 1917 — Rubber Sponge for Tires. [ARTICLE]

Rubber Sponge for Tires.

It is proposed to manufacture punc-ture-proof automobile tires from rubber sponge, and experiments with this end in view are being carried forward. Rubber sponge has some remarkable properties 'Whichmake it a- promising material. It contains'great quantities of air, but the air. is in the form of very minute bubbles, each bubble Inclosed in a thin sac of rubber. Rubber sponge is made by the addition of certain chemicals which give off large quantities of gas, which is imprisoned by the soft rubber during the vulcanizing process. It distributes the shocks of the road much as an air-filled tire does by virtue of the imprisoned gas in its structure, and has the added virtue that a puncture wilt only affect the airsacs actually ruptured.