How do they make gum?
In the old days, gum base was made from the rubber tree. Nowadays gum base is made from synthetic rubber. I think the synthetic rubber is a petrolium product. Before they had the rubber gum, people chewed sap from similar trees, or even beeswax. General Santa Anna of the Alamo introduced rubber chewing gum to America The approximate manufacturing methods are fairly constant between brands. The gum base is melted at a temperature of about 115 °C(240 °F), until it has the viscosity of thick maple syrup, then filtered through a fine mesh screen. Then it is further refined by separating dissolved particles in a centrifuge, and further filtered. Clear base, still hot and melted, is then put into mixing vats. Other ingredients that may be added include: powdered sugar (the amount and grain size of which determines the brittleness of the resulting gum), corn syrup and/or glucose (which serve as humectants and coat the sugar particles to stabilize their suspension and keep the gum flexible), v
