Matches, the name now given to splints of wood tipped with some composition (often containing phosphorus) to produce a light by friction. These came into general use about the year 1834. Before that the common light producer was the flint and steel along with a tinder-box. The tinder (charred cotton) was set on fire by sparks from the flint and steel, but did not burst into flame. This was obtained by touching the burning tinder with a spunk or strip of wood tipped with sulphur. Perhaps the most primitive way of producing a light is by rubbing two pieces of wood together, or by rapidly twirling one piece of wood into a hole or socket in another piece, touchwood being ignited by either process when sufficient heat is raised. These methods of obtaining fire by the friction of two bits of wood are in use by some savage races (see FIRE). Among other devices formerly employed for the same purpose were a lens to concentrate the sun's rays on some inflammable substance; an arrangement (Döbereiner's lamp) for producing and kindling a jet of hydrogen gas by making it play on spongy platinum; the oxymuriate match, consisting of a splint tipped with a mixture of chlorate of potash and sugar, which took fire on contact with sulphuric acid; and the lucifer match, which was tipped with a paste containing chlorate of potash and sulphide of antimony that ignited when drawn across sand-paper. This original lucifer match required to be rubbed with a good deal of pressure to produce a light, and as it gave off sparks of kindled matter it was not free of danger. The introduction of phosphorus in 1834 was a great improvement.
The chief operations in the manufacture of matches embrace (1) cutting the wood splints; (2) immersing the splints in melted paraffin; and (3) preparing the igniting composition and dipping the splints into it. There is also the making of the boxes, which, in the case of safety matches, have the phosphorus composition glued upon their sides. Pine or aspen is the wood used for the splints.
There are several kinds of splint-cutting machines. One of the simplest is a special kind of lathe for which the tree trunks to be operated upon are sawn across in pieces 14 inches long, and the bark removed. One of these pieces is the length of seven matches, and is fixed on the chuck of the lathe and cut into a continuous slice or shaving equal to a match in thickness. The principal cutting tool is fixed on the slide-rest, and as the shaving comes away it is divided into seven equal widths by cutters placed above the chief slicing tool. After the two-inch wide shavings are cut into six feet lengths, they are divided into single splints by a guillotine cutter similar to that used for cutting paper. Under favourable circumstances this machine will cut a million splints in an hour.
For the purpose of being immersed in paraffin and afterwards dipped into the igniting composition the splints are fixed into a dipping-frame. This frame consists of thin wooden laths fully two feet long, placed parallel to each other and held in position by two round iron bars passing through holes in their ends. About fifty splints, projecting equally beyond the frame, are held firmly between every two of these laths at a little distance from each other, the whole frame containing between two and three thousand. The splints are supplied to the frames by filling-machines, of which there are several kinds, chiefly of American invention. In the dipping-room, to which these filled frames are taken, the igniting composition is spread of the proper thickness on a hollow iron table kept hot by steam, and the splints dipped into it to form them into matches. The rooms where the igniting-mixture is prepared and the matches dipped are, or at least were, the most unhealthy parts of a match-factory. In former days especially, among those who worked in these rooms cases of necrosis or caries of the lower jaw occurred from the action of the phosphorus fumes. But, owing to the lessened quantity of phosphorus now used in the dipping-mixtures and improved ventilation, this disease has become rare. It never occurs at all where red or amorphous phosphorus is employed, but common phosphorus is still very largely used.
Nearly every manufacturer has his own special mixture for the dipping of matches. One published recipe gives as the ingredients for this: part by weight of common phosphorus, 4 of chlorate of potash, 2 of glue, 1 of whiting, and 4 of finely-powdered glass. The proportion of phosphorus is small in this mixture. As it makes a more noiseless match, nitrate of potash is sometimes substituted for the chlorate. Other oxidising agents used instead of, or along with, these salts of potash are oxide of manganese and the red oxide or the dioxide of lead. Of course some water (slightly heated) is used in preparing dipping-mixtures. According to Gautier (Cours de Chimie, 1887), the igniting-mixture for ordinary matches made in France consists of 3 parts of common phosphorus, 2 of lead dioxide, 2 of sand, and 3 of gunn. The same author states that safety or 'Swedish' matches are dipped in a composition of 5 parts of chlorate of potash, 2 of sulphide of antimony, and 1 of glue; and that the rubbing-surface for these is a mixture of 5 parts of amorphous phosphorus, 4 of sulphide of antimony, and of glue. It need hardly be mentioned that matches are made in enormous numbers, some large firms turning out a hundred millions daily.
Probably matches to the value of £1,500,000 are made annually in Britain. In Sweden and Norway, where of late the trade has most rapidly developed, there are some sixty factories; Jönköping alone employs some 6000 matchmakers. Germany and Austria have together as many as 450 factories. In the United States the manufacture is mainly controlled by one combination of capitalists; in France the making of matches is a government monopoly. As a contrast to present prices it may be added that in 1830 the first friction matches, the Congreves, were sold in tin boxes of fifty at half-a-crown a box, each box containing a piece of glass paper to strike the matches on.
Vestas only differ from ordinary matches in the stalks being formed of bits of stearyl tapers (called wax-tapers) instead of wood splints. Vesuvians used by smokers consist of a hard wood, or sometimes a hollow glass stalk, with a bulbous head formed of some slow-burning compound, such as a mixture of charcoal, saltpetre, sand, and gum, tipped with the igniting composition of ordinary matches. 'Flamers,' also for the use of smokers, have a thick head of a flaming mixture, with either a 'wax-taper' or wood stalk.