Since many years Paramelt has been supplying products to the chewing gum industry, both to primary gum producers as well as to chewing gum base producers. The main products for this market are microwaxes and rubber concentrates of wax and polyisobutylene rubber.
Rubber concentrates are very fine dispersions of e.g. butyl and polyisobutylene rubbers in paraffin or microcrystalline wax blends. These blends have a very high viscosity and are therefore hard to produce. The concentrates can be blended with waxes using simple mixing equipment without the need for heavy duty rubber mixers. These products are used for the production of chewing gum bases.
Hard and semi hard microcrystallene waxes are used in chewing gum base to make the plastisize the rubber compound. These microwaxes are approved for use in foodstuff and are registered as food additive under E 903.