Beer can is crafted of African bauxite

BY JAMES ROWBOTTOM
Staff Writer

From the Pottsville Republican


Courtesy of Ball Corp.
Cans roll off the conveyor belt at Ball Corp's plant in Williamsburg, VA., Yuengling's supplier.
A can is a can is a can is a can. Not.

For Richard L. Yuengling Jr., owner of D.G. Yuengling & Son Brewery, Pottsville, a can's quality must be as fine as the beer it contains.

"We look at quality first, then price," then service, said James L. Helmke, Yuengling's vice president of operations for the brewery.

The arduous journey toward Traditional Amber Lager's cream-colored and maroon can starts with "red dirt" -- bauxite, mostly from Halco Mining Inc.'s operations in west Africa.

Lesser amounts come from Alcoa mines in Brazil and Australia, reports Michael A. Infante, communications manager at Alcoa Aluminum Tennessee Operations.

The ore is shipped to Point Comfort, Texas, Alcoa's only U.S. refining plant, where it becomes alumina powder, which looks like table salt, Infante said.

Alumina is put in railcars and shipped to Alcoa's smelting and fabricating plant in Alcoa, Tenn.

Jolted with high-voltage electricity, the powder's chemical content changes, turning it into molten aluminum, which is cast into ingots, then rolled into "can sheet," aluminum rolls.

Ball Metal Beverage Container, a subsidiary of Ball Corp., then buys these can sheets from Alcoa, and also from Alcan Aluminum Corp.'s Oswego, N.Y., foundry, said Geraldine R. Walsh, region sales manager at Ball Corp. headquarters in Muncie, Ind.

Founded in 1880, Ball -- it supplies Yuengling with 2 million cans a year -- is a worldwide manufacturer of metal and plastic food and beverage packaging, employing 7,400 people in 40 locations.

At plants in Witbey, Ont., and Williamsburg, Va., the aluminum rolls pass through 20 separate machines to form cans. Most plants in the United States produce cans with reduced-diameter necks; these Ball plants still produce the larger necks that "America's Oldest Brewery" prefers.

An internal coating is then applied to preserve beer quality; otherwise, the beer would dissolve the can and taste metallic.

The label is printed directly onto the can through a process called offset lithography -- as with a newspaper press, a printing plate is run through a well of ink; the plate then "offsets" the inked image onto a rubber blanket, which "offsets" the image onto the cans.

A coating then seals the can. The lids, which are punched out of an aluminum sheet, are made at another Ball plant in Findley, Ohio.

The lids and cans are shipped to the brewery at Fifth and Mahantongo, where they are filled and crimped shut. Voila


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