I think we don’t give enough details on some of our more popular product lines. So I thought I would spend a little time to go over the various ranges of bottles we offer at Elemental Container.
Today, we’ll go over our industrial aluminum bottle line called the Plus range. These very versatile bottles range in capacity from 50ml (1.7oz) to 32L (7 gallons). They’re most frequently used for storing, shipping and packaging liquid or volatile products. On our website, you will see the product names Plus 32, Plus 45 and Plus 62.
Plain or coated, all Plus bottles are secured with a heavy-duty tamper evident cap. They are also U.N. approved as single packaging; they can be used for the transportation of hazardous materials.
It’s easy to forget that aluminum is one of the basic elements of nature. Just review the periodic table of elements from high school and you’ll see that aluminum – with atomic number of 13 – is among the most basic elements. It’s right next to Silicon (atomic number of 14)
The Properties of the Element Aluminum:
Name of Element : Aluminum
Symbol of Element : Al
Atomic Number of Aluminum : 13
Atomic Mass: 26.981539 amu
Melting Point: 660.37 °C – 933.52 °K
Boiling Point: 2467.0 °C – 2740.15 °K
Number of Protons/Electrons in Aluminum : 13
Number of Neutrons in Aluminum : 14
Crystal Structure: Cubic
Density @ 293 K: 2.702 g/cm3
Color of Aluminum : silvery-white
Interestingly enough – aluminum in its pure, unalloyed state is silvery-white in color.
The Aluminum Association ran an interesting article on “The Ever-Shrinking Aluminum Can”. Some excerpts:
“Beyond aluminum cans’ advantages relating to its “stackability” and high rates of recycling, its light weight gives it an additional environmental edge over many competing packaging formats.
Broomfield, Colo.-based Ball Corporation over the past 40 years has pursued “lightweighting” as a fundamental part of its business for both economic and environmental reasons. The canmaker has repeatedly reduced both the end diameter of its cans and the amount of aluminum used in its can bodies—to the point where its aluminum cans use 40 percent less aluminum today than they did in 1970.
Ball further notes that:
Aluminum cans are the lightest-weight beverage container—at 34 cans per pound—enabling savings in shipping and handling costs throughout the entire supply chain; and
The average post-consumer recycled content of an aluminum can is 44 percent—the highest recycled content of any beverage container.”
The Container Recycling Institute has launched a campaign to achieve Zero Beverage Container Waste by 2020. Considering aluminum’s superior recycling rates, this bodes well for the aluminum packaging industry.
We came across an interesting article from Rexam, the largest beverage can maker. You can view the entire article here. Here are excerpts from the article:
“Independent studies show wine in cans have environmental benefits and cost savings. Two separate studies commissioned by Rexam, the world’s largest beverage can maker, have demonstrated that wine in cans is not only an environmentally friendly and sustainable pack format, but also offers beneficial cost savings for both suppliers and retailers. The first study, carried out by Incept, a UK based consultancy, looked at the space efficiency when transporting wine in aluminium cans compared to transportation in glass bottles and analysed the environmental effects and CO2 emissions during the transportation of still wine.
The study found that:
Slim cans have half the CO2 transport related emissions of the equivalent 75cl wine sold in glass packaging
Wine, in both 200ml and 250ml cans, produces fewer transport related CO2 emissions than other packaging formats
Compared to glass bottles, to save one tonne of CO2, only 5,330 cases of 250ml slim cans need to be sold”
So it looks like aluminum packaging has a smaller carbon footprint and is cheaper to store and transport! I’m sure winemakers aren’t the only ones who have recognized these advantages and have added aluminum packaging options.
We just introduced a new dispensing option for our brushed aluminum container line – an aluminum lotion pump. Manufactured with a 24/410 neck finish, the new pump will work interchangeably on our 2, 4, 6, 8 or 10 oz size bottles. It comes in a matte finish (see picture) which complements the brushed aluminum bottle’s finish perfectly, and is equipped with a twist and lock feature. The pump is rated for an output of 1.2cc and is supplied with a 170mm (6.7”) deep tube.
These new aluminum lotion pumps are ideally suited for soaps, gels, shampoos, creams and lotions. They are available from stock and may be ordered in small quantities.
The metallic element aluminum is the third most plentiful element in the earth’s crust, comprising 8% of the planet’s soil and rocks (oxygen and silicon make up 47% and 28%, respectively). In nature, aluminum is found only in chemical compounds with other elements such as sulphur, silicon, and oxygen. Pure, metallic aluminum can be economically produced only from aluminum oxide ore.
Metallic aluminum has many properties that make it useful in a wide range of applications. It is lightweight, strong, nonmagnetic, and nontoxic. It conducts heat and electricity and reflects heat and light. It is strong but easily workable, and it retains its strength under extreme cold without becoming brittle. The surface of aluminum quickly oxidizes to form an invisible barrier to corrosion. Furthermore, aluminum can easily and economically be recycled into new products.
We’ve introduced a new line of aluminum straight edge screw caps. These can be produced from standard tooling or custom designed.
Diameters: 20, 24, 28, 33, 70 and 89mm
Necks: 400, 410, Special
Styles: Straight edge with smooth finish (no knurl)
Liners: EPE (others available upon request)
Finishes: Anodized, powder coated, clear/gold lacquered, embossed/debossed
These caps are suitable as closures for glass, plastic and aluminum bottles, flasks and jars.
Specifications are available for toiletries, hair-care, food, pharmaceutical, aromatherapy, waxes, polishes and other products.
Aluminum packaging looks very well-positioned in the new “green revolution”. Everything is going green these days – green computing, green buildings, green energy, and of course green packaging. According to the Aluminum Association, “the aluminum industry recovers approximately 54% of the aluminum containers produced in the U.S.” More significantly, the aluminum industry is targeting a 75% recycling rate by 2015 (see article text here).
This is really quite a significant target and a story that both consumers and packagers should really know. Most people would probably think that glass containers have better recycling rates than aluminum. In fact, according to the EPA, “only 22% of glass containers were recycled in 2003, as compared to 44% for aluminum cans.” The Container Recycling Institute reported that in 2006 aluminum recycling rates were at
45.2%, vs. 23.5% for PET plastic and 27.8% for glass.
Aluminum’s recyclability and sustainability are clear pluses for the environment, especially in this new environmentally-conscious US administration. We’re already seeing greater use of aluminum packaging in many new applications such as wine. So expect a lot more stories in this e-zine on aluminum as a green packaging material!
Welcome to the Elemental Container E-zine! Together with our website at www.aluminumbottles.com, this ezine will give you lots of information on our aluminum packaging business, including new products and services, news, useful articles, customer news and a whole lot more. It will be updated constantly with articles, podcasts and and even videos like the one below. So keep coming back!
Aluminum is a great material for promoting new products, and relaunching existing products. It’s no surprise that even wines are now being packaged in aluminum.
There are some new aluminum cans that are rugged, lightweight, versatile & and really cool. They’re all recyclable and can be readily re-used by consumers. Here’s some basic info on this line:
• Range of 12 diameters with lengths up to 265mm on some larger diameters: 20mm, 23mm, 27mm, 30mm, 33mm, 37mm, 40mm, 46mm, 50mm, 53mm, 63mm, 75mm
• canisters can be supplied
• can be made with or without an inward curl
• comes with lined or unlined caps (packed separately)
• coated internally
• printed 1-4 colors on a base coat externally
• can be embossed to customer specific requirements (with a small tooling cost)
I think we don’t give enough details on some of our more popular product lines. So I thought I would spend a little time to go over the various ranges of bottles we offer at Elemental Container.
The Aluminum Association ran an interesting article on “The Ever-Shrinking Aluminum Can”. Some excerpts:
We came across an interesting article from Rexam, the largest beverage can maker. You can view the entire article 
Manufactured with a 24/410 neck finish, the new pump will work interchangeably on our 2, 4, 6, 8 or 10 oz size bottles. It comes in a matte finish (see picture) which complements the brushed aluminum bottle’s finish perfectly, and is equipped with a twist and lock feature. The pump is rated for an output of 1.2cc and is supplied with a 170mm (6.7”) deep tube.
Did you know that . . .
We’ve introduced a new line of aluminum straight edge screw caps. These can be produced from standard tooling or custom designed.
Aluminum packaging looks very well-positioned in the new “green revolution”. Everything is going green these days – green computing, green buildings, green energy, and of course green packaging. According to the Aluminum Association, “the aluminum industry recovers approximately 54% of the aluminum containers produced in the U.S.” More significantly, the aluminum industry is targeting a 75% recycling rate by 2015 (see article text 
