Over the past decade, progress in the weight reduction of three-piece food cans has stalled, partly because of the problem of wrinkling of the seam during the canning process. This issue has tended to occur when the gauge of tinplate ends manufactured from higher-strength steels is reduced below a certain thickness.
Lighter-weight cans without the wrinkles
Further weight reduction in three-piece tinplate cans is possible using an optimised seamer tool profile that minimises wrinkling when lower gauge, higher strength tinplate ends are used, according to new collaborative research described by Thomas Lieber*