Hindalco | Aluminium | Foil and packaging

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Plant profiles

Kalwa | Silvassa | Kollur

Kalwa

Hindalco's 6,000-tpa foil plant at Kalwa, near Mumbai, is equipped with state-of-the-art foil rolling and converting facilities that allow foil to be rolled down to a 7-µm thickness to very close tolerance; it also boasts high-tech modern converting facilities.

The unit is responsible for creating appropriate packaging solutions for diverse applications. Its impressive equipment range includes the following:

	Two rolling mills from Hunter, Italy
	Three Rotoconvert coater-cum-laminators, from Hoffman and Kampf
	An extruder from Sumitomo, Japan
	A twin-head tandem co-extruder from Egan Davis, USA
	Two multi-colour printing machines from Cerutti, Italy
	A seven-colour Rotomec printing machine from Italy
	An electronic engraver from Ohio, USA
	A chemical etching unit
	14 slitting machines, of Atlas and other reputed makes

Silvassa

Hindalco's 30,000-tpa foil plant at Silvassa has taken significant strides towards increased value addition with a rolling capacity of 9 to 200 µm thickness.

As a multi-dimensional performer of international quality, the foil plant, operating well above its capacity, is backed by:

	Five rolling mills, including a 'Five-Stand Tandem' Mill, which can roll down from 600 to 22 µm in a single pass
	Inert gas annealing furnaces
	A fin stock coating line from Selema, Italy, capable of producing hydrophobic and hydrophilic coated fin stock, coated closure stock and coated container foil
	Converting facilities, include wet and dry laminators from MB srl., Italy, and lubricator from Selema, Italy
	A six-colour Cerruti printing machine and a Rotomac poly extruder
	Finishing equipment such as Wickeltechnik separators and heavy, medium and light gauge slitters
	A state-of-the-art three-layer blown film line with the capacity to produce 20-µm film

In addition to the standard bare and converted pharma, blister, light and medium gauge and household foil, the Silvassa plant has unique product diversification, ranging from bare and coated closure stock in coil and sheet form, and bare and coated fin stock in different tempers to bare and coated container foil and radiator fin stock.

Kollur

Hindalco's 4,000-tpa Kollur plant produces a wide array of high-quality foil — from cigarette and blister foil to lidding foil in thicknesses from 50 down to 7 µm.

The plant has installed cutting-edge equipment that meets global standards to cater to the burgeoning foil and packaging demand:

	A 1060-mm wide, 4-high universal foil cold rolling mill, operating with globally recognised Fata Hunter Technology out of Italy
	A foil separator from Midimat, Italy
	Two machines from Prandi, Italy, for various foil lamination processes and the coating of cigarette foil, confectionery wrap, blister foil, lidding foil and other substrates used in food and pharma packaging applications
	Poly extruder from Prandi, Italy, extruding various polyethylene grades on the foil surface for varied foil structures
	A five-colour Cerruti printing machine that produces various foil printed designs tailored to customers' needs




	Interestingly it was the Swiss, who had no access to the sea who built the first aluminium boat in 1891. The following year, the French built an all-aluminium yacht.