New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1891-06-08
NOW FOR TIN PLATES.
WHY THE NEW DUTIES WERE LEVIED AND
WHAT THEY HAVE DONE.

THEY HAVE BEEN ANTICIPATED BY REMARK
ABLE EXHIBITIONS OF AMERICAN ENTER
PRISE WHICH LEAVE NO DOUBT OF
THE SUCCESSFUL ESTABLISHMENT
OF THE NEW INDUSTRY.
With singular faulty the Free-Trade advocates
have consolidated their opposition to the ne"
Tariff bill upon its tin-plate provisions. They
have, however this excuse for their policy, that
if they are forced to admit that a new industry
of immense proportions has been created here by
the tariff they arc robbed of their only eiiectual
argument against Protection. When the Mchin-
ley bill went into effect the American people were
consumers of 1877 735,Oa9 pounds Of tin plates an
nually and not single pound of them was made
or timed in the United States. They had cost
the people at the foreign price in 1900 H.
and during the period of twenty-five years ending
with 1880 the tremendous sum Of 1920, 037362
had gone from America TO England for tin plates.
There is nothing essentially difficult in the manu-
facture Of tin plates AS present mechanical
problem it is utterly insignificant. 1t consists,
first, in the manufacture OF bar steel. That, of
course is now of no account in the problem for any
plant that is capable Of producing steel rails is
capable also of producing steel bars and the finest
steel rails in the world are made here to the annual
amount of all, 544 net tons in 1890. There are
a score Of American manufacturers who can pro-
dnce all the bar steel required TO make all the
steel plates necessary TO supply the entire Ameri-
can demand for tin plates and at least three such
manufacturers Carnegie, Phpps d Co., Of Plus
burg; the Pennsylvania Steel Company, OF Harris
burg, and the Weman Iron and Steel Company, OF
Chester, have given notice that they are now
equipped to make steel bars. So far as any IN
equality that may exist between them and British
steel barmalSers is concerned, it is obvious that
they stand, with regard to the making OF steel
bars for tin plates, precisely where they stand
with regard to the making of other forms OF par
steel, so that as they have competed triumphantly
with foreign producers in these other forms, they
can as easily compete in steel bar making for the
tin trade.
There is no difficulty, then, about che first and
chief step in the tin-plate industry-the manu-
facture of the bar steel from which the Steel plates
thereafter to be coated with tin, TO be rolled.
The second step is the rolling process, and that,
too. is already solved 1t was principal argyll
ment of those who opposed the new tin-plate du-
ties that there were no black plates made here
of the kind used in tin-plate making, and they
asked what was to be gained by increasing the
duties or the timed product when its base was
wholly wanting. These persons overlooked the
fact that fine qualities of sheet iron and sheet
steel used in the production of fine kitchen uten-
sils and galvanized iron (which is simply a sheet
of soft steel coated with zinc), were already made
in this country in enormous quantities, and that
the plants capable of making them needed but
slight additional equipment to roll the finer quail
ties of steel sheets used for tin plates The Ameri
can product Of sheet iron and sheet steel for roof
ing, galvanizing and domestic purposes, such as
the making of StOveppe, coalhods, breadpans, etc.
already amounts to quite 100000 tons, product
i've value of not less than S15,000,000 Some
slight changes were made by the Mckinley Act in
the tariff on sheet steel for the especial purpose of
rendering our iron and steel workers competent
to go ahead with the manufacture of that particu-
lar quality of steel sheet used for timed plates,
and as many four fims-Jennings Brothers d
Co., Of Pittsburg; the st. Louis Stamping Com
pany p. II. Laufman & Co., of Apollo, Penn, and
the United States Iron and Tn-Plate Co., of DENIM
Ter, Penn.-aare now producing such plates. There
are certainly as many sixteen twenty other
establishments to which their production is per-
fectly easy, and which of course will produce as
the demand for them increases.
Getting down at last to the real question that
confrontS those who advocate the policy of max
ing our own tin plates and of saving to our own
which has hitherto gone unchallcnged to England
it is found to consist of nothing whatever beyond
the possibility of our being able to coat with tin
home product of steel already provided or safely
guaranteed. How much of question this is
any one can judge for himself. 1t is impossible
to imagine simpler process than the coating of
black plates with tin. Ii is the work of thirty
minutes. The plates are washed in sulphuric acid
to get out all imperfections, and then in clear
water. They rubbed with sand to render their
surfaces smooth, and dipped in palm-oil, which
serves fiux. Then they are dipped in tin,
sometimes in one pot of metal and sometimes in
two or three, and then they are allowed to become
cold and are rubbed down. That done, the timed
plate is ready to be assorted, packed and sold.
What there is in this process to discourage
American ingenuity il is difficult to perceive
What there is in the way it has TO be done dis
courage American labor is quite another matter
From beginning to end it is manual process
The plant is simple and wholly inexpensive
There is a pot of acid. another Of water. another
of oil and two or three of metal box of sand
a box of sawdust and sheepskn rubber That
is the sum and substance Of a. tin-plate factory
and the product of the factory is great small In
direct proportion to the number of these sets Of
pots contained within it, Each set, however
must have seven workmen. and they must do all
the work by hand. They must soak the plates
in the acid by hand. They must wash them in
water by hand. They must rub them smooth
and dry by hand. They must dip them in oil
by hand and in the metals by hand. They
must rub them down by hand. The entire
process is one of manual labor. There is ma
chine consisting of a series of rollers. which,
after the plates are coated is used to make their
surfaces bright and smooth. but the function of
this thing is to scrape off the metal not to put it
on or. in other words. to economic tin at the eX
pense of the quality of the plate. 1t is not used
at all in the manufacture of the best quality OF tin
plates either for roofing or domestic purposes
It's one object is to cbeapen the manufacture by
reducing the thickness of the coating and by so
much as it is used the plate is dcteriorated. But
except for this machine. the process Of tin-plate
making is process Of human labor. 1t may be
that American ingenuity has problem TO solve.
in the creation of machinery which will save labor
nv running the nlatps through all these several