Some Assembly Required (2007–…): Season 2, Episode 10 - Golf Balls/Tape Measures/Panty Hose - full transcript
For all the stuff in our world,
there's a story of
how it came to be.
Hello. I'm Brian Unger.
Coming up on "Some
Assembly Required"...
the anatomy of one
rough-riding machine.
And melting, pouring, rolling...
That's how we
make aluminum foil.
The best way to get
around terrain like this...
is on a horse.
But this is far more
accessible, and it won't bite you.
With its four-wheeled
frame and rugged design,
the ATV is an amazing
feat of engineering
that allows you to go
just about anywhere...
and do plenty of
hauling along the way.
We're going to
Timmonsville, South Carolina,
to make one of the
world's most popular ATVs.
The FourTrax rancher.
We're gonna see how
all this comes together
to assemble the
ultimate all-terrain vehicle.
Here at Honda, they rely
on state-of-the-art technology
to build an ATV that combines
toughness with adaptability.
First step... the frame.
In order for this ATV
to pull a heavy load
over mud and up hills,
it must have a
sturdy-but-flexible frame.
For this, Honda uses
a high-strength steel.
Welders build the basic skeleton
before more efficient
robots take over.
They perform the
long, difficult welds
required to hold
the frame together.
The line staff steps back in
for hand welding too
small for machines.
Then the frames leave welding
in need of only one thing...
A paint job.
A conveyor belt delivers
them to the painters.
But this is no ordinary paint.
It's called powder
coat, and it adds color
as well as protecting
the metal underneath.
First, workers use spray guns
to coat the hard-to-reach areas.
Next, a robot gives the
parts an all-over dusting.
Then it's through this
doorway to an oven
that cooks them at
425 degrees for an hour.
They emerge with a
tough polyurethane seal.
It'll resist scratches
and corrosion,
protecting the ATV frame
no matter how rough the ride.
Then we're headed
for the engine assembly.
Honda actually makes
each engine right here,
and they're designed to be
small, compact, and powerful.
Now, the engine that
powers our ATV is aluminum.
That means it's
very lightweight.
It reduces our
power-to-weight ratio.
That makes our ATV very
nimble, very quick, very powerful.
An injection of liquefied
aluminum kicks off the process,
molding the back and
front of the engine case
at the same time.
An operator breaks the
superheated case in two
and removes any excess aluminum.
Then we drill screw holes
to prep them for assembly.
It's kind of like
being a dentist.
- Almost, except...
- Much bigger drill.
And you got about 45, 50
seconds before your next patient.
Now we're ready to
assemble the engine.
Every 70 seconds, a completed
engine comes off this line,
but from start to finish,
it takes an hour
to put one together
because it's nearly
all done by hand.
The engine is a four-stroke
motor with a single cylinder.
Our single cylinder lightens
the weight of the motor.
It lowers the center
of gravity for our ATV,
and it's easier for
the rider to straddle.
Four-stroke engines
are ideal for ATVs
because they produce reliable
power and are easy to maintain.
A four-stroke engine is
named for its four-stroke cycle.
The intake stroke... The
engine takes in air and gas.
The compression stroke...
The piston compresses
the fuel and air.
The combustion stroke...
The spark plug ignites the gas.
And the exhaust stroke...
The engine expels the exhaust.
This is a really great
cross section of our engine.
And right here is
our transmission.
It has five gears, and
that's important for the rider,
because it allows him or her
to use the engine for braking
as you're going down
steep, dangerous terrain.
It's like a backup
to the hand brakes
that are on the handlebars.
As the engines
come off the line,
they're stowed until we're
ready to assemble our ATV.
We've got a strong frame
and a souped-up engine,
but we won't be going
anywhere without our fuel tanks.
Honda uses a blow mold
to make the fuel tanks.
A durable plastic
called polyethylene
extrudes into a hollow cylinder.
When the mold
clamps around the tube,
air forced inside
blows the plastic
into the shape of the fuel tank.
We use polyethylene
because, unlike other plastics,
it remains strong in
cold temperatures,
making our ATV an
all-weather vehicle.
The final step... leak testing.
This is crucial because a
leaky fuel tank could catch fire.
Operators submerge every tank,
looking for air bubbles and
checking pressure gauges.
Defective tanks stand out,
but a green light
means a passing grade.
And these tanks are
ready for installation.
Next, fenders.
Pellets of polyethylene
melt into a thick plastic paste
that's injected into a mold.
It's our Rancher E.S. fender.
What's pretty amazing is it only
takes four of these red pellets
to every 100 of these
to make this brilliant,
bright, beautiful red color.
Using those pellets, it
takes just 65 seconds
to make a fender tough enough
to protect the rider
from debris and mud,
but flexible enough
not to break if snagged.
From here, we head to
the main assembly floor.
All of our completed
parts converge...
Frames, handlebars,
fenders, and engines.
To begin, workers fit
the engine into the frame,
then pass it off to another line
where we install the
handlebars and cables
to control the
throttle and brakes.
Every 84 seconds, an
ATV rolls off this line,
so workers have to be fast
to keep up with the pace.
I'm just gonna get
in your way right now.
- Okay.
- Yeah.
One click. One
click, proper torque.
There we go.
Willy, can I do this?
Oh, no, sir. You need gloves.
- Oh, I do need gloves?
- You need a uniform.
I need...
One of us is not wearing
the proper attire here.
Is it all right?
Our ATV still needs tires.
They're inflated with 3
1/2 pounds of pressure...
Just enough to give
our ATV good traction
without leaving
damage in their wake.
And the tires raise the Rancher
6 1/2 inches off the ground,
giving the ATV the clearance
to get over logs and rocks.
Our long line of Ranchers
rolls through their
final quality checks.
Well, our assembly is
complete, and at this Honda plant,
they can churn out 1,200
of these ATV Ranchers
in a single day.
But we've got to do
some rigorous testing here.
This is a stationary test
called a dynamometer.
We're looking for speed.
We're looking for good
shifting and braking.
Then it's into the saddle
in this indoor test track
for an overall test to make sure
our ATV is functioning properly.
It's a little shakedown
kind of thing.
Oh, but, of course, this is
the ultimate test... the fun.
There's adventure out
there in them thar hills
in South Carolina!
Whoo-hoo!
To get this...
you got to go through there.
Aluminum foil.
It's practically a
miracle of metallurgy.
But before this paper-thin
sheet winds up in your kitchen,
it's got a long way to go.
It's an amazing
journey that begins here
in Goose Creek, South
Carolina, at Alcoa Century,
and with the main
ingredient to aluminum foil...
Aluminum oxide.
Aluminum oxide comes
from this... bauxite.
It's a rock. Looks like dirt.
Aluminum oxide is a compound
comprised of
aluminum and oxygen.
The challenge is how to get
a smooth roll of foil out of it.
1,800 tons of this
stuff arrive every day
and get pumped from
railcars into Alcoa's factory.
This building is enormous.
It's a quarter-mile long, and
there are 90 pots in there.
Inside those pots, all
of our aluminum oxide.
And through each pot,
we will run 230,000 amps
to separate the
aluminum from the oxygen.
The natural attraction
between aluminum and oxygen
is so strong
that it takes a huge amount
of energy to split them apart,
so they give the aluminum
oxide an electric jolt.
A mineral bath of cryolite
plays the role of conductor.
When the aluminum
oxide is put into cryolite,
the electricity
shoots through it,
loosening the bonds between
the aluminum and the oxygen.
As these elements break apart,
the heavier aluminum
sinks to the bottom.
Dozens of workers
maintain these pots,
collecting the molten
aluminum that falls to the bottom.
The raw aluminum is
siphoned into giant crucibles
made of steel and
insulated with brick.
The crews fill
100 of these a day.
Well, we finally have aluminum!
15,000 pounds of
aluminum... Molten aluminum...
Inside that crucible.
Now we're going to put it
inside a holding furnace.
That furnace is heated
to about 1,300 degrees.
This is very dangerous
stuff. Very, very hot.
Rule one of aluminum...
Never touch it.
You can never
tell when it's hot.
In its current state,
this liquid aluminum is too
dangerous to really work with,
so workers have to
be covered head to toe
in flame-retardant gear as
they tackle the next step...
Casting the liquid into a solid.
The molten aluminum flows
through troughs into molds.
We're casting blocks of
aluminum that weigh six tons.
Since the process
takes so much energy,
it's more efficient to make
these massive beams
and cut them down than it
is to create smaller blocks.
That's why these
12,000-pound ingots
are sent over to the saw,
which reduces them to
a more manageable size.
So, we're gonna cut them
down to something we can use,
something we can deal with.
Soon, we'll have
hunks of aluminum
measuring about 4 feet long
and weighing 1,500 pounds.
Those slabs will be
shipped out all over the world,
and some will be sent
to a factory nearby.
Now we've gone next
door to J. W. Aluminum.
That's where we'll take these
enormous slabs of aluminum
and make them very, very flat.
The first step is to
melt them down again.
John Sumpter here
oversees this melting
operation of our aluminum ingots.
An operation that,
if done incorrectly,
could blow this plant sky-high.
Because of any water the
ingots may have absorbed,
every pound of aluminum here
has the potential explosiveness
of three sticks of dynamite.
Once you push it into the bath
with the moisture in it,
that's when they expand.
- Expand?
- Right.
That's a polite way
of saying "explode."
Explode.
If we throw these ingots
into the superheated furnace,
the water would flash to steam,
bursting the aluminum
like a bomb... a big bomb.
So we preheat them
at a lower temperature.
And that gets rid of all that
moisture inside those ingots
so that we don't have a
gigantic explosion here?
That's right. We
wouldn't be here.
Can we move?
Yeah, let's do that.
After workers preheat
and melt the ingots,
they mix other metals into
the aluminum to strengthen it.
For each 1,500-pound ingot,
we add about 6 1/2 pounds of iron
and less than one
pound of copper.
Gas bubbles from below
bring bits of debris to the surface
where they can be scraped away.
The molten mix leaves
the furnace in a trough,
where this stream of liquid
flows from the
furnace to the casters.
That's the place
where the aluminum
finally becomes a solid again.
Workers draw samples
to test the aluminum
for consistent levels
of many elements,
including copper and iron.
And if they're too low,
more of those elements
will be added to the mix.
Kenny Light manages
this casting process,
where the aluminum
hardens again.
But is this basically getting
where we're starting
to see this mixture
turn into something
other than liquid?
It is.
Workers scrape off impurities
floating atop the hot stream
to ensure the strongest foil.
Although you can't see it,
a kind of magic
trick happens here.
Hot liquid aluminum
moves through these casters,
and what rolls out is a long
sheet of solid aluminum...
Aluminum that has been
cooled by the casters.
A graphite-water mix
sprays the steel rolls
to keep the aluminum
from sticking to them.
For the first time...
this looks like something
called aluminum foil to me.
But can I wrap a
baloney sandwich in this?
No, no, not quite.
This is still much
too thick for that.
We're running about
1/4 of an inch thick here.
These 1/4-inch
sheets of aluminum
will be wrapped onto massive
rolls that weigh 24,000 pounds,
and it's still a long way
from being something
you'll find in your kitchen.
Because it's a
continuous process,
Kenny and his crew have just
one minute to replace the roll.
This is interesting.
For the first time, I
can actually touch this.
- Yes.
- Without burning my hand.
Absolutely.
It's a little warm.
Just a little bit.
It's about 130 right now, 120.
Jeff Thompson is in
charge of the rolling mill.
'Cause after we put it
through the rolling mill,
which is a process of
essentially thinning it.
After we do that, it's
gonna be too hot to touch.
Absolutely.
That heat is
produced by friction...
as the rolling mill presses
our 1/4-inch aluminum
to 1/8 of an inch thick.
It's still nowhere near thin
enough to be aluminum foil.
Every pass through the
mill reduces the foil by half,
and it will take eight
passes through the rolling mill
to get this down to
9/10,000 of an inch...
Thinner than a sheet of paper.
I'm making the world's biggest
roll of aluminum foil right now.
During the process, the
aluminum becomes more brittle,
so along the way, we
anneal, or heat, the coils
to make the aluminum
more flexible again.
Workers place
giant coils in an oven
that heats them to 850
degrees for 12 hours.
They're later heated again at
700 degrees for about 48 hours.
Now the aluminum is
finally ready to be foil,
so it's off to finishing, where
razor blades slice the coil
into more manageable rolls
and trim away the rough edges.
And, at last, we've got
finished aluminum foil.
But there's one big question.
How the heck are we
gonna get this onto here
and into your kitchen?
That is the job of
Cindy Alexander.
- Cindy?
- Yes?
Are you ready to roll some foil?
I'm ready.
All right, now we'll go
ahead and move it north.
Wow, Cindy.
And I thought melting the
aluminum took a long time.
Now, what we do... We come
in between these two rolls.
Then we'll come underneath
these three rolls right here.
Now, we've got to
stick this somewhere
to the cardboard
roll at some point.
Yes, we do.
And that's where we will
use our double sticky tape.
That's all you use?
Oh, yeah.
So, right now, one of the
eternal mysteries of life
has been answered.
Why it's holding on, right?
It's sticky tape.
Two-sided sticky tape is
what holds the foil to the roll.
Mm-hmm.
Put that over there.
Get it to stick.
- Hit the run button?
- Hit the run button.
- Turn it?
- All the way up.
All to the right?
Oh, we're moving.
- We're moving.
- We're moving. We have foil.
We have aluminum
foil right there.
It's going onto the rollers.
- Can I turn it up?
- Turn it up.
- Just crank it?
- Just crank it. Let it go.
Let it fly.
So we want six... What?
620.
620 feet of foil.
Right. And there it is.
That's actually... There's
a bonus roll right there.
622 feet, so someone's
getting 2 extra feet.
Take your safety lock off.
- Taking the safety lock off.
- Exactly.
Taking the safety lock off.
I'm going to move this
right. Are you ready?
And go.
- No, the other way.
- Oh.
Then we'll bring
it to this table.
- And I weigh it.
- You weigh it.
- 10 pounds on the nose.
- All right.
- Nice work!
- You did good.
That's amazing.
So we have it...
Our 10-pound roll...
of aluminum foil right here.
From bauxite to your kitchen.
there's a story of
how it came to be.
Hello. I'm Brian Unger.
Coming up on "Some
Assembly Required"...
the anatomy of one
rough-riding machine.
And melting, pouring, rolling...
That's how we
make aluminum foil.
The best way to get
around terrain like this...
is on a horse.
But this is far more
accessible, and it won't bite you.
With its four-wheeled
frame and rugged design,
the ATV is an amazing
feat of engineering
that allows you to go
just about anywhere...
and do plenty of
hauling along the way.
We're going to
Timmonsville, South Carolina,
to make one of the
world's most popular ATVs.
The FourTrax rancher.
We're gonna see how
all this comes together
to assemble the
ultimate all-terrain vehicle.
Here at Honda, they rely
on state-of-the-art technology
to build an ATV that combines
toughness with adaptability.
First step... the frame.
In order for this ATV
to pull a heavy load
over mud and up hills,
it must have a
sturdy-but-flexible frame.
For this, Honda uses
a high-strength steel.
Welders build the basic skeleton
before more efficient
robots take over.
They perform the
long, difficult welds
required to hold
the frame together.
The line staff steps back in
for hand welding too
small for machines.
Then the frames leave welding
in need of only one thing...
A paint job.
A conveyor belt delivers
them to the painters.
But this is no ordinary paint.
It's called powder
coat, and it adds color
as well as protecting
the metal underneath.
First, workers use spray guns
to coat the hard-to-reach areas.
Next, a robot gives the
parts an all-over dusting.
Then it's through this
doorway to an oven
that cooks them at
425 degrees for an hour.
They emerge with a
tough polyurethane seal.
It'll resist scratches
and corrosion,
protecting the ATV frame
no matter how rough the ride.
Then we're headed
for the engine assembly.
Honda actually makes
each engine right here,
and they're designed to be
small, compact, and powerful.
Now, the engine that
powers our ATV is aluminum.
That means it's
very lightweight.
It reduces our
power-to-weight ratio.
That makes our ATV very
nimble, very quick, very powerful.
An injection of liquefied
aluminum kicks off the process,
molding the back and
front of the engine case
at the same time.
An operator breaks the
superheated case in two
and removes any excess aluminum.
Then we drill screw holes
to prep them for assembly.
It's kind of like
being a dentist.
- Almost, except...
- Much bigger drill.
And you got about 45, 50
seconds before your next patient.
Now we're ready to
assemble the engine.
Every 70 seconds, a completed
engine comes off this line,
but from start to finish,
it takes an hour
to put one together
because it's nearly
all done by hand.
The engine is a four-stroke
motor with a single cylinder.
Our single cylinder lightens
the weight of the motor.
It lowers the center
of gravity for our ATV,
and it's easier for
the rider to straddle.
Four-stroke engines
are ideal for ATVs
because they produce reliable
power and are easy to maintain.
A four-stroke engine is
named for its four-stroke cycle.
The intake stroke... The
engine takes in air and gas.
The compression stroke...
The piston compresses
the fuel and air.
The combustion stroke...
The spark plug ignites the gas.
And the exhaust stroke...
The engine expels the exhaust.
This is a really great
cross section of our engine.
And right here is
our transmission.
It has five gears, and
that's important for the rider,
because it allows him or her
to use the engine for braking
as you're going down
steep, dangerous terrain.
It's like a backup
to the hand brakes
that are on the handlebars.
As the engines
come off the line,
they're stowed until we're
ready to assemble our ATV.
We've got a strong frame
and a souped-up engine,
but we won't be going
anywhere without our fuel tanks.
Honda uses a blow mold
to make the fuel tanks.
A durable plastic
called polyethylene
extrudes into a hollow cylinder.
When the mold
clamps around the tube,
air forced inside
blows the plastic
into the shape of the fuel tank.
We use polyethylene
because, unlike other plastics,
it remains strong in
cold temperatures,
making our ATV an
all-weather vehicle.
The final step... leak testing.
This is crucial because a
leaky fuel tank could catch fire.
Operators submerge every tank,
looking for air bubbles and
checking pressure gauges.
Defective tanks stand out,
but a green light
means a passing grade.
And these tanks are
ready for installation.
Next, fenders.
Pellets of polyethylene
melt into a thick plastic paste
that's injected into a mold.
It's our Rancher E.S. fender.
What's pretty amazing is it only
takes four of these red pellets
to every 100 of these
to make this brilliant,
bright, beautiful red color.
Using those pellets, it
takes just 65 seconds
to make a fender tough enough
to protect the rider
from debris and mud,
but flexible enough
not to break if snagged.
From here, we head to
the main assembly floor.
All of our completed
parts converge...
Frames, handlebars,
fenders, and engines.
To begin, workers fit
the engine into the frame,
then pass it off to another line
where we install the
handlebars and cables
to control the
throttle and brakes.
Every 84 seconds, an
ATV rolls off this line,
so workers have to be fast
to keep up with the pace.
I'm just gonna get
in your way right now.
- Okay.
- Yeah.
One click. One
click, proper torque.
There we go.
Willy, can I do this?
Oh, no, sir. You need gloves.
- Oh, I do need gloves?
- You need a uniform.
I need...
One of us is not wearing
the proper attire here.
Is it all right?
Our ATV still needs tires.
They're inflated with 3
1/2 pounds of pressure...
Just enough to give
our ATV good traction
without leaving
damage in their wake.
And the tires raise the Rancher
6 1/2 inches off the ground,
giving the ATV the clearance
to get over logs and rocks.
Our long line of Ranchers
rolls through their
final quality checks.
Well, our assembly is
complete, and at this Honda plant,
they can churn out 1,200
of these ATV Ranchers
in a single day.
But we've got to do
some rigorous testing here.
This is a stationary test
called a dynamometer.
We're looking for speed.
We're looking for good
shifting and braking.
Then it's into the saddle
in this indoor test track
for an overall test to make sure
our ATV is functioning properly.
It's a little shakedown
kind of thing.
Oh, but, of course, this is
the ultimate test... the fun.
There's adventure out
there in them thar hills
in South Carolina!
Whoo-hoo!
To get this...
you got to go through there.
Aluminum foil.
It's practically a
miracle of metallurgy.
But before this paper-thin
sheet winds up in your kitchen,
it's got a long way to go.
It's an amazing
journey that begins here
in Goose Creek, South
Carolina, at Alcoa Century,
and with the main
ingredient to aluminum foil...
Aluminum oxide.
Aluminum oxide comes
from this... bauxite.
It's a rock. Looks like dirt.
Aluminum oxide is a compound
comprised of
aluminum and oxygen.
The challenge is how to get
a smooth roll of foil out of it.
1,800 tons of this
stuff arrive every day
and get pumped from
railcars into Alcoa's factory.
This building is enormous.
It's a quarter-mile long, and
there are 90 pots in there.
Inside those pots, all
of our aluminum oxide.
And through each pot,
we will run 230,000 amps
to separate the
aluminum from the oxygen.
The natural attraction
between aluminum and oxygen
is so strong
that it takes a huge amount
of energy to split them apart,
so they give the aluminum
oxide an electric jolt.
A mineral bath of cryolite
plays the role of conductor.
When the aluminum
oxide is put into cryolite,
the electricity
shoots through it,
loosening the bonds between
the aluminum and the oxygen.
As these elements break apart,
the heavier aluminum
sinks to the bottom.
Dozens of workers
maintain these pots,
collecting the molten
aluminum that falls to the bottom.
The raw aluminum is
siphoned into giant crucibles
made of steel and
insulated with brick.
The crews fill
100 of these a day.
Well, we finally have aluminum!
15,000 pounds of
aluminum... Molten aluminum...
Inside that crucible.
Now we're going to put it
inside a holding furnace.
That furnace is heated
to about 1,300 degrees.
This is very dangerous
stuff. Very, very hot.
Rule one of aluminum...
Never touch it.
You can never
tell when it's hot.
In its current state,
this liquid aluminum is too
dangerous to really work with,
so workers have to
be covered head to toe
in flame-retardant gear as
they tackle the next step...
Casting the liquid into a solid.
The molten aluminum flows
through troughs into molds.
We're casting blocks of
aluminum that weigh six tons.
Since the process
takes so much energy,
it's more efficient to make
these massive beams
and cut them down than it
is to create smaller blocks.
That's why these
12,000-pound ingots
are sent over to the saw,
which reduces them to
a more manageable size.
So, we're gonna cut them
down to something we can use,
something we can deal with.
Soon, we'll have
hunks of aluminum
measuring about 4 feet long
and weighing 1,500 pounds.
Those slabs will be
shipped out all over the world,
and some will be sent
to a factory nearby.
Now we've gone next
door to J. W. Aluminum.
That's where we'll take these
enormous slabs of aluminum
and make them very, very flat.
The first step is to
melt them down again.
John Sumpter here
oversees this melting
operation of our aluminum ingots.
An operation that,
if done incorrectly,
could blow this plant sky-high.
Because of any water the
ingots may have absorbed,
every pound of aluminum here
has the potential explosiveness
of three sticks of dynamite.
Once you push it into the bath
with the moisture in it,
that's when they expand.
- Expand?
- Right.
That's a polite way
of saying "explode."
Explode.
If we throw these ingots
into the superheated furnace,
the water would flash to steam,
bursting the aluminum
like a bomb... a big bomb.
So we preheat them
at a lower temperature.
And that gets rid of all that
moisture inside those ingots
so that we don't have a
gigantic explosion here?
That's right. We
wouldn't be here.
Can we move?
Yeah, let's do that.
After workers preheat
and melt the ingots,
they mix other metals into
the aluminum to strengthen it.
For each 1,500-pound ingot,
we add about 6 1/2 pounds of iron
and less than one
pound of copper.
Gas bubbles from below
bring bits of debris to the surface
where they can be scraped away.
The molten mix leaves
the furnace in a trough,
where this stream of liquid
flows from the
furnace to the casters.
That's the place
where the aluminum
finally becomes a solid again.
Workers draw samples
to test the aluminum
for consistent levels
of many elements,
including copper and iron.
And if they're too low,
more of those elements
will be added to the mix.
Kenny Light manages
this casting process,
where the aluminum
hardens again.
But is this basically getting
where we're starting
to see this mixture
turn into something
other than liquid?
It is.
Workers scrape off impurities
floating atop the hot stream
to ensure the strongest foil.
Although you can't see it,
a kind of magic
trick happens here.
Hot liquid aluminum
moves through these casters,
and what rolls out is a long
sheet of solid aluminum...
Aluminum that has been
cooled by the casters.
A graphite-water mix
sprays the steel rolls
to keep the aluminum
from sticking to them.
For the first time...
this looks like something
called aluminum foil to me.
But can I wrap a
baloney sandwich in this?
No, no, not quite.
This is still much
too thick for that.
We're running about
1/4 of an inch thick here.
These 1/4-inch
sheets of aluminum
will be wrapped onto massive
rolls that weigh 24,000 pounds,
and it's still a long way
from being something
you'll find in your kitchen.
Because it's a
continuous process,
Kenny and his crew have just
one minute to replace the roll.
This is interesting.
For the first time, I
can actually touch this.
- Yes.
- Without burning my hand.
Absolutely.
It's a little warm.
Just a little bit.
It's about 130 right now, 120.
Jeff Thompson is in
charge of the rolling mill.
'Cause after we put it
through the rolling mill,
which is a process of
essentially thinning it.
After we do that, it's
gonna be too hot to touch.
Absolutely.
That heat is
produced by friction...
as the rolling mill presses
our 1/4-inch aluminum
to 1/8 of an inch thick.
It's still nowhere near thin
enough to be aluminum foil.
Every pass through the
mill reduces the foil by half,
and it will take eight
passes through the rolling mill
to get this down to
9/10,000 of an inch...
Thinner than a sheet of paper.
I'm making the world's biggest
roll of aluminum foil right now.
During the process, the
aluminum becomes more brittle,
so along the way, we
anneal, or heat, the coils
to make the aluminum
more flexible again.
Workers place
giant coils in an oven
that heats them to 850
degrees for 12 hours.
They're later heated again at
700 degrees for about 48 hours.
Now the aluminum is
finally ready to be foil,
so it's off to finishing, where
razor blades slice the coil
into more manageable rolls
and trim away the rough edges.
And, at last, we've got
finished aluminum foil.
But there's one big question.
How the heck are we
gonna get this onto here
and into your kitchen?
That is the job of
Cindy Alexander.
- Cindy?
- Yes?
Are you ready to roll some foil?
I'm ready.
All right, now we'll go
ahead and move it north.
Wow, Cindy.
And I thought melting the
aluminum took a long time.
Now, what we do... We come
in between these two rolls.
Then we'll come underneath
these three rolls right here.
Now, we've got to
stick this somewhere
to the cardboard
roll at some point.
Yes, we do.
And that's where we will
use our double sticky tape.
That's all you use?
Oh, yeah.
So, right now, one of the
eternal mysteries of life
has been answered.
Why it's holding on, right?
It's sticky tape.
Two-sided sticky tape is
what holds the foil to the roll.
Mm-hmm.
Put that over there.
Get it to stick.
- Hit the run button?
- Hit the run button.
- Turn it?
- All the way up.
All to the right?
Oh, we're moving.
- We're moving.
- We're moving. We have foil.
We have aluminum
foil right there.
It's going onto the rollers.
- Can I turn it up?
- Turn it up.
- Just crank it?
- Just crank it. Let it go.
Let it fly.
So we want six... What?
620.
620 feet of foil.
Right. And there it is.
That's actually... There's
a bonus roll right there.
622 feet, so someone's
getting 2 extra feet.
Take your safety lock off.
- Taking the safety lock off.
- Exactly.
Taking the safety lock off.
I'm going to move this
right. Are you ready?
And go.
- No, the other way.
- Oh.
Then we'll bring
it to this table.
- And I weigh it.
- You weigh it.
- 10 pounds on the nose.
- All right.
- Nice work!
- You did good.
That's amazing.
So we have it...
Our 10-pound roll...
of aluminum foil right here.
From bauxite to your kitchen.