Singen aluminum works
The Singen aluminum works , on whose premises the companies Constellium Singen GmbH , Amcor Flexibles Singen GmbH and 3A Composites GmbH Singen are active, is located in Singen am Hohentwiel and was one of the first producers of aluminum foil in Germany. In the population of Singen the work was and is called " Die Alu ".
founding
In February 1912 Robert Victor Neher and Erwin Lauber signed the founding deed of Dr. Lauber, Neher Co. GmbH Singen , whose business purpose was the production of aluminum foil and similar goods. The shareholders' capital at that time was 100,000 marks. In the same year the factory for the production of aluminum foil and pre-rolled sheet was inaugurated. Also in 1912 the company in Singen merged with its parent company Dr. Lauber, Neher & Cie. in Emmishofen, Switzerland, and Aluminum GmbH in Teningen, founded by Emil Tscheulin in 1910 . The new company was called Aluminum-Walzwerke AG (AWAG) and was based in Schaffhausen .
The Singen plant produced aluminum foil using the so-called belt rolling process , with which, according to its own patent, endless foil strips could be produced. The first foils could already be delivered in August 1912.
1914 to 1921
Already at the beginning of the First World War , the majority of the male employees had to go to war, and Alu , which had grown into a large company in the years since it was founded, was forced to severely limit its production due to a lack of raw materials. From November 1914, the film rolling operation was shut down. In 1918 one of the founders, Robert Viktor Neher, died of the Spanish flu .
In 1919, aluminum strips, foils and sheets as well as circular blanks were again being produced. In 1920 the delivery program was expanded, including aluminum wire, which was produced on an extrusion press with a pressing force of 1000 t. The first hot roll was also installed in the factory in 1920 . In 1921, the majority of the shares in AWAG were taken over by Aluminum-Industrie-Aktiengesellschaft Neuhausen (AIAG) , later Alusuisse , and Fritz Respinger was hired as general director of AWAG.
1922 to 1932
In 1922, the company moved into a new foil rolling mill, the rolling stands of which were designed for the production of 50 tons of aluminum foil per month. Dyeing and laminating machines as well as flat printing presses were purchased for the finishing of foils. A new rough rolling mill was built in the vacated industrial halls. Hans Constantin Paulssen also became commercial director of the plant that year . A curiosity were aluminum banknotes, which were produced as emergency money during the inflation of 1923 . Aluminum foil banknotes were also issued by the aluminum works in Teningen.
In 1924, Dr. Lauber, Neher Co. GmbH from AWAG founded Aluminum GmbH in Teningen, which was uneconomical due to the inefficient package rolling process. The company's capital was increased to 2 million marks and the number of employees in the various factories rose to over a thousand. After the company moved to Aluminum-Walzwerke Singen - Dr. Lauber, Neher Co. GmbH , an aluminum foundry was set up on the premises in Teningen in 1926 and in the same year AWAG acquired the Teningen Breisgau rolling mill and commissioned the Singener Werke to manage the business. This restructured production: the “white” film was produced in Singen and then laminated, colored or printed in Teningen. In Teningen, a new film called “Kraftfolie Spezial” was developed, which could be used to package processed cheese , among other things . The tin foil that had been used by the cheese dairies up until then was completely displaced from the market.
The expansion of Aluminum-Walzwerke Singen continued in 1930 with a majority stake in the Hamburg film finishing company Kluge & Winter GmbH . At the same time, the foundry was relocated from Teningen to the Villingen location and the company name was changed to Vereinigte Aluminum-Gießereien Singen-Teningen-Villingen GmbH .
By order of the Reich Minister of Finance, the duty-free processing trade for aluminum was abolished, which placed particular burdens on the Singen company, as it worked closely with the Swiss companies located in the immediate vicinity in Kreuzlingen , but also with other Swiss aluminum plants. With the mediation of the Reichstag member Friedrich Dessauer , the supply of the Singen company with raw aluminum could be secured.
In 1932, the first machines for the production of semi-finished products made of aluminum alloys were put into operation, and this enabled production to be extended to a further area. The installation of the first continuous strip rolling mill was also of great importance and marked a decisive advance in the technology of rolling aluminum strips.
1933 to 1953
After the Breisgau rolling mills were relocated from Teningen to Singen in 1933, a press shop was set up in 1934 and a drop forge with three forging presses in 1935 . In addition to the technical innovations, new facilities were created during this time with regard to the social concerns of the workforce: In 1934 a company health insurance fund was founded and in 1935 eight single-family houses could be started in "Schnaidholz", which were subsidized by the company, but became the property of the settlers.
In 1937 the company was renamed Aluminum-Walzwerke Singen GmbH . In the same year Singen acquired a majority stake in foil rolling mill tantalum in Warsaw .
During this time the plant was included in the National Socialists ' armament program. It mainly produced for the aircraft industry and also received orders as part of the radio measurement program of the Ministry of Aviation. The Swiss parent company AIAG founded the Aluminum-Industrie-Gemeinschaft Konstanz (ALIG) in 1939 as a limited partnership with the personally liable partners Hans Constantin Paulssen and the Viennese businessman Heinrich Boschan. The ALIG was given the management of the AIAG's property in Germany and Austria, namely the clay works Martinswerk in Bergheim / Erft , the chemical factory goldsmiths in goldsmiths near Breslau , the aluminum smelters in Rheinfelden and Lend , the Breisgau rolling mill in Singen and aluminum -Walzwerke Singen with the subsidiaries Tantal in Warsaw, Kluge & Winter in Hamburg and the aluminum foundry Villingen.
After the permanent German workforce became smaller and smaller during the war years, production had to suffer from the increasing shortage of raw materials and the removal of the products had become increasingly difficult, the company had to shut down at the end of April 1945. Hans Constantin Paulssen was banned from working in the company by order of the French administration. Paulssen was only able to take over the management of the Singen plant again in 1948.
On May 2, 1945, operations were resumed with 247 employees and were fundamentally modernized with the help of loans from the Marshall Plan . By the end of the year the number of employees rose again to 930 and production soon returned to the pre-war level. In 1949 the foil rolling mills were converted to continuous production, for which the first four-stand foil rolling mill, a Singen construction, was put into operation. The social institutions of society were also expanded. In 1951, for example, all members of the workforce were granted a legal right to a company pension , and in 1952 the plant built 94 private homes for its employees. To further construction of company housing was aluminum industry-Wohnbau GmbH founded.
In 1953 a four-high strip mill was set up and in 1956 an 800 t tube and extrusion press, the largest horizontal press in Europe at the time, was inaugurated in the new press shop. Thanks to extensive investments, the company was able to further expand its market position in the 1950s.
In 1953 a cooperation with the Mannesmann AG began with a 50% stake in the Mannesmann Leichtbau GmbH, Munich. This gave a pioneering field of application for standardized aluminum pipes in the manufacture and construction of scaffolding.
Boom
A new type of household film was produced in 1958 with the “ABC film”, and the “Alucobond” composite panel was introduced 10 years later. With the commissioning of a cold rolling mill in line with a hot roll, the world's fastest rolling mill for raw foil strips was created in 1978. Over the years, the Singen aluminum works became the largest employer in South Baden and in 1985 employed around 4500 people. In 1987 a rolling mill for special surfaces in lighting technology was put into operation.
Reorientation and name changes
In 1988 the company was renamed from Aluminumwalzwerke Singen GmbH to ALUSINGEN GmbH and in 1992 the company was split into two companies: Alusingen Verpackungen GmbH and Alusingen GmbH , the latter being renamed Alusuisse Singen GmbH in 1996 . Following the acquisition of Alusuisse by Alcan in 2000, these names changed in Alcan Packaging Singen GmbH and Alcan Singen GmbH . In the same year, the production facilities in Gottmadingen , which deal with the manufacture of automobile components, were inaugurated and production started.
Alcan Packaging becomes Amcor
In 2010 the Alcan Packaging division was sold by the Rio Tinto Group to the Australian packaging manufacturer Amcor . This means that the Singen site with 1138 employees also belonged to this group, which became one of the leaders in the industry through the takeover.
Constellium
In 2011, the Alcan Engineered Products division was partially sold by the Rio Tinto Group to Apollo and FSI and renamed Constellium .
literature
- Aluminum-Walzwerke Singen GmbH (Ed.): Aluminum-Walzwerke Singen GmbH - Singen / Hohentwiel - 1912-1962. Festschrift for the 50th anniversary of Alu 1962. 52 p.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Constellium: Who we are ; Retrieved March 17, 2012