Studies on the storage behaviour of mustard and groundnut oils in galvanized iron containers.

EDIBLE oils are generally stored and transported
in mild steel drums and tin containers in India.
Although measures for oils, milk and other fluids
are fabricated out of galvanized iron, no information
is available regarding suitability of this
metal as a container material for storage of edible
oils. Galvanizing consists of hot-dipping of iron
sheets in zinc which forms a thin coating (1 zo-
170 gms./m2) on the iron plate and prevents
rust formation. In this paper, storage behaviour
of mustard and groundnut oils with special
reference to the dissolution of zinc during storage
is reported.
Fresh samples of mustard oil (filtered) and
crude and refined groundnut oils were obtained
for the study. All the samples obtained were free
of peroxides. Refined groundnut oil had a
moisture content of 0.21 per cent while crude
groundnut and mustard oils had moisture contents
of 0.31 and 0.33 per cent respectively. Zinc cans
(solder type, round) of 4 oz. capacity were
specially fabricated for the experiment. Tin
containers of the same dimensions and glass
bottles of the same capacity were used as controls.