The following convention is used for most adhesives:

• 04 - month of manufacture (2 digits)
• 21 - day of manufacture (2 digits)
• 99 - year of manufacture (2 digits)
• A - manufacturing plant (1 letter)
• 2 - shift (number 1 or 2)

Example: 042199A2 - manufactured April 21, 1999, at plant A by shift 2.

Note: For Adhesive S-230, the following convention is used:

• 16 - manufacturing plant (2 digits)
• A to M - month of manufacture (1 letter; "I" not used)
• 10 - day of month (2 digits) 9 - year (1 digit)
• 1 - machine number (1 digit) 2 - batch number in same machine (1 digit)

Example: 16B10912 - manufactured February 10, 1999, at plant 16 on machine 1, batch 2. For purposes of knowing the date of manufacture, you only use the middle four characters of this code (B109).

Occasionally, you will come across a batch number that is not uniform and may look like one of these:

• 961230 - manufactured December 30, 1996
• 030896 - manufactured March 8, 1996

If the batch number cannot be found on the can itself, it might be on the original carton.