City Brewing Company in collaboration with the University of Pittsburgh

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My Process Engineering Co-Op Experience at City Brewing
Company in Latrobe, PA
Daniel Leon
Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science
University of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA
DBL10@pitt.edu
Abstract
The following technical paper is part of the
Pitt co-op program’s requirement of a post
co-op completion summary of experiences
both with the co-op office and co-op
employer. Topics to be addressed, as per the
guidelines listed on the co-op office website,
include a summary of work experiences,
particular details of the nature of work
performed, relationship between work and
academic experiences (including specific
courses that were particularly useful), and
any suggestions on how to improve the
operation of the program. The completion of
this paper will count towards the acquiring of
a technical elective substitute, which will be
used towards the credits needed for my
graduation from the Department of
Mechanical Engineering and Materials
Science (MEMS) this December 2018. All
company information (processes, products,
business model, etc.) is understood to be kept
confidential within the co-op office.
1. Introduction
For three semesters I was placed at City
Brewing Company (CBC) in Latrobe, PA as
a process engineering co-op in their
maintenance and engineering department.
These rotations followed my fifth, sixth, and
seventh semester of undergrad, specifically
in spring 2017, fall 2017, and summer 2018.
I began the co-op search during the first
semester of my sophomore year. I attended
the spring 2016 and fall 2016 co-op fairs, but
had little luck until the December 2016, when
I submitted my application to CBC. The
interview process included a phone interview
with the engineering manager, Scott Lysko,
and two currently placed co-ops, and then a
follow up, on-site interview and tour of
facility. The turnaround for my placement
was almost immediate as I accepted the offer
in late December and started the first week of
January.
I attribute a majority of my academic
success at the University of Pittsburgh to my
co-op experience. There is roughly a 1.0
GPA point difference between my first five
semester’s cumulative GPA vs. my sixth
through eighth semester average GPA. With
the predicted success of my final semester, I
will have pulled my GPA from a 2.6 in my
fifth semester to a 3.0 overall. My co-op
experience gave me a real world look at
applications of engineering which I had
previously failed to conceptualize in the
classroom. I would hope that all engineering
students at the University of Pittsburgh
consider enrolling in the program, as its
benefit has been significant both in and
outside of the classroom. The following
sections of this paper will outline my
experience as a process engineering co-op at
City Brewing Company.

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2. Company Overview
City Brewing Company is the largest contract
manufacturer of alcoholic beverages in the
eastern United States. Contract
manufacturing in the beverage industry
means that the recipes are provided by third
party companies (such as Pittsburgh Brewing
Company, Stoney’s, Arizona, Welch’s, etc.),
and brewed/packaged at CBC. The Latrobe
branch is the smaller of the three facilities,
the other two located in Memphis, TN and
LaCrosse, WI. Latrobe is located in
Westmoreland County, roughly 50 minutes
commute from Oakland. The Latrobe facility
is the original factory of Rolling Rock beer, a
brand which was iconic to Western
Pennsylvania culture and a symbol of the
Laurel Highlands region from 1939-2006.
Figure 01: CBC Latrobe facility
In 2006, beverage industry titan, Anheuser-
Busch InBev, purchased the Rolling Rock
brand and moved the production to Newark,
NJ, leaving the Latrobe facility vacant. City
Brewing Company acquired the location in
2006, reopened the plant in 2007, and after a
two year lull of business has been running
steadily since 2009.
The Latrobe facility is split into two
primary operations, brewing and packaging.
Secondary departments within these
operations include shipping, quality
assurance, waste water treatment, and
maintenance & engineering. With recent
market trends pointing towards the
favorability of non-beer alcoholic beverages,
such as teas, root beers, lemonade, etc., the
brewside has split into beer (fermentation)
and batched (grain alcohol added to sugary
syrup) products. Beer makes up less than
20% of the liquid volume which is shipped
from the facility. The seven stories high
brewhouse includes all operations from grain
unloading to finished product storage, with
the capability to hold over 30 million gallons
of liquid at a single time.
Packaging is divided into three separate
container-type production lines: cans, bottles
and kegs. Current production assets
accommodate 12oz bottles, 12, 16, and
23.5/24oz cans, and 1/2, 1/4 and 1/6 kegs.
Production can run at most four independent
product lines (e.g. 12oz bottle, 12, 24oz can,
1/2 keg) at any one time. Each primary
operation has its own employee union, while
management, shipping, and quality assurance
are non-union.
3. Role of Process Engineering
Co-op
CBC maintains two process engineering co-
op roles each semester at their Latrobe
location under the supervision of Scott
Lysko. The co-op program started in 2015 by
then engineering manager, now plant
manager, Mark Siegel. Both Scott and Mark
are graduates from the University of
Pittsburgh in chemical engineering. The two
co-ops are given a wide range of tasks within
the plant, spreading across all departments
and material processes. These tasks are
generally either daily/weekly duties (such as
data processing and EHS inspection) or long
term projects either inherited from previous

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semesters or started based on the current
company priorities (e.g. proactive/reactive
measures due to EPA audit). The daily
workload is dependent upon the initiative of
the co-op as Scott is, as he will tell you, not a
micro-manger. Notable projects include, and
will be discussed in the following sections,
production assets study for can line,
establishment of standard operating
procedures for batching process, effluent
monitoring from waste water treatment plant,
tunnel pasteurizer replacement, hot water
delivery system redesign, real time ABV
monitoring, can production line redesign, and
automation in the batching process.
4. First Rotation
My spring 2017 rotation began with Cassidy
Teixeira, a third rotation CBC co-op from
Pitt’s chemical engineering department.
Most of the co-ops at CBC have historically
been chemical engineering majors, as the
academic background helps in the liquid
processing comprehension on the brewside
(such as heat exchangers, mass transfer,
pump sizing, etc.). My mechanical
engineering background gave me an
advantage in understanding the packaging
side of operations, so the combination of the
two disciplines made for a very effective
team. My first month at the factory was
challenging in understanding my role in the
company, but by the end of my first rotation,
I was well equipped to take initiative and start
my own projects.
4.a. Production Assets Study
Early on in my first semester, I was tasked to
identify the maximum throughput rating on
each packaging asset in the can production
line(s). I used a combination of past
production data and correspondence with
each machine’s OEM in order to determine
such results as the limiting asset. My
findings included a realization of capability
in one case packer which led to almost
doubling its throughput. A majority of the
projects I worked on at my tenure at CBC
included acquiring information from both
inside the company and outside contractors.
4.b. Effluent Monitoring
The co-ops were given several projects
regarding the utility mapping of the plant.
All effluent process water (such as from the
packaging areas) is sent to a dedicated waste
water treatment plant across the street. Once
the liquid is neutralized, it is sent through an
outfall building to the Loyalhanna River. In
order to accurately measure the volume of
discharge through the building, we used a
combination of a parshall flume (shown in
Figure 02) and a radar to track the open
channel height.
Figure 02: Parshall flume schematic
This data was more accurate than the pre-
determined estimate discharge volume the
company had been reporting to the city of
Latrobe and resulted in a significant cost
savings. A similar application (v-notch weir)
was implemented in my third rotation to
measure the bottle line discharge volume.

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5. Second Rotation
My fall 2017 rotation began with Meredith
Kulak, a second rotation CBC co-op from
Pitt’s chemical engineering department. One
of the highlights of this semester was being
sent to a Utility Conservation in Industry
seminar at Penn State New Kensington on
behalf of the company in order to identify
utility cost savings at the plant. With my first
rotation successfully under my belt, I was
given more responsibility in project
management and more flexibility in
purchasing power. In order to fill the
following semester vacancy in one of the two
co-op positions, Meredith and I were put in
charge of collecting resumes and scheduling
interview times with applicants through the
SSOE co-op office. This was my first
experience on the opposite side of the table in
the interview room and I gained valuable
insight from the process.
5.a. Pasteurizer Replacement
The most significant project during this
semester was the replacement of the 80ft
tunnel pasteurizer on the can production line.
The co-ops were given the responsibility of
1) managing the Gantt chart for the project 2)
identifying the pertinent utility connections
on the new pasteurizer and mapping the
existing utility lines to the new connection
locations and 3) mapping out the infeed and
discharge conveyors through AutoCAD.
One of the more difficult requirements of the
project was keeping one of the two can lines
running during the demolition and
installation of old and new pasteurizer. The
Gantt chart experience has been very
beneficial in my current academic projects
and I’m glad to have been exposed to the
management side of such a large project.
6. Third Rotation
My summer 2018 rotation was my second
semester with Meredith Kulak, also in her
third rotation. This semester we were given
the responsibility of a full time engineer at the
company. In preparing for our exit from
CBC, we were placed in charge of another
interview process for three open positions in
the upcoming two semesters. Towards the
end of the rotation, a position opened in
LaCrosse, WI for a production supervisor
role and I was asked to interview at their
facility. I declined, but am thankful for the
consideration.
6.a. ABV Monitor Integration
The filtration process on the brewside of
operations includes a dilution (via water
injection valve) to lower an original brew
alcohol content to the customer’s
specification. Historically, the volume of
dilution water needed for a particular brew
was calculated on a percent of total volume
basis. Using automated ABV monitoring
technology, we implemented a real time
dilution process which adjusts the alcohol
content using a PID loop.
Figure 03: PID Loop for ABV monitoring
As the original brew flows through a section
of pipe fitted with the ABV monitor, a signal
is sent to the water injection valve and the
appropriate volumetric flow rate is applied to
the brew, based on the customer’s setpoint.
This automation increased accuracy in the
dilution process and is currently being used
for all products.

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7. Company Culture
All the people I met at CBC Latrobe were
both helpful and patient in contributing to the
success of the co-ops. Every Thursday
during my summer rotation, the management
team and co-ops would go to Glengarry Golf
Links and play 9-holes. We had quite a few
laughs on the golf course. I discovered that
developing relationships with your co-
workers outside of work aids in the
effectiveness of the team within the
workplace.
8. Academic & Professional
Overlap
There were several instances during my three
rotations were I extracted lecture material
directly from my engineering courses in
order to solve a problem in industry. I
frequently utilized theory from classes such
as Mechanical Design II, Applied Fluid
Dynamics, Applied Thermodynamics, and
Mechanical Measurements I. In one case, I
used gear train design equations from
Mechanical Design II in sizing keg-line
conveyor gears to assess maximum
throughput. One of my third rotation projects
dealt with tension weigh module load cells
which utilize strain gauges similar to the ones
studied in Mechanical Measurements I. In
my final semester at Pitt, we spent several
weeks of Mechanical Measurements II lab
studying different types of control loops,
which I easily conceptualized because of my
experience with the aforementioned ABV
monitoring project.
9. Suggestions for Program
I will recommend that there is more
communication between co-op office and
positioned co-ops, as I didn’t feel there was
much interaction after I was accepted into a
program. Additionally, the co-op application
process can be difficult for a student with a
less than average GPA, and I think the
program would benefit from educating
applicants on how to approach this obstacle.
Please continue to utilize the email blast
format for position listings as I found it to be
much more helpful than the two co-op fairs
that I attended.
10. Conclusion
I am thankful to have been part of the co-op
program at Pitt because of its long-lasting
benefits in both my academic and
professional development. I believe that a
program of this nature should be more widely
utilized between academic departments
outside of the engineering school. It presents
an invaluable, tangible connection between
the concepts learned in the classroom and
their applications in industry.
Figure 04: Brewhouse area of CBC Latrobe facility
11. Acknowledgements
I’d like to thank my mentors at CBC Latrobe
including Scott Lysko (Engineering
Manager), Mark Siegel (Plant Manager),
Kevin Herron (Packaging maintenance
Manager) and Tom Pofi (EHS Manager) for
their willingness to share their industry
expertise during my three rotations.