a beverage can is that it must be of a steel which will withstand exposure to a variety of contaminants and which under such circumstances will not be corroded the applicant has found that this objective can be satisfied by manufacturing the tab of a steel which is coated with a material which will be corroded in preference to the steel and which has only surface corrosion properties so that once the surface is corroded by exposure to various reactant materials corrosion will stop by comparison it is well known that steel corrodes from the inside of a mass thereof rather than simply on the surface so that for example a piece of solid steel can rust through on the contrary a mass of for example aluminum is corroded only on the surface and only in a very thin layer so that once the layer has formed no further corrosion is possible it will be clear to those skilled in the art that manufacturing the tab out of steel coated with a corrosion preventive material will be effective as to those surfaces of the steel which are exposed when the coating is applied to the steel however if tabs are sheared or stamped from a sheet of steel after having been coated it would appear that the edges of the stamped tab would not be covered with the coating and therefore would be liable to corrosion applicant has found however that if the stamping operation is properly designed and operated the coating can be made to cover a considerable fraction of the edge of the tab thus preventing corrosion from attacking the tab at any point referring now to fig4 a section corresponding to that identified by the.