Glas-Col has been a Terre Haute company for 64 years. And methamphetamine has been around longer.

The two didn't seem to go together until about five years ago. That's when Glas-Col discovered it was getting some unwanted publicity among meth makers in a drug "recipe" being circulated out West.

Glas-Col is just one of several companies whose legitimate wares have turned up in illegitimate and clandestine labs that require everyday products to make an extraordinarily powerful and addictive illegal drug. And like it or not, its managers must now combat a problem they never imagined.

Red phosphorous meth, or "red p" is made from the red chemical on the tips of matches. It uses a different process and different ingredients than the "Nazi labs" that produce meth in Indiana. But the addictive effects are the same, said Supervisor/Special Agent Craig Hammer of the California Department of Justice.

Glas-Col's 22-liter flask heating device, used legitimately in laboratories worldwide, was being found in a number of meth labs in California.

Steve Sterrett, president of Glas-Col, said he found out about his company's unintended association with the California meth problem when he got a call from Hammer's office.

"It's kind of a disappointing feeling. That's not what you build a product for," Sterrett said. "We definitely had an attitude of, 'How can we help?'"

That attitude is not just nice to have from a company, but legally enforceable, Hammer said.

"If we tag [a meth ingredient] to a company they can be prosecuted," Hammer said.

Under the federal Methamphetamine Act of 1996, companies found to "recklessly distribute" meth ingredients or to willfully distribute such precursors to meth labs can be prosecuted.

That wasn't the case with Glas-Col, Sterrett said.

"We will do whatever we can to keep our product out of [clandestine labs]," Sterrett said.

Sterrett said a drug agent in Nevada told him the mantles change hands four-to-six times before they get to an illegal meth lab. Some mantles are even posted for sale at Internet auction sites.

At the time Glas-Col was visited by Hammer in 1999, Hammer said, 76 percent of its heating mantles shipped to California distributors were paid for in cash by individuals with Hispanic surnames. Mexican organized crime rings are responsible for the majority of "red p" meth sales on the West Coast and in Mexico, Hammer said. Those Mexican customers bought 90 percent of the 2,041 mantles shipped to California during a three-year period.

Eighty percent of the buyers also bought meth-related chemicals, Hammer said, although not necessarily from the same distributors. Hammer said four California distributors were responsible for 99 percent of the more than 2,000 sales. The 22-liter mantle retails for about $600. All four distributors were prosecuted and now are out of business, he said.

Sterrett and members of Glas-Col's management team met and came up with a system to help law enforcement track the heating mantles the company ships out.

From July 1997 to April 1998, Glas-Col shipped 596 of its 22-liter mantles to California, alone, about 60 per month, Sterrett said. In November 2001, Glas-Col shipped 25 of the mantles nationwide, 14 to California. By contrast, in November and December 2002, the company sent just one such mantle to California - to a legitimate distributor, Sterrett said. And overall shipments of that model of heating mantles are down, too, to about a dozen per month nationwide.

Today, the company sends the California Justice Department a list of serial numbers of the mantles it's sold to authorized lab equipment distributors, never to individuals. It sends its customers a log sheet to fill out when the equipment is sold, including the buyer's information.

The company's efforts have helped, although all companies whose products are coveted by drug dealers need to be more vigilant in monitoring sales and distribution, Hammer said.

"We don't just chase the cookers," he said.

Cleaning up after the 'cooks'

Heritage Environmental Services also is unexpectedly on the front lines of the meth trade. The hazardous waste disposal company near Indianapolis does not track where its hazardous waste originates - from legitimate business or from illicit methamphetamine labs.

All of the hazardous chemicals seized from meth labs in Vigo and surrounding counties by Indiana State Police end up at Heritage, where they are destroyed, said Sgt. Dave Phelps of the Indiana State Police.

"Everything we get is pretty much incinerated," said Heritage technical services manager Jason Massey. "Most is one gallon or less."

Edgar County law enforcement officials put the cost of cleaning up two clandestine labs at about $10,000. With federal reimbursement, Edgar and other counties get help covering those costs.

Under lock and key

While established companies find themselves unexpectedly drawn into the meth business, Tanks-A-Lok is one of a few new companies to spring up as a result of methamphetamine.

Dean Kitley and his brother-in-law, Dave Christianson, are Iowa farmers who now co-own C and K Manufacturing. The pair developed a lock, based on the best bicycle locks, for anhydrous ammonia tanks.

"My brother-in-law asked me if there was a way to lock these tanks up," Kitley recalls.

Methamphetamine is troublesome in Iowa, too. Christianson did the development work and Kitley handles sales and marketing. C and K has sold 6,000 Tanks-A-Lok units to agribusiness companies in 18 states since it started in 1998. And it recently won a $200,000 federal contract to produce another 4,500 units.

"The last year-and-a-half, it's been really picking up," Kitley said.

One of the company's first customers was Grower's Co-op in Terre Haute. Joe Hill, risk coordinator at the co-op, said the lock has been a necessary device to his industry, still struggling to outrun the meth problem.

"We've got to take whatever action we can," Hill said. "It was quite a shock to the industry, but we've all adjusted to it."

Kitley said the locks are "99 percent successful" in keeping meth makers from draining an anhydrous tank.

"The only ones they've got into are ones where keys got into the wrong hands," he said.

The locks don't cure the problems for fertilizer dealers whose tank hoses get cut and drained. But the locks keep the loss at a minimum, Kitley said.

"They'll get what's left in the hose, but they can't open up the valve and drain more," he said.

And among the 18 states, from Washington to Maryland, where the locks are found, Indiana is one of C and K's best customers, Kitley said.

"Indiana's been our biggest state, really," he said. "We've got a lot of them out there."