Novelis said its aluminum‑rolling facility in Oswego, N.Y., will resume operations on Wednesday, ending a nine‑month shutdown triggered by two fires. The plant, the largest U.S. source of sheet aluminum for automakers, supplies roughly a dozen carmakers, among them Ford, General Motors and Stellantis. Restarting the line removes a bottleneck that has strained supply chains since September.

The September blaze disabled the primary rolling mill, while a second fire in November damaged auxiliary equipment and parts of the building. The thin aluminum sheets produced there are stamped into fenders, hoods and other exterior panels, a material choice that helps keep the weight of vehicles like the F‑150 pickup down. The outage forced buyers to seek alternative sources at higher cost.

Ford’s reliance on lightweight aluminum for the F‑150 has made the Oswego shutdown especially painful, given the model’s status as America’s best‑selling truck for decades. With production back online, suppliers can again meet volume demands, and automakers avoid scrambling for premium metal on the spot market. The restart signals that the supply chain disruption that rattled U.S. auto factories is largely resolved.