Welding Tales: Its funny now, but not when it happened

[kmorin]

Welder may find a better place to post about shop and building mistakes so I'll just leave this here and follow it if moved?

Acetone in halibut long line reel core.

Halibut are caught in commercial fishing areas by a long anchored line, where hooks, with bait, are snapped onto the line every few feet or so . This line lays on the bottom with the hooks drifting in the tide’s currents and halibut swim along and swallow the bait and get hooked on the long line.

Long lining halibut is and old commercial fishing method that retrieves the long fishing line in one of two methods depending on the size of the fishing boat. One of the methods, the one in this story, involves a 12” core, 5’ diameter 4’ wide reel of welded aluminum.

The ground line, as its called, is rolled up on this drum or power reel, like a huge version of a hook and line reel on a fishing pole without the pole. A buoy, attached to one end of the ground line is pulled aboard the stern (sometimes at the bow) of this size fishing boat, and the ground line attached to the reel core and hydraulics are then used to turn the reel and pull the hooks to the surface with any fish that are at the hooks on the small leader lines attached to the ground line.

This process allows the ground line to be pulled in, the fish lifted by hydraulics and the line to be store ready to be reset with new baits on the hooks and the hooks to be removed and replaced with SS snaps when setting the gear or retrieving it.

All that was to say the core of this type of reel is usually a Sched. 80 pipe, and the word schedule for those not familiar with pipe means “that percentage of the diameter of the pipe- in the pipe wall thickness.” In this part of the pipe specification, schedule 5 is thin wall and schedule 160 is xtra heavy wall, and XXS is ‘extra, extra heavy’ wall.

To resist the compression forces of the ground line as it dries out, having been wound onto the reel’s core while under tension from pulling it off the bottom, the Sched. 80 or about 5/8” (18mm) wall pipe is used most often. I used that size pipe with that wall thickness to build this type of fishing reel.
The pipe is often fitted with internal donuts, or frames to help it resist the compression forces of hundred and even thousands of feet of ground line compressing the core as it dries. The plates, commonly ¼” were welded inside the pipe from the center outward, by reaching the MIG gun inside and welding a few stitches to the fillet of the pipe’s inner wall to the vertical fillet of the ‘donut’ or frame piece. Not a hard weld with the push pull type MIG torch from MK Products. (Cobramatic for those who are familiar)

Once the pipe has the donuts inside, the ends can be put on. To drive the reel with a hydraulic gear reduction or even a direct drive motor set up, you just about have to put a flange on the drive shaft running all the way through the reel form end of core to end of core. This flange is bolted to the end plates to transmit the torque and therefore is usually ½” or thicker plate to accept the tapped holes for the SS bolts to connect shaft flange to the reel core’s end plates.
To make these two plates attached safely and completely with an ‘outside only’ weld, they core pipe is beveled to 45 degrees for all but 1/16” of its entire wall thickness or a ½” interior bevel. The same is true of the end plate it has been bored at center, trued to the circular dimensions, drilled and tapped for the flange bolts AND beveled to the same ½” 45 deg bevel around its circumference.

By leaving the end plates just a bit ‘tight’ they have to be forced into the core by light hammer taps and thus the tack up and weld out as well as the alignment is simplified because the end plates are a force or interference fit.

But, except for the shaft bore- 2” or there about – these force fit end plates tend to almost seal the core before welding.

Enter your intrepid, young and in a hurry welder and narrator- Yes, you can probably see this coming, and so should have I seen the next series of mistakes; but I didn’t at the time.

To clean the weld areas after sanding, cutting, grinding or almost any other power tool shaping or fitting, we always used acetone and since it evaporates- boy does it evaporate- cleaning with a clean cotton rag and acetone is the best way to get aluminum degreased and ready to weld. The acetone will remove the spray on anti stick pan spray we use to lube all cuts and grinding/sanding.

While I finished the last clean up on the two end plates using acetone and a wire brush to weld prep the edges, the welder's helper cleaned inside the ends of the reel core pipe while it rested horizontally on pipe jacks.

I didn’t bother to watch his work as I was busy with a task so when it was time to put the end plates in, I failed to notice the helper had left the cleaning rag in the end of the core. He was absorbed in his task of tapping in ‘his’ end of the core, and checking that plate for flush to core end and he didn’t pay much attention to the rag either.

The reel core pipe had been welded on to fit the interior core donuts frame pieces and was warm, the shop was warm and the rag full of acetone was warm, acetone will evaporate in the cold but it really evaporates well in a nice closed in warm 12” Sched. 80 ‘cannon’ barrel.

We got both ends on, checked them with a straight edge and I put on my hood and began to tack the first end.

As I lit up, so did my acetone powered aluminum cannon and the ½” end plate was launched trailing a 3’ long bluish flame (I’m told, as I was under the hood and couldn’t see any flame) as it sailed across the shop missing two other people working in the line of fire and lodging on a shelf 60 feet away.

Nobody was hurt, little or no damage was done, but a bit of safe work practice regarding acetone was retaught those who were ‘in a hurry’ to get done and move to the next project. I could have been in the line of fire and only my habit of standing to the side of the pipe to tack-up saved me that 1/2" end plate in the chest/gut consequences of my foolish youthful blindness to the cannon we’d made.

Its amazing I lived through all the foolishness of my hurry to 'get things done' but thankfully I did.

Cheers,
Kevin Morin
Kenai, AK

[MacCTD]

Cool story, glad no one was hurt. What is the breaking strength of the line they use? Must be very strong stuff.

[kmorin]

MacCTD.
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/109110500/Longline-catalog here's a link to one catalog, roughly one to several tonnes I think?

Cheers,
Kevin Morin
Kenai, AK

[Chaps]

Reminds me of the acetylene canons we used to build at the old farm implement factory I worked in as a youth. Big steel tube with a welded cap at one end and a paper rag covering the other end secured with a tape wrap. The cap had a small drilled hole where we would inject oxygen and mapp gas into the tube then light it off . . . OMG . . . big old fireball and a thundering roar . . . do that today and a swat team will show up

[goatram]

Propane + Shop Air + Mole Tunnel = a Mild Pop when the air fuel mixture becomes Optimal for combustion.. Will need to wait a few weeks to see if the little bugger comes back.

Knock on Aluminum. I have not experienced that in my shop Yet!

[welder]

I was "TOLD" that you can take a 330Cubic foot Oxygen bottle [now we get 270s] Slide it into a 20' piece of pipe angled at Mission Bay at about a 45* angle, take a 4 pound hammer and knock the valve off and the bottle will LAUNCH waaaaaaay out into the bay.
I was told that the company had to hire security guards to WATCH the security guards that were doing this and once it was discovered what was going on the company sent their NAVY DIVERS out to locate the lost Oxy. bottles and they did.......OVER 200 of them and yes they ALL had NAVY on the ring.

For those that don't know, A 330cu ft bottle can attain speeds over 200MPH and can punch through a one foot concrete wall.

My Grandpa had some funny stories of working in the ship yard in San Diego during WWII , he always wondered why some of those men didn't get killed and why they would waste our resources like that.

[goatram]

Need a LIKE Button for your Story Les

[kmorin]

Lots of power boats use the spaces below decks for tankage, and a 32’ commercial fishing boat I built in the early 80’s was no different. The difference was the level of decks in the stern. In many forward cabin “stern pickers” nets are set and retrieved over a roller or fairlead mounted to the top of the transom and the lazarette deck, as this space over the after 1/3 of the hull is called, is lowered so the transom topping net roller is about shirt pocket high or just over 45” below the top of the roller.

In the 32’ gill netter in question this meant there was an area of about 30” under the lazarette deck for tanks, steering gear and an auxiliary pump mount. Transverse frames below the deck varied to about 10" deep, the deck beams were 4" deep in some places so anyone moving about in the space was confined to the 16-20" vertical space left between the bottom and deck framing but tied together with vertical angle legs making the frames into trusses running transversely and longitudinally. It was not intended for regular access and if a tank had problems the deck would be taken out with a saw.

We didn’t often draw plans for most hardware mounts back then, we just took the pump and fitted it to a base, then held it in location and fit legs or brackets to mount that hardware. More care was taken in the engine room forward, and special care was taken at the helm for the radios and other individual electronics as this was before integrated single screen network displays.

So one of my ‘apprentice’ welders, got the job to mount the under deck safety bilge pump in this particular boat before the under deck tanks went in, and the deck stringers were on and before the deck plate itself. The boat was divided into three main fore aft compartments and the keel sloped down hill -forward; the pump in the aft most compartment was located just aft the compartment's forward bulkhead but forward of the tanks.

He forgot to weld both legs to their frame elements, but he did completely weld the base’s outboard edge to a frame long against a tank bed. This meant the inner two angle legs were not fully welded, only tacked but the pump base was solidly welded to the tank bed or stringer (hull longitudinal cut deeper than the rest to carry the tank’s wt between the transom and next forward bulkhead.)

The boat was launched and did well, and there were no problems with her, she ran on her own bottom to her fishing grounds and fished a decent season, and on running home she ran over a submerged log that ‘dinged’ her prop and her last two days of running home (several hundred miles) the prop vibrated the entire stern pretty well. About four hours of limping along at reduced speeds, it was only a 10 knot boat so slowing to 5-6 knots made progress painful, the lazarette started buzzing with a loud noise.

The vibration had revealed that both inboard legs of the pump mount were not welded; the tacks came loose and the buzz was from that noise of the pump mount legs rattling against the hull long.

The skipper didn’t know what was wrong but figured he had shaft and bearing problems (not the case) so he pulled off his headway, opened the laz hatch and tried to see any water or cracks or structural damage, but nothing was visible. The pump was not visible, but at a distance forward and he could see not the base just a suction hose down into the bilge at the keel. After concluding there was no hull penetrations and that he was not taking water, he continued to port.

The skipper found the least shaking RPM, still buzzing and humming in the stern, and limped home then trailered the boat (wide load, pilot car, road permits…) to the shop.

I climbed in the with a bright hand light and air hose and checked the tanks, crawled around and around and finally 8-9’ forward of the hatch in the least body friendly place under that deck, around and outboard of the forward corner of the port tank, found the two legs where they’d rattled against a hull long for hours. All covered with black soot-like powder and at an incredibly hard to clean and weld location.

Following this survey, now dutifully rearmed with breather (organic vapor charcoal cartridges), hood, MIG gun, acetone, brushes, vent hose, air hose, I spent almost an entire day going back and forth in an out of the space making odd little SS brush handles for each of the four vertical welds. I cleaned, and washed and ventilated and contorted and said things about that welder’s mother that were not true- or kind.

By the end of the day’s work, slowed to a crawl, literally crawling by the contortions of the space without removing the deck, I was not in the most cheery mood. In fact I was thinking of, taking a long pull on the medicinal bottle of distilled beverage that was kept at the shop for emergencies like this- and just letting this repair go and finishing tomorrow.

However, I was told by the skipper his permit was only good for the am on the following day, so he had to leave the shop early to be cleared of the roads by his permit's expiration time; either do it now or at 4:00 am, I might as well 'git 'er dun'.

Alright, one last time I went in to do the weld, all the acetone was gone; I’d already learned that lesson. I was bruised on both legs and forearms from crawling over frames, on longs and between longs and to weld I had to curl on my right side putting my strong hand below my body but still leaning on it.

I got in position, holding the gun nearly vertical, to run a down hand pass, and called out “eyeballs”, our standard notice the arc was starting; even if no one could see any arc but a blue light reflecting out the opened Freeman Oval casting in the deck 8’ aft my position.

I got a few inches of weld on the angle where it was clamped to the longitudinal when someone hit the deck above me with a hammer.

I’m laying curled at 90 degrees around a 100 gallon fuel tank (not gas) but not welding on or near the tank. You know that saying of your life passing before your eyes: it is sort of true. I saw myself being burned to a crisp in a fireball, and a second later, I was still alive, cold and all I could hear was my heart in my ears and laughter from the deck above.

Of course the first reaction is to hit someone, more than once and with a hammer; until my adrenalin was more or less used up..... but as I begin to back out, I realized it will take three to five minutes to reverse slither the path more than enough time for the crew to get in their cars and trucks and put plenty of miles between us. I decided I’d finish the welds to avoid coming back in the under deck pace, so I did. I was a little more shaky than usual, with all that go fast juice in my blood stream, but the welds 'stuck'.

Backing out I’d had to bring the clamps, brushes, torch, hood and all so it was more like 15 minutes after I was done welding, maybe even 20 minutes, before I emerged from the hatch for the last time.

By then the humor of the prank was obvious even to me, but it sure wasn’t for the first few minutes after that incredibly loud boom on the deck. I haven’t been below a deck to weld in years, and frankly that’s one aspect of repair work I don’t miss.

Cheers,
Kevin Morin

[ReelSong]

Havnt created the cannon yet, but have had rags that were not set far enough away from the work ignite, several times

[kmorin]

The Cook Inlet in South Central Alaska has tides which at its head rise and fall 30plus feet every six hours. I live 100 miles south of Anchorage where the Inlet ‘ends’ so we only see a 20-25 rise and fall in that time.

However building a dock on the beach where the tide rises and falls that far in a few hours does present some challenges.

These tides and their impact on my welding work back in the day caused me to stand flat footed and try to beat my ‘manly appendages’ to a pulp- thankfully with limited success.

One local entrepreneur decided to install a ‘dock’ for service boats to support the offshore oil and gas platforms but the cost of pure sheet pile and back fill was too much for him to swing- he needed a more economical method to get working.

Being an imaginative problem solver, he found the WWII Liberty Ship grave yard in SanFran’s harbor and bought a few of these surplus ‘hulks’ to have towed to the beach where he owned property, in the Cook Inlet.
The three ships would be scuttled on the beach, filled with some extra ballast in the form of gravel and the result was a set of ‘piers’ that could hold a crane and allow loading and unloading without the full investment we might see in a Stateside harbor. In fact the entire operation was very much less expensive than a full harbor or pier system, and was more or less ice-proof too!

All went well for the first decade or so. He was able to provide dockage on a reasonably sheltered beach area, the costs to the oil firms was lower than their own chosen site some miles south in more exposed waters. The entrepreneur prospered, the dock did well, the site was finally sold to a major tug and barge company whose name you’d recognize and they closed this facility for a while to spend more energy on the southern dock they also leased or controlled.

Then a winter storm move all the old hulks around, and broke one in half and what came out? Bunker C oil was still in the ship’s bottom! This was a ‘cleaned’ hull, CG certified, US Dept Def certified, EPA/DEC/AGen- CEEEEE certified clean old metal hulk. But it wasn’t cleaned and that meant the current owner had to try to find a way to ‘control’ the ship’s halves.

Enter your (then) youthful narrator and his willingness to raise a wage as a welder while his burgeoning boat building business got under way.

The contractor was a notorious ‘body mill’ that went through people, even whole crews, in weeks if not days! This company was sort of famous in the State for somewhat questionable work methods and projects but they were awarded the contract to ‘weld’ the two halves of a WWII Liberty ship, laying broken on the beach –back together enough to last one winter before it could be salvaged in the follow warm season.
I got a job welding for this contractor and the work entailed going over the side of the ship, near the tear of the hull, and put various beams AND huge padeyes to lace up the side with even larger cables. In other words, the welders were both putting external I beams on the hull AND putting large lacing eyes for a cable that would lace up the hull’s tear like a work boot on a grand scale.

Most of the welding was just 7018, some guys wanted a 6010 root or tacking rod because there were lots of scaffolding to make in order to have a work space. A typical work space involved being lowered over the side on a bosun’s chair (flat plank in a loop of line off a hook from the Gallion hydraulic cranes ), sitting in that rig you held an angle in your lap, wore your hood and held the stinger in your working hand while trying to keep steady on the bosun’s chair sling with the off hand.

When you got to the work site elevation, they swung you against the hull so you could stand off with your legs butt the angle to the hull, tack then weld that 2”x2”x1/4” to the hull and then get on it. By standing on the angle they could raise the bosun’s rig and send your helper down next with another angle or two, and you’d put the basis for your own work platform on the ship’s side.

OK, that was not bad, got my first few day’s work done and was carrying my load, but on the third or fourth day I tried to pound my ‘plums’ into mush.

When the scaffold was built the crew on deck would lower the beam or the padeye base plate to be attached to the hull. These were 1-1/2” thick bases about 2’ on a side and all four sides had to have six passes or a buildup of ½ the depth of the plate in weld. They were kept on the rigging until unshackled by the helper and the welder; once the welder felt that plate was secure enough.

It was almost low tide, no more than 3’ of water below and I was half the way up the hull about 20’ off the almost all gravel beach and there was a decent breeze blowing from the south, to my back. I’d gotten the pad base tacked enough and was getting the overhead passes under the bottom of the 2’ plate. To make time, reduce passes and to improve our performance putting on pounds of steel –wet; we’d mostly gone to 5/32 LH70 (7018) and I was carrying as much puddle as I could overhead.

I was standing on the two 2x12’s we used as scaffold planks laying on the two 2”x2” x1/4” angles we had welded to the hull at 90. There was a light frame of hand railing above that, but only 1-1/4” x 1-1/4” x 1/8” sort of a work safety guard. We were both wearing falling harness and that may have been part of the eventual problems coming my way?

I was leaned in looking up under the plate to hull overhead fillet with my left arm against the hull. My right hand, at the wrist, was propped on my left forearm and I had my head back fully to see under that plate. My leathers were only sleeves not a full jacket as that was too heavy to wear all day climbing up and down that doggone homemade scaffold to the deck for breaks and lunch.

About half way along a 6-8” bead of 5/32” LH70 the breeze gusted up against the hull. When it did the puddle was uncovered and the entire molten puddle dropped down onto my left arm where the liquid splashed onto my uncovered throat. My head was up, my neck arched back and the hood didn’t cover that low.

Of course, I reacted to having my throat burned by caning my neck inward-chin down- and that opened up my collar and gravity did the rest. As soon as the burning liquid hit my belt line it stopped and began to burn my soft white belly and so I grabbed my belt and pulled to stop the pain.

Now that right there was a big mistake. Preoccupied by pain, I’d forgotten that gravity was not going to stop working just because I’d forgotten why the metal dropped downward in the first place.
Let’s review: I was standing 20 off a small chop with a gravel beach below a few feet, on two planks located 20’ from the deck, with a beltline full of melted steel and decided reflexively to pulled my belt outward to relieve the pain when I learned that the next stop south…. Was inside my shorts, right at the fall harness’s lower leg band.

The pain of having one of the ‘boy’s’ burned by hot metal that is cooling against your leg can cause you to jump up and down and pound yourself in the groin area. I did that- quite a bit.

My helper was not looking at the weld, didn’t know about the dropped puddle and wasn’t aware of any reason for me to begin shouting (screaming might be better used?) and rattling on like a sailor about pain. So his conclusion was that I was having a fit or a mental break down.

Eventually the metal cooled and I was able to drop trousers and retrieve the ingot that had burned the two adjoining pieces of hide- to a couple of quarter sized burn areas- and slowly but surely climb the scaffolding looking for a burn kit.

Of course the entire crew was informed by the next day, so when I limped onto the deck to go back to work there was plenty of smiling and head nodding. I can’t remember the jokes offered but I’m sure they were appropriate?

It sure wasn’t funny when it happened but of course it’s a funny image now- standing there beating my groin and for what seemed no reason; but I still use tape to close my collar when I weld overhead!

Cheers,
Kevin Morin
Kenai, AK

[goatram]

Cheers for a good story again

[astglenn]

Now I have found a subject on this great forum that I feel I can offer some Journeyman level input on! Please allow me to tell you a little story. This may take a couple of sessions due to a mental break and subsequent trip to a shrink as I grind through this

Chapter 1. The Big Hawaiian

A bit of background. Enter John Edward Evans. My Father. Dad was a 7th generation Hawaiian. He was a craftsman of amazing skill in just about any media but none more so than metal. His business supported the aircraft refueling industry and aviation fuel storage. Refueling trucks, delivery systems and heavy maintenance on the tank farms. Lots of steel. Plate and pipe welding happened continuously.

Dad was built like a Greek Adonis but much more muscular. To say that he was "Ripped" is to say that Hitler was indifferent about humanities. His personality was, well, best described as toothy. Let me try to bring clarity to "Toothy" through euphemism.

Imagine that you are a shark tooth supplier and business is good. The hassle is that you have to get them from big live sharks in 100 feet of water with a pair of pliers. No matter how good you are with a pair of pliers, that shark is going to get lucky more than occasionally and all in all, the entire event is a treacherous and unstable thing to be doing. My father suffered foolishness about as bad as can be and he was absolutely not unsure about his commitment to prove it. I, out of low intellect and a serious addiction to sadism, took it upon myself to keep him in the proper RPM range to fully explore his horsepower.

Dad was my boss and that is where the welding story begins.