The Home Machinist!

Harold seems a straight up fellow - but I'm quite sure we do not want to xxxx him off. I try but I'm prone to xxxxxxx folks off - especially my friends - now we are on a forum...worse. It's tough to go from eye to eye to this sort of media; Bill - welcomed to the 'OLD GUY' syndrome. We're smart as smart but then - just a little behind. We built this system and it continues too fast for our youth to disolve - or - have related to them what we did by folks who don't konw what we did. Sorry for lengthly the bla, bla. I'll stop.
BC

Straight up?

Well, it's a matter of what one considers "straight up" means.

If it means that I look after the board in a fashion in keeping with the desires of the owner, then, yeah, I'm a straight up guy. I have a sense of humor, I swear like a drunken sailor, I take a drink or two, and tolerate machining (got burned out on it long ago). I also willingly share the things I learned in the 26 years I worked as a machinist/toolmaker.

I was asked to moderate about 15 years ago. I accepted. I now have an obligation to perform the duties I accepted, and I do them. If I did not, I would step down. I am responsible for myself, and owe more than nothing to those who have given me permission to interact with the board software. I take that responsibility very seriously, as I am a man of my word.

I try to be fair, I try to be non-judgmental, but I also don't allow things to spin out of control. It is for that reason that this board is the landing zone for many---those who prefer to read about their interests and share their views with others without fear of being flamed, or insulted by those who prefer the fight.

We ask of readers to use language that would not be offensive to one's mother or young daughter. That's not too much to ask. If I can do it, anyone can, as I have a potty mouth ---- but I don't use it on this board.

H

To bring the discussion back to boiler design, one of my pet peeves is a boiler designed and built with no way to get inside to inspect it or wash it out. I just tried to inspect a boiler with the dome made from a weld cap welded to the shell and the largest opening 1/8 NPT. There was no way I could tell the customer whether or not he should replace it.

Thanks Harold!

So One more post. As to the 844 firebox she has had extensive Firebox repair/replacement just in the last 17 years. If you look at the before pics it is from poor water treatment. I kind of think they may have used Mig, but maybe not I have no knowledge and have not seen up close pics to tell.
As to Marty's post on boiler access, I don't have the ASME code here but washout plugs are supposed to be 1" or larger on the miniature boilers which are not hobby boilers. Wash outs placed I think at each corner of the firebox. The big ones have them all over and I plan to do that to my boilers disguising them becomes a problem. I was thinking of dummy blow downs. Also hiding them under the jacket, two down the side and two on the bottom. This is also as Marty says to be able to see inside. I might hide the steam dome under the sand dome so as to make it as large as possible. Just saying...Back to watching.

Clint

But Marty - you are not looking at this correctly (giggle):

Welding on a cap for a dome is the most expedient (cost effective) way to build a boiler for resale....and forget about the poor guy who owns it.

Kinda like welding or silver soldering flues into a steel boiler...although I could never figure out how someone can think they can do that faster or less expensively than rolling...but different strokes for different folks....

I have cut a few off and welded in a proper bolt-on dome more than once in the past 20 years - just to 'see what is inside'.

SP&S700 wrote:As to the 844 firebox she has had extensive Firebox repair/replacement just in the last 17 years. If you look at the before pics it is from poor water treatment. I kind of think they may have used Mig, but maybe not I have no knowledge and have not seen up close pics to tell.

844 was one of the seven 800 class that did not receive a whole new firebox in its service life. The combustion chamber from 5 o'clock to 9 o'clock was from the factory as was the bottom of the combustion chamber throat sheet. All the other sheets had been replaced piecemeal. UP was getting 350,000 miles out of a set of side sheets in the late 1940s. The crown sheet was installed in its later life but was located 3/4" down and 1" forward from where it should have been.

This resulted in pandemic staybolt breakage.
The new firebox was installed with Tig roots and 7018 fill passes on all the seams and and flexible staybolts. Rigid bolts were threaded on both ends.
844 New Firebox Photos

Wow! That's quite a miss-alignment between the old and new sheets. (I am assuming the stay bolts should have been uniformly positioned on the sheets.)
With that asymmetrical stay bolt pattern it's no wonder there were failures.
~RN

BB

Thats interesting, had not seen those pics before. I assume this is the 2000 repair I believe it was around then that the crown was replace. It seems to me for her 15 year inspection she got more of the same. Did 844 really get 300,000 plus miles on her from 2000 till 2016? Nice to hear roots were tiged,
I met a Boiler inspector from Hawaii once?

Clint