Paint Remover

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yogi
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Paint Remover

Post by yogi »

For you hydraulic press fans: https://i.imgur.com/W8juoYe.mp4
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Kellemora
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Re: Paint Remover

Post by Kellemora »

I used to watch these guys with the big presses smash all kinds of things.
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yogi
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Re: Paint Remover

Post by yogi »

The slo-mo photography is alluring and entertaining. All I ever watched were YouTube videos. We didn't deal with presses where I worked.
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Kellemora
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Re: Paint Remover

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We had a 30 or 60 ton press, don't remember which now, it was used to press wheel bearings and a few other fitted parts.
Aside from that, we used it to crush a few soda cans, one of the workers lunch pails, and an old 4-channel CB, that I can remember.
We had more fun with a metal-cutting bandsaw. Sawed a Craig 4-Track Cassette Player into 1/2 inch strips, hi hi.
Plus other sundry items, like a baseball, golf ball, and a bronze statue in 1/4 inch strips. Other than the base which we left upright, we turned each sawed off piece upside down and glued it all back together again, then put it back up on the shelf where we snatched it from. Nobody noticed it was modified for over a month, hi hi.
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yogi
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Re: Paint Remover

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What you did with a band saw sounds like a mechanical version of a CAT scan. They do layered imaging and come up with a 3-dimensional view. I'd guess the thinly sliced statue lost some height by being cut the way you describe it. That must have been obvious, but not so obvious as to draw anybody's attention. The electronic engineers I worked with were not stone sober stoics, but I can't recall any funny stories about life in the lab equivalent to yours. The craziest thing I remember is when they super-glued one of the tech's chairs to the floor. That worked really well because the floor tiles came up with it when the chair was finally moved. Super glue is a lot tougher than I suspected.
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Kellemora
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Re: Paint Remover

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Super glue is strong stuff, especially the professional grades like JET or Hot Stuff!

In an office over the shopping center, one of the gals who worked there glued several malt sized soda straws to a ductwork vent so it would help direct some of the cool air down toward her desk. She kept adding straws, about one per day I assume, until she was comfortable. Then when winter came, she climbed up there and turned the register upside down so the straw pointed up toward the ceiling and not blowing the heat down on her.

The owner of the building took a tour through all the offices and saw the register with all the soda straws glued to it.
Said they couldn't do that. At least he asked the gal why she did it, and after she explained, he had the HVAC guy come out and install a second vent under the ductwork just for her, and replaced the vent with all the soda straws in it with a new vent. If I recall, he also had the HVAC guy add another duct down from the ceiling to the floor in the back corner of the room to get heat down to peoples feet who worked in that cold corner in the winter.
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yogi
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Re: Paint Remover

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My understanding of super glue is that it has tremendous tinsel strength, but really sucks with lateral stresses. The stuff we used in the lab was industrial strength; they had a solvent just in case.

I think that was pretty nice of the owner not to fire the gal and to go ahead and redo the duct work. I recognize each situation is different, but I would be afraid to glue straws to a heating duct. It could melt or create a fire hazard or both. Then again, that was pretty innovative of her. :mrgreen:
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Kellemora
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Re: Paint Remover

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I don't think it would have been a fire hazard, after all, the duct vent was over 50 feet away from the furnace.
I do know she tried using a magnetic cover that directed the air from the vent, but that cut off air to other folks, and it vibrated down and would fall off from time to time.
The building owner was great about making needed modifications whenever and wherever necessary.
Seitz meat company leased one of the floors, and he bent over backwards to make those offices look more like attorney's offices than a place for sales reps to hang out between calls. The main reception entry faced the two elevators, and when the elevator doors opened, the facade to Seitz main entry lobby was amazingly elegant.
Quite unlike the owner of the building next to his who never fixed or upgraded anything if he didn't have to.

Many years ago, when I worked for McDonnell-Douglas, one of the folks who worked in one of the assembly plants gave me a 2 foot long piece of scrap tape. I think he said it held something to the ailerons on the jets they built. He warned, whatever you use it on, it will never come off, nor can it be removed.
I thought to myself, yeah right.
I pealed the backing back about 1/4 inch to stick it to a supporting pipe in my basement so I could find it when I needed it.
Now the paint they use on those pipes that hold up the center I-Beam in a house, must be the strongest paint in the world as well. Putting both feet against the pipe and pulling on the tape would not release it from the pipe. No problem, I got a claw hammer out and stuck the claw up against the tape, wrapped a little of the still covered tape around the handle and pulled as hard as I could. After a few more tries I ended up breaking the handle off the hammer. The head stuck to the tape by probably less than 1/8 inch, except where the paper backing tore a little.
I got a scissors and cut the rest of the tape away, and thankfully the scissors did not get stuck.
I left that hammer head up there for probably close to five years, yanking on it, or hitting it with something every so often. Right before dad finished moving out of that house, I grabbed a blowtorch and managed to get the hammer head off the tape, but nothing would faze the tape itself. I'm sure it was still on that pole when they tore his house down for a shopping center.
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yogi
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Re: Paint Remover

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Sooo ... what you are telling me is McDonnell-Douglas builds their planes with duct tape holding them together. It's a bit unsettling to think our military depends on that technique. :mrgreen:

Then again, I have an idea what could have gone into the research for creating that super tape. My guess is that you could have purchased a new house and a Mercedes for the price of that two feet of tape. LOL
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Kellemora
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Re: Paint Remover

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You got that right!
Just looking at the one small part I drew, and the number of hours that went into the engineering and design, selecting which designs, and then having several of us draw the blueprints for those designs. Then when they finally chose which of the designs they wanted to carry to the next stage, of those of us who's were selected, we had to scribe the templates, usually five of them, and of those five they only selected the one they considered perfect.
Then the chosen template is sent down to the imaging on metal department, where it is treated like a negative, and the metal like a print. From there it goes to the cutting room, and from the cutting room to the forming room, etc.
In other words, every little part passes through many engineering and design stages, through many drawing stages, through many template stages, before it even goes into the production areas.

Although I drew a lot of parts while I worked as a draftsman at MAC. I was proud of the fact that one of the parts I drew, possibly more, but I learned about this one from my bosses. It was the Drop Chute Door for the Gemini XII Space Capsule. Although I had no idea what it was at the time I drew it, we were on a need to know basis, hi hi. After the fact, when Kudo's came around, this is when the boss told us what parts our hands had touched.

It gave me something to brag about anyhow, hi hi.
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pilvikki
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Re: Paint Remover

Post by pilvikki »

cool!

we used locktight for assorted jobs at DH and every so often to glue my fingers to some unsuspecting part. it was ok, if it was my left hand, i would just use an exacto to cut my hand free, but if i'd done the R hand, i'd call peter to perform the surgery. he didn't laugh as loud as the others... :doh:

saxon would watch hydraulic press all the time, and chuckle at the guy's accent.
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yogi
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Re: Paint Remover

Post by yogi »

Surgery would work most of the time but as I mentioned earlier we had a solvent for just such occasions. As far as I know, nobody lost any fingers. :grin:

A couple decades after Gemini XII the idea of zero defects became a goal for us electronic manufacturing people. We were doing good at 6 Sigma defects, i.e. 3 failures per million opportunities. Obviously more stages to a process created more opportunities and upped the failure likelihood. Thus a good deal of life at the Big M was spent finding ways to reduce the number of opportunities to make mistakes. Not only did this help achieve Six Sigma quality, it also cut the costs of manufacturing. While all that was good for cell phones, I don't think I'd want to be flying in a space capsule that only meets the Six Sigma standard.
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pilvikki
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Re: Paint Remover

Post by pilvikki »

well, i'd just want to fly in a space capsule at all... :eek: claustrophobia for one. but i sure like to see pictures...

oh, just a thought, have you read Sparow and Children of God by mary doria russell? space stuff and meeting with aliens and since you've had a catholic education, you'd understand more of the finesse in the plot than i did.
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yogi
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Re: Paint Remover

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My SIL was a captain in the Army many years ago and invited us to his camp for a tour one day. His main duty was to maintain and store tanks. I learned that the ones he dealt with have 1700hp motors in them. Amazing but they don't go very fast. Top speed is around 40mph. He offered to let me ride inside one. I climbed up and looked inside the turret and decided to opt out of that. Instead I sat on the deck with a few other fellows and rode the tank that way. I can't say I'm claustrophobic, but the inside of that tank looked way too confining for me.

I've not ready any of Mary Doria Russell. While it's true I was raised Catholic, I abandoned that church altogether when I left grammar school. I like to read philosophy and about religion in that context. Anything else kind of turns me off.
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Kellemora
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Re: Paint Remover

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Speaking of Claustrophobia, have you taken a ride to the top of the Gateway Arch yet?

That's where I proposed to Debi 17 years ago!
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yogi
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Re: Paint Remover

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Been here a little over two years now - hard to believe it went by so quickly - and have yet to tour St Louis city. Part of it is that we know there are no-fly zones but don't know where they are. Chicago had the same situation. Unfortunately, my wife has a fear of heights. She closes her eyes when we cross over the river bridges. We did talk about visiting the Arch, but she insists she would wait for me on the ground floor. I might do that some day, but it doesn't sound like a lot of fun. I've seen skyscrapers in Chicago, and have been up to the top floor of a few. To be honest, St Louis does not impress me in that regard.

On the other hand, even not having been there I can imagine the top of the Arch is a romantic setting at the right time of day. My proposal was while sitting in the car parked in front of her house after a date one night. I can't think of anything more unromantic. But, she married me anyway.
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Kellemora
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Re: Paint Remover

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Although I lived in St. Louis my whole life. I actually paid to go on bus tours of St. Louis to see things I may have missed, or couldn't visit unless you were with a tour, this was in later years.

When I was younger, I was off work on Tuesdays. Back then, you could go visit a company or place of interest, and the owner would take you through their entire operation. In later years, no can do, insurance won't allow it.

I took my son out to Missouri Meerschaum Company, a place I visited many times.
I thought he would love to see how the hand-made corncob pipes were produced.
After driving all the way out there, the owners son was running the place and said he can't let us go back there, too dangerous. I said call your dad before you say you can't, I think he'll say otherwise.
He refused to bother his dad, so we sorta left.
In the lobby was a public pay telephone, I called my dad who in turn called the owner who called his son and said I was waiting in the lobby for a guided tour.
Talk about a change of tune in the way this kid acted.
Not only did we get a guided tour, he stopped to explain in detail the hows and whys of each step in the process, even more so than his dad every did for me.
When all was said and done, I thanked him for taking the time to explain all the little details to us.
He apologized for giving me the runaround at first. He said it is very dangerous back there and we are struggling to stay afloat as it is. My father said you would stay in the aisles and not go close to any machine or worker without my even warning you not to. I saw he was right. He also said to say hi to the rest of your family.
My dad had a lot of pull with a lot of people, something I never managed to inherit from him.
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yogi
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Re: Paint Remover

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i've used a few Meerschaum pipes, and a corn cob pipe. They were nowhere near the same thing. It looked as if the corn pipe was made from an actual corn cob. Plus, it didn't last very long. It was fun to use, and reasonably priced. They say meerschaum yields a superior smoke, and that might be true. A lot depends on the tobacco and how well the pipe is seasoned. My better briar pipes seemed to be just as good as the meerschaum. I would love to have been with you on that tour just to see the kid's change of heart. Your dad must have been a magnificent man. A lot of it has to do with one's willingness to schmooze and being savvy in politics. You're too damned honest for that. :mrgreen:

I like the idea of a guided tour through the city. Next time we have an urge to see why we left the urban life, I will consider doing it on a tour bus.
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Kellemora
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Re: Paint Remover

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I had two real Meerschaum pipes, but rarely used them. Both were facial designs and were given to me as gifts.
I also had a couple of hand-made large pipes, about the size of the Meeerschaum pipes, also rarely used, but loved them.
The corncob pipes held up well for me, only had a couple of the cheap kind burn out.

Missouri Meerschaum pipes, although corncobs, are soaked in thin plaster, then coated with a heavy layer of plaster, and when dry, the plaster is ground off down to expose the corncob. I'm sure this has a cooling affect so they don't burn out so fast. These are the type I smoked at work.
I also had a couple of corncob pipes that were soaked in plastic resin first, then ground down to shape. I was leery about smoking one made with plastic, but I know a few folks who did for years.
At home I had a couple of corncob pipes with Meerschaum liners, which was only a cylinder of Meerschaum stuck inside. Now these, the bottoms would burn out of over time. But I learned a little trick to save them. The refractory cement they used to hold the sleeve in place could be purchased fairly cheap, and I used it to form a bottom in the last of these two pipes I had. Worked great!

After I lost my teeth, I struggled to keep smoking pipes, buying special bite grips, they didn't work real well, especially after I was on the road so much driving OTR, so I eventually quit smoking pipes.

Dad made lots of friends in the service, and as a musician in a fairly big band, plus our family held annual events that drew out the whole town, and several from town around. Heck, folks as far away as from Hermann even drove in to our annual main event. Hermann is the other city all the Krauts lived in, and many were my grandfathers friends.

I will admit, our family was very well known back in the pre- and post-war era.
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yogi
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Re: Paint Remover

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If your family ran it's own Volksfest, or a form of Oktoberfest, I can see where the popularity comes from. I didn't realize there were German settlements in Missouri. The wiki entry says Hermann is in the middle of the Missouri Rhineland, also a big surprise to me. I figured all you folks were north of the Wisconsin state line. LOL Truth is, I miss the ethnicity that was prevalent up in Chicago. Around O'Fallon anyway it's all pretty much plain vanilla. I will admit that there is a preponderance of Irish looking people roaming around town, but there is only a certain amount of charm in those old world pubs. I miss some of the ethnic food stuff that seems non-existent around here. Something simple like Polish sausage or Italian sausage can be seen in stores, but it's disgraceful. There is nothing like the real thing I was taking for granted up north. I'd pay in gold if I could get my hands on lox and bagels. I have yet to find somebody who actually knows what lox are. I can get a Chicago style hotdog. Well, something that approximates one. The real thing uses Vienna brand hotdogs. No such thing in or around O'Fallon.

I too had a few of those meerschaum lined pipes. I can only recall one cracking at the bottom. It never occurred to me that they can be repaired. It's also fascinating that plaster is used to fabricate corn cob pipes. The one I had was embedded in some kind of resin, but I don't think there was any plaster involved.
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