HG's thread of miscelaneous stuff

[hgs_notes]

These are from way back in the archive when digital cameras were still pretty new to the general public, so the pixal count wasn't that high. This antique fire engine actually came from the San Fransisco FD I think, but was going to the NYFD or vice versa, can't remember which anymore. It was from the 1870's I think. The shop I worked with on the restoration had to rebuild the boiler and the rest of the engine pump and get it back to working order. The only drawings they could find for it were from a catalog, like Montgomery Wards or Sears or something. It was a very unusual design, but we had to build it to meet the code as much as possible even though it was never built to one because no pressure vessel codes existed at the time. I was changing jobs right at the end of this project, but the shop called me and said to come watch them test it, just a few days before I moved. It worked perfectly and you would never know it wasn't all original.







This shop in Everett, WA did some unique projects. The owner was a great guy, really into steam powered boats. He built his own boiler for his, then got certified to build high pressure boilers just so he build build more for the niche market he was involved in.

But even more interesting than this shop was their neighbors shop, who I also did some inspection work with. They built nuclear containment storage casks. (sorry, no pics) That was some funky welding those guys did. I was involved with some tritium processing vessels there, little heat exchangers that used aluminum foam material in them. The radiographs were not easy to read I can tell you that much. If I had stayed in that area for work there was a fairly good chance I would have got certified to inspect nuclear ASME code vessels and my career would not have taken the same path it did. I like where I'm at, no complaints.