Andy, I've observed some drivers who believe their cars are self-driving when they're not. However, I have been assured no one uses their phone while driving, at least at the time of the accident.
I believe that's true. Bob. An innocent guy in prison told me that too.
Hey Andy, long time lurker that really enjoys the fun! I had to chime in about TVA Paradise Steam Plant. I worked there briefly about 20 years ago during a shutdown taking asbestous samples in the isolation enclosures where they were removing it. A very interesting place, especially for a native Kentuckian. I walked by an openining to a boiler where they were steam cleaning the inside. I casually mentioned it to my supervisor who got excited and said to stay away due to the heavy metals (arsenic, etc...) that were byproducts of burning the coal. I found it to be a very interesting place, but I beat a hasty retreat back to my previously chosen career field (aviation) as soon as possible!
My daughter is preparing to move to OKC with her fiance who works there as a geologist in the oil industry there. We are looking forward to seeing her there as we love Oklahoma!!!
Thanks for the Coke!
Glad to have you post, I'm honored!
I was last at Paradise to work 48 years ago. I helped commission Unit 3 and I understand it has been shut down, full life cycle, like me. I'm almost ready to lay down in my coffin.
Paradise was built in the middle of a large coal field but I understand they about exhausted it and were hauling coal in by barge and rail.
Stop by when you're out this way, I'll sell you another Coke. (And you can see how I've doctored pictures of my shop to make it look so clean)
I don't think it's of much interest to others, but I'm back on the microscopic investigation of porosity.
Three polished hammers:
The hammer head on the left was poured from swarf and dirty window frames. You can see the porosity. I posted about it earlier.
The one in the middle was cast from clean window frames. It has plenty of porosity but not as bad. Those are mostly smudges in the picture.
The hammer on the right was cast from old muffins, which were from aluminum cans. You can't see porosity in it very well.
Yes, I didn't have it clamped well and the mill gouged it during cleanup. So fire me.
The center hammer has some porosity but when polished and magnified, it has some really nasty places, like this.
Those are connected.
It's not hard to find porosity.
The one on the right cast from muffins came out very nice. Since I'm not 100% sure of the muffin source (other than I poured them) I need to do some more investigating and test pours. Very hard to find porosity, and it's 0.003" and less.
I cut up a recently poured ingot and compared it with the automotive box section.
The ingot is very clean, maybe five dots in the section. Here's the largest I found, about 0.003", others were smaller.
The commercially manufactured box section is full of small porosity, about 0.007", like this one at the bottom of the picture. I think the other is 0.0045".
Using the pouring basin, the spout on the crucible, and using ingots or muffins instead of raw scrap seems to make a lot of difference. No degassing. And my castings are all extruded material, not previously cast. To prove that those three items make such a difference I need to do several more tests.
Thanks for stopping by!
So I grabbed a drill and a sharp 3/8th's drill bit and started eating at the insides of the 7/8th hole. It took a while using this crude method but it worked. 
But I got them all penned, then had to take my wife to town. Neighbor's bull was in the pen too, so he came to get the bull in the afternoon about the time I got all the big cattle wormed and he helped castrate and tag. turned them out into the little pasture (about 3 acres) next to the barn. Big fresh tender clover. They had a ball.
Just as all large industrial plants there is a risk, I'd be curious (but not enough to look) at how many people are hurt or killed in or around food processing plants vs. nuclear plants. With all of the rules and regulations on nuclear the likelihood of a major disaster is low outside of a natural disaster causing one such as in Japan.
