Reminiscing..

[ironglow]

    Sometimes in our senior years..we start reminiscing, considering our "old days" and the friendships and experiences we shared with co-workers.

  This morning in reverie, I travelled back to my  days working high steel. My part was not assembling the pieces, but painting them, sand blasting
     same when needed.

  Much of the structures, oil tanks etc., were prime coated with red lead paint.  In Texas and Louisiana, we sprayed the red lead, but in
   New york State, we could only apply red lead with a brush.

  I worked on offshore drilling rigs..I believe for Haliburton, but I worked on them as they were built onshore. They require sandblasting "to white"..
   but no red lead. Instead carbo-zinc primer with a 3 part epoxy was applied.

   One memory I have, is a stern "chewing-out" I underwent was inthe Gulf Refinery.  We used to bring thinners in a separate can... in this case,
  we (my crew) happened to show up with 5 gallons of 50/50 r5educer... in a TEXACO can!  An apparent supervisor there took us to task for that !

  To assuage his concern, i told one of the guys toturn his sprayer (with primer) on the can.. 

  Below, a photo from the web,showing this type work.  I rarely worked over a couple hundred feet, but we knew full well that a fall from anything
   over 80 feet, was normally fatal...or at least bad enough so one may as well be dead.

  The worker shown is walking a 6" beam..  we ofte walked as small as 2" beams.  Brush painting horizontal beams, was a task, because we had to
   "coon" the beams, which simply means crawling along the beams, while painting them.... in reverse gear, naturally.

   Do you have any reminisces to share.

[Bob Riebe]

When men were men....

As close to that I ever got was trimming trees without an extension ladder; you would put a ladder against the tree, climb up to the offending branches, then shimmy out on the six inch wide branch as far as you could till it started to bend, your legs straddling the branch, tie a rope,  cut it off ,lower it and shimmy back, cut it off, lower it, till it would clear the building below and drop the rest.

I also put up metal racking in new warehouses where you simply stand on the racking you installed , put a new layer on, climb up a layer, install, climb up, install till finished and start the next seection.
At that...
When it was finished and being used, I had to fill orders and replace unused orders.. by climbing up the racking, four sections high, and taking out and putting items back in.
That kept one quite limber.

They finally gave the workers elevating carts, which was sweet as instead of pushing/pulling a pallet, you got to drive around, five years before going bankrupt.

[ironglow]

When men were men....

As close to that I ever got was trimming trees without an extension ladder; you would put a ladder against the tree, climb up to the offending branches, then shimmy out on the six inch wide branch as far as you could till it started to bend, your legs straddling the branch, tie a rope,  cut it off ,lower it and shimmy back, cut it off, lower it, till it would clear the building below and drop the rest.

  The suspense.."just how brittle is the branch ?"

I also put up metal racking in new warehouses where you simply stand on the racking you installed , put a new layer on, climb up a layer, install, climb up, install till finished and start the next seection.
At that...
When it was finished and being used, I had to fill orders and replace unused orders.. by climbing up the racking, four sections high, and taking out and putting items back in.
That kept one quite limber.

  It also encouraged careful assembly of the racks..since you will be betting your life or limb on that assembly...

They finally gave the workers elevating carts, which was sweet as instead of pushing/pulling a pallet, you got to drive around, five years before going bankrupt.

[DDZ]

IG,When working as a steel worker, was there such safety items as harnesses, or fall protection?

[ironglow]

IG,When working as a steel worker, was there such safety items as harnesses, or fall protection?

   I didn't have any, but I understand they are required now.  I didn't have them on either high steel or farm silos.  After a certain height...one
    mistake would be your last.   No redux...

  A couple momths after I moved back from Texas..going from high steel to farm silos, Marshall, my old steel working partner, was killed while
   painting an oil tank.

  He was working on a bosun's chair, when a knot came untied, and he fell over backwards and broke his neck...killing him.  He only fell about 20 feet.  Someone said his new partner was a bit lax on rigging the chair.

[DDZ]

Started out working construstion. Mostly building bridges. Definetly had to be young and in good shape to do that job, but I enjoyed it.
Then got on with a paving company that envolved road building, road repairing, and paving. Also shooting and chipping which was my favorite job. I ran the spreader box on the chipper, backed trucks into the chipper, and while on the move had to signal the truck driver to lower his bed for trees and wires. I only tore down one wire, when the driver didn't see me soon enough, and the top of his bed hooked the lower wire. Was a great company to work for and worked with some good guys. Allthough none of the friends I worked with there never became lasting friends.

The last 31 years of my career I worked at a compressor station. Mostly as a repairman in the 12 2500HP gas fired engines. Eventually became the Sr. repairman. We also had 3 units that were driven by a 3400HP electric motors. Below is a photo of one of the coopers with the crankcase doors off. They were V10 cylender, with 18 inch pistons, and a 20 inch Dia. crankshaft. The one pictured below was one of 4 low stage units that had 3 compressors, with each having a 24 inch bore. The 8 high stage units have a 13 3/4 inch bore.  I enjoyed working there, mainly because after a repair it gave you a sense of accomplishment.  That is not me in the photo, but a coworker that was, and still is a very good friend.   

[ironglow]

 yes, it is hard for sone to understand, but there is siomething about doiung a job others cannot or will not even try.  High steel was OK, but I truly
    loved silo building. Of course, as you said, one only has so many years at that job...since they are by necessity, the exclusive domain of young,
    strong men.
 
   I found a couple videos on Youtube showing work.  First one shows how it is done today..several booms, totally screened scaffold and safety ropes on everybody.

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bE1wlmXARaw

  The second one...I would not be surprised if those Amish guys were using my old rig and building somewhere around here, in the same area
   as I built...except i don't see any new or rebuilds (shown) going up.

  Our brand silos had deeper grooved staves, so we crawled the outside walls tightening and adjusting the rods, before putting the roof on.

   As foreman, I did the job the guy in the blue shirt is doing.

  I also worked for the Harvestore people..the blue asilo shown inn the picture.    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itESzoQHAtg

[Lloyd Smale]

first day of being a lineman i was with an old school lineman that gave me the basics of pole climbing on a 30 ft pole. he asked if i think i had the basics and i said yes just to get the torture over with. he smiled and didnt say a word. next day he pulled up to a 60ft pole without wires on it and said climb it or go home. i was pretty much terrified but did it. it was a bit windy and because there was no wires tied to it the pole moved back and forth about a foot in the wind with me on it. i was pretty much peeing my self. than the lead man told me to let go and lean back. said to myself when i hit the dirt im going home. he made me sit there for about 10 minutes and my feet were in agony. never thought you could tense up the muscles in your feet enough to make your arches scream. when he said come down it wasnt over. if youve climbed youd know coming down is much harder than going down. especially with your feet screaming. when i hit the dirt i was about to tell him to shove it and he said good job. the last 3 were about crying and quit like babies. that hit my ego so i couldnt give up and i told him "piece of cake" he laughed and said i know better. i did the same thing 20 years ago and at the top of the pole told myself this aint for me