So I get to class this morning and got one hell of a shock. At about five yesterday afternoon someone changed out one of the acetylene bottles. He was new and didn't know what the hell he was doing even though we do a lot of training with all the new guys. He just tightened it up by hand and left it be. You are supposed to use a wrench and crank them on. Well he is cutting away with the torch and the acetylene bottle starts shooting flames about a foot high from the fitting. My instructor trys to tighten it but the flames are too high by this point. It keeps burning and the oxygen bottle starts to get really hot. (Now for those of you that don't know anything about oxyacetylene cutting and welding. When acetylene burns it it not that much hotter than say propane. Now you mix it with an oxidizer and you get a BIG boom. Also the bottles that gases are stored in can only take so much pressure before they blow up.) My instructor gets a fire extinguisher and puts the flames out and the fire dept. is called. They show up and hose our whole shop down with enough water that it was about two inches deep through the whole shop.
So onto this morning. I get there at about 7:45am and notice that fire extinguisher smell. I didn't think anything of it until I saw this:
It melted the dials off the regulator. All I could say was "wow".
Notice that the needles are pegged out. That is how high the pressure got in the oxygen bottle before it fried.
Here is the oxygen bottle. You cannot really see it in this picture, but the bottle has runs in the metal and is pitted. I couldn't get one of the acetylene bottle.
Also the knob to that use to turn off the acetylene bottle was melted off of the bottle. It was scary as hell. One of the torches that was in the back of the bottle rack was toasted and is trash now. (It was a $350 torch) The oxygen bottle is gonna be trashed. The bottle rack is not too bad, we are gonna have to weld it back together though. The acetylene bottle is most definitely dead.
It was a big time wake up call for all of us. If the flames had lasted a minute or two more both bottles would have gone up and at least five people would be dead right now. Scary as hell when something like this happens. Makes you feel really alive. Just thought I would share. And those of you that have worked around this stuff know how bad it would been.
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I know my environmental footprint is massive because I drive like and asshole!
Scary stuff. One of my instructors was telling us a story about that stuff. He said him and his friends would fill a trash bag up with that stuff, light it, and let it go. He said it would float around the neighborhood and then blow up and shatter windows. I always watch out for those things, like if one is under a lift and someone is about to lower a car down. Yikes!
Wow, we joked around about this all the time happining in shop class, just shows you how easy it can happen.
same here we joke about it too but dang I guess it can happen. and we have had so many people come close to dropping them and whatnot it is so scary. like people have dived and grabbed for them only inches from the ground. scary scary stuff.
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My name is paul and please call me by it!
One scary morning... 56k NO!!!
