[GreenKeys] How not to test a teletypewriter

[Jeffrey Angus]

  On 10/12/2010 8:50 PM, Jeffrey Angus wrote:
>    Ah the joys of the aerospace industry.
Oh, I almost forgot. My favorite "oopsies."

A large rack mounted console. 5-Bay. Lots of stuff in it.
First Article Testing. (Always a frightening array of awful things they
want you to do to something.)

Explosive Atmosphere Testing.

Put it in the chamber. Run it through it's paces by remote control.
Passed with flying colors.

Only one thing left to do. Draw out a sample from the chamber and
make sure it is indeed explosive. Little test box on the side with a widow.
A couple of valves and a plunger draw type pump to suck the chamber
"stuff" into the test box.

Only one problem that day. The check valve stuck open. So....when I
pushed the "test" button, the little text box flashed, followed immediately
by a rather loud and resounding whump from the chamber.

I looked at our Air Force QA rep, put my hand on the chamber door and
said, "Should this be warm?"

Yuppers, it turned out 5-bay console into 5-bays of slag. Very embarrassing.
The Air Force was actually pretty cool about it. "You can build another set
for first article testing, run ALL of the tests over again, and we will 
waive this
one as it's obviously passed."

Jeff-1.0
wa6fwi