[TheForge] Ice rink

[Jerry Frost]

Your supplier doesn't exchange bottles? They stopped filling the customer's 
bottles up here some decade ago or so and just exchange them now. This way 
you always get a currently inspected bottle and if the valve seat or valve 
leaks when you turn it in it doesn't next time it goes out. I think they 
instituted this system for safety's sake.

I don't recall what's used but teflon including T-tape makes half of an 
interesting version of thermite, one that's a lot easier to light than al/fe 
thermite.

Jer
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Peter Fels & Phoebe Palmer" <artgawk at thegrid.net>
To: "Blacksmithing List Sponsored by ABANA" <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Saturday, November 17, 2012 9:57 PM
Subject: Re: [TheForge] Ice rink


> They fill them...that's the scary part and their problem basically. I 
> generally check for hydrostat dates when i pick them up.
> Matheson ( Dutch multinational?) just bought them and the competition out 
> last year and seem to be a bit more professional.
> The prior  outfits were really pretty shaky sometimes..No real 
> choice..they used to have drop off points that were much closer.
> I dislike driving , much less driving over the Santa Lucia Mountain grades 
> with a truck full of HP bottles. So i do it as seldom as possible.
> 3 hours driving, another hour or more shuffling bottles and doing the 
> transaction, etc, lunch,  gasoline, unloading and storing the tanks....
> And, Poof! a day is gone and my back is complaining. I've accumulated a 
> fair collection of 2nd hand bottles over the years.
> So, i make them work if i can. I can be leery all i want, they have a 
> virtual monopoly.
> If i can't, they are probably going to have to repaint the bottle when 
> they replace the valve. I label the bad ones very clearly.
> I do use soap  to spot leaks on compressed gasses other than oxy, and use 
> some special purpose commercial crap from the welding shop for oxy.
>
> On Nov 17, 2012, at 10:03 PM, Bruce . wrote:
>
> This is your gas supplier you're talking about?  Losing track of
> cylinders is not a good thing, but  pales before failure to keep
> cylinder inspections up to date.  I am very leery of management
> changes.  Who knows what know-nothing might have got put in charge and
> decided to save money by skipping the hydraulic tests!
>
> ASAP, take a look at your current gas cylinders and see if you can
> find the inspection info.  See if it looks like the ones you've got
> have been tested recently enough to be okay.
>
> Next -- if a leak is at the bottle valve and is NOT due to a problem
> with the fitting on your regulator, the gas supplier CANNOT charge you
> for that cylinder.  Inform them the minute you discover the problem
> and get them to replace it.  If you have to fetch the cylinders
> yourself, take a good CGA fitting, dead-headed it with a cap, and use
> it to test the cylinder before you leave their premises.  A few drops
> of detergent in water is generally safe for such testing, though you
> should rinse it off with water afterwards.
>
> On Sun, Nov 18, 2012 at 12:49 AM, Peter Fels & Phoebe Palmer
> <artgawk at thegrid.net> wrote:
>> Point taken ! Thanks!
>> That's why i asked, rather than tried it.
>> I have dressed the poll/nipple before successfully when i'd run out of 
>> replacements.
>> The problem is that the bottle's valve's seats are sometimes sorrowful 
>> abuse victims..
>> It's a swap full-for-empties bottle system and after 9 (?) successive 
>> buy-outs and mergers since i've been a customer,
>> They have no idea how many bottles they have out and what the serial #s 
>> are.
>> Using teflon tape on threaded oxy fittings seems to be a common practice.
>> I'll check Western, thank you.
> -- 
> Bruce
> NJ
>