Aurora 4x
Off Topic => Off Topic => Topic started by: niflheimr on October 26, 2012, 04:01:55 PM
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Was wondering what expensive equipment you've managed to send to an untimely end today . For me Fridays are bad - a few weeks ago I managed to fry my RAM and today at uni well ... I think this is the most expensive piece I killed so far.
5000$ 85kV@200mA power supply connected to a ~ 1500$ prototype neutron generator. With 10$ worth of crappy tubing for the cooling system . Add a lead shield brick that I missplaced (as in it fell off the table) and ripped the tube.
The funny part is the 50$ neutron detector survived the soaking . The power supply didn't - and the arcing and EMF took down a 20W argon laser assembly on another lab table .
That's six months of funding gone in less that 5 seconds - probably delaying my EngD by at least a year. So... how was your day?
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So how many research points did you lose?
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I cracked a piece of a 300 dollar counter I was installing in my store, I think I can hide it though.
Doesn't really compare.
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Many years ago, I was project managing an upgrade of some logistics systems from an old Cobol-based mainframe system to more modern (for the time) hardware/software. As well as many other things, the system handled automated parts ordering. It would know how many of an item were in stock, the average rate at which that item was sold and the lead time for the supplier. The computer would take the lead time into account when ordering to ensure new stock arrived before the old stock was sold. This function was in both the old and new systems.
Part of the upgrade was a data migration, taking data from the old system, checking it, cleansing it and transferring it to the new database. One minor item that escaped my attention when writing the spec was that the lead time on the old system was held in days and the lead time on the new system was held in weeks. Everything seemed fine in test. When we went live, the computer obviously panicked because it suddenly though it would take several weeks to get hold of stock instead of several days, so it ordered half a million dollars worth of extra stock that we didn't actually need. We had lorries arriving at warehouses all across the country :)
Oops!
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Ouch , I've worked for a while with porting databases and such from one system to another and it can be a hell of a task indeed. Though I never did reach half a million in damage :D
Update to the OP : Found a service engineer that's willing to repair the power supply ( I know some about fixing them but working on a 80kV constant and pulsed operation supply when you can pay someone to do it for you is not a good way to reach retirement age ) for just a couple hundreds .
Also I fixed the laser assembly (it's an argon-pumped Ti-Sapphire laser that we use for some applications like ionizing deuterium in my generator and a few studies on reducing the radioactivity of waste materials .)
Thankfully I didn't burn anything or cracked the tube with Friday's mishap, the power supply for it just overloaded from EMF and popped the fuse. If that went down too I think they would have cut my funding for sure - that thing costs more than my appartment . A typical assembly like that goes up to 40k $ depending on specs.
Will have to bribe a colleague to help me realign and re-calibrate it though , it's very hard work without 4 hands :)
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Haven't toasted anything lately, but have had several good opportunities over the years.
But on the subject of 'bad orders', I have had some experience with that.
When in Germany in the US Army / V Corp / Corps Support Command (COSCOM), I did have the unfortunate experience of being attached to the Assistant Chief of Command for Transportation. We were helping Supply process orders for replacement vehicles, parts, etc...
Well, the best we could figure out was that someone who was typing got their fingers misaligned on the keypad and typed in a string of numbers that was incorrect. Not sure what was supposed to be ordered, but the number was for some rather expensive parts for a nuclear sub.
We didn't know about the mistake until the Pentagon kicked back the order after the lower eschalons had approved it as the part had always been transported by ship and they were having difficulty scheduling delivery to a land locked location.
Two days later we all had an early morning 'briefing' where we all had to pee in a cup... ::)
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Well, a collegue of mine at the nuclear reasearch reactor once pressed "Trip-2", rather then "Trip-2 reset".
We poisoned out, which cost us ~120k in lost productivity.
Me - I've been next to a ~80k cryogenic turbine when it died. Luckily I had argued against going "cold". Unfortunately when the turbine went, it took the reactor with it, and I pushed too hard on the recovery, got a second trip and ended up poisoning out..... So that was ~120k lost productivity chalked up on my "tab".....
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I've only done that on the simulator at our plant. Still it was nerve-wrecking hearing the printers go through a couple dozen pages of logs :)
I believe they tripped it once when the operator leaned on the wrong switch and shut down one of the primary pumps. Took them 20+ minutes to find out what happened so yeah , 36h outage .
36h * 700MW * 220$/MWh -> 5.5 milion $ loss :D
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36h * 700MW * 220$/MWh -> 5.5 milion $ loss :D
120K verse 5.5M - shows the different between a power reactor and a research reactor.... ;D
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And that's why the operators are paid ten times the average salary around here .
About research reactors , I did have the chance to spend a few weeks collecting data for my EngD at our 3MW TRIGA . We had a few issues but other than that no unintended trips ( besides the ones we induced by pulsing it - man the blue glow is pretty)
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And that's why the operators are paid ten times the average salary around here .
Well - that's obviously another difference between a power reactor and a research reactor, as I wouldn't say that we are that well paid (for example, I took a pay cut when coming to ANSTO, cause a 10 minute drive to work is better then a 2 hour drive to work.....)
About research reactors , I did have the chance to spend a few weeks collecting data for my EngD at our 3MW TRIGA . We had a few issues but other than that no unintended trips ( besides the ones we induced by pulsing it - man the blue glow is pretty)
Man that pulse is pretty intense - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyN2E75VGw4 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyN2E75VGw4).
For obvious reasons, my bosses don't wont to let me do this at my work.....
However, here's a picture of our blue glow (with all the background lights off). This is at 1/2 power (10 MWt) - http://www.ansto.gov.au/__data/assets/image/0015/8340/OPAL_1000.jpg (http://www.ansto.gov.au/__data/assets/image/0015/8340/OPAL_1000.jpg)
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I had to beg , bribe and brown-nose everyone in charge for a few months before I got them to let me run my tests :) In the end we did four pulses at 1 , 1.2 , 1.5 and 2$ -last one was about 1GWt for a few microseconds :)
But most of the time it was really boring - 4-5 hours a day of watching the graphs and handwriting the date since security here is absurd , they didn't even allow me to print the logs :) But then that's what you get when you live in Romania - I was lucky I secured access at all.
If you are curious , here's the institute where I did my study . They do have an English version of the website.
http://www.nuclear.ro/prezentare_en.htm
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I had to beg , bribe and brown-nose everyone in charge for a few months before I got them to let me run my tests :) In the end we did four pulses at 1 , 1.2 , 1.5 and 2$ -last one was about 1GWt for a few microseconds :)
1 GWt - not bad for a 500 kWt TRIGA (assuming that it wasn't the steady state 14MW TRIGA).
I mean, $2 is what - 1400 pcm of reactivity? Just to put that into perspective - that's almost 20% of the total core at work (and you inserted it in one go.....)
But most of the time it was really boring - 4-5 hours a day of watching the graphs and handwriting the date since security here is absurd , they didn't even allow me to print the logs :) But then that's what you get when you live in Romania - I was lucky I secured access at all.
Heh - my work is either really boring, busy (but boring), or really busy (wishing that you were bored!) ;D
If you are curious , here's the institute where I did my study . They do have an English version of the website.
http://www.nuclear.ro/prezentare_en.htm
Interesting! You're lucky to have a place where you can do higher courses in nuclear engineering. Here in Australia, we have to go overseas (typically to the US) - and so we only have a small number of nuclear qualified engineers.....
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Well not a loss but could have been.
Had my prctice on a Ro-Ro ship and when we were entering the harbour of Felixstove(? I think) I was the helmsman and the pilot orderd hard turn to starboard(right) but somewhere in my head there was a disconnection and I started turning the ship to Port(Left) the thing is I thaught why does he say left when the river turn right...
I never were put at the helm anymore... :-[
Oh well I am not a sailor anymore either... ;D
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Well not a loss but could have been.
Had my prctice on a Ro-Ro ship and when we were entering the harbour of Felixstove(? I think) I was the helmsman and the pilot orderd hard turn to starboard(right) but somewhere in my head there was a disconnection and I started turning the ship to Port(Left) the thing is I thaught why does he say left when the river turn right...
I never were put at the helm anymore... :-[
Oh well I am not a sailor anymore either... ;D
Heh, a story I read about the first time a guy was on shift on the reactor control panel (the story is just above the comments):
http://www.tommcmahon.net/2005/10/the_story_of_ho.html (http://www.tommcmahon.net/2005/10/the_story_of_ho.html)
"So at 1 hour and 45 minutes into my first watch, I was disqualified and relieved of my watch. The All-Time Navy Record."
We use this story to scare the newbies when the first come on shift and are controlling the reactor manually.
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1 GWt - not bad for a 500 kWt TRIGA (assuming that it wasn't the steady state 14MW TRIGA).
It is a 14MW one indeed , though modified slightly to use LEU back in the 90's . If I remember right it could do up to 4 GWt pulses , though I've never seen it at that power level. We also had a 250KW one at another research lab closer to me , but they closed it down a few years ago.
There's a funny story about that one. My teacher used to work there from 1975 all the way to the early 90's . And between the usual tasks , he and his team had three more assemblies built on site - no licence , no anything. they even did the control instrumentation on site. From what he told me they were 10 KWt air-cooled assemblies.
They asked for the authorizations to build another reactor building on the premises , and when they didn't get the construction papers they just... build a couple of rooms inside one of the larger metal barracks they had around there.
In the end they ran them for a couple of years until the guys from Austria came to inspect something and ... well they pretty much freaked out when they saw not one but 4 fully functional - quite glowy after all those years of testing - assembly inside a building inside a barrack :) Needless to say , they did decommission them afterwards :)
Interesting! You're lucky to have a place where you can do higher courses in nuclear engineering. Here in Australia, we have to go overseas (typically to the US) - and so we only have a small number of nuclear qualified engineers.....
It's not overflowing with nuclear engineers here either - back when I started college we were 120 in the class. Four years later 32 graduated , out of which only 5 of them with grades above 8/10 .Then I started my master degree at the same uni ( nuclear security , radioprotection and advanced reactor design) and out of 19 only 4 graduated. That makes what , 3% ? :D Oh and right now I only know of two others that are working for their EngD in the field.
There's a reason for that since research work is paid less than sweeping streets ( not joking , a street sweeper get 350-400 euro/month while most salaries in research are 300-350) . Though I am waiting for the other two units to be commissioned at our CANDU plant - 1400 job offers when that happens :)
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In the end they ran them for a couple of years until the guys from Austria came to inspect something and ... well they pretty much freaked out when they saw not one but 4 fully functional - quite glowy after all those years of testing - assembly inside a building inside a barrack :) Needless to say , they did decommission them afterwards :)
(VBG) - I imagine that it was "interesting" for the guys who made these reactors ("interesting" in the chinese sense....) I imagine that they would be able to post in this topic - with the body being "numerous national laws...." ;D
Still, that makes 5 reactors - which is pretty good when you consider that Australia has had a total of 4 reactors in 55 years (HIFAR, ANTARES, MOATA and OPAL). And that's not counting the 2+2 NPP's you have.... (Sorry - I'm a little envious :( ).
It's not overflowing with nuclear engineers here either - back when I started college we were 120 in the class. Four years later 32 graduated , out of which only 5 of them with grades above 8/10 .Then I started my master degree at the same uni ( nuclear security , radioprotection and advanced reactor design) and out of 19 only 4 graduated. That makes what , 3% ? :D Oh and right now I only know of two others that are working for their EngD in the field.
Still - that's better then where I work. Despite the 55 years the organisation has been running, currently we have no nuclear engineer qualified staff in the Operations section.....
There's a reason for that since research work is paid less than sweeping streets ( not joking , a street sweeper get 350-400 euro/month while most salaries in research are 300-350) . Though I am waiting for the other two units to be commissioned at our CANDU plant - 1400 job offers when that happens :)
Well, we've just poached a Shift Manager from NRU (in Canada) - are you interested in moving to Australia? Basic operators pay is ~1000 euro's a week (before taxes), plus shift loading (after you are accredited). A Shift Manager is about 50% higher base pay..... ;D
Interested - or are you waiting for Units 3 and 4 to come on-line (in 2014 and 2015)?
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(VBG) - I imagine that it was "interesting" for the guys who made these reactors ("interesting" in the chinese sense....) I imagine that they would be able to post in this topic - with the body being "numerous national laws...." ;D
My plan was to stay for a few years at my current job ( system design for one of the subcontractors that manage the current NPP) and then either go for units 3/4 or somewhere else - Canada prolly , but I'm not tied to a tree down here :)
Oh and to enforce the envy : beside the CANDU plant there are plans (they've already decided on the location and running impact studies) for another two units - either two EPRs or the 1600 MWe APR . Though I'd prolly grey out before they finally build it.
Compared with the CANDU6 an EPR would be a wet dream :D Especially one that actually has a straight generator shaft unlike our unit 2 (got slightly bent when some idiot tried to steal the power lines couple of kms away and shorted the hell out of the switching yard)
(VBG) - I imagine that it was "interesting" for the guys who made these reactors ("interesting" in the chinese sense....) I imagine that they would be able to post in this topic - with the body being "numerous national laws...." ;D
Not really - they did got reprimanded but nothing more - it was back in the late 80's and the political situation was more of a "results first , bend the law afterwards" kind of deal. If they did it now it would have been nasty though.
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Broke a data aquisition card . The process computer it was attached to might still live - I'm not yet sure.
Always , always double check the insulation on your high voltage cables . Especially if the are a cm away from the sensor cables.
I didn't . It sparked .It smoked . It stank of ozone and plastic. It sounded like the king of crickets after a bottle of jack .And lots of nice shiny sparks came out of the pc . About 33kV worth of sparks.
Total cost 250$ if the pc survived , 3k if it didn't . The smoke cleared up fast though. But still , there goes my rent for this month.