Has anyone had the unfortunate luck of.....

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being tasked with the unfortunate duty of having to hard face the knives/anvils from an animal rendering grinder? Just watched the dirty jobs episode and I can't imagine that would be fun to do....Whats was the dirtiest job/place/thing you were contracted to work on as a welder?"...My pappy was a pistol I'm a son of a gun...""...God is great, beer is good, and people are crazy..."
Reply:**slowly begins erasing check mark next to "Welding" on tech school application, pencil hovers over "Machining"**
Reply:Years ago replacing the hinges on a 45' garbage hauling trailer as well as repairs on the pusher plate at the front of the trailer. Bad enough having to do it but it was the middle of summer....Mike
Reply:"repairing" about 30 metal chairs from the the local "welfare" beer parlor. Wire brush and weld legs back on. I rubber gloved them as soon as they came in the shop. God dammit they were disgusting.  "I have some metal chairs that need fixing, can you do it? I've got cash!" Always ask "from where" now so I don't find out after there in the shop. Used to have a good stomach for smells. Worked in a butcher shop in my youth, then as a bouncer in a bar. Just lost the fortitude at some point.200amp Air Liquide MIG, Hypertherm Plasma, Harris torches, Optrel helmet, Makita angle grinders, Pre-China Delta chop saw and belt sander, Miller leathers, shop made jigs etc, North- welders backpack.
Reply:nothing that gross. just repairing coal mining equipment
Reply:Worked one winter in the mid '70's replacing machinery in a rendering plant. Yep, 'bout lost my breakfast the first morning, but after a few hours your nose goes numb. I will say that's the softest my hands have ever been w/ all that lanolin on everything!! I guess doin' a job depends on how hungry you and yours are.                                   MikeOl' Stonebreaker  "Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes"Hobart G-213 portableMiller 175 migMiller thunderbolt ac/dc stick Victor O/A setupMakita chop saw
Reply:I did some work at a steel processing plant, had to work over acid cleaning tanks with the air cleaners not working. The fumes would get so bad you would just drop everything and run out.
Reply:Yep, 44 to 47 years ago, when I was 16 - 18 years old, I had a number of summer jobs at a copper refinery.1963 Casting Department7 students carrying one giant wrench on our shoulders - walking through the plant, looking like Snow White's 7 drawfs off to the mine, "Hi Ho, Hi Ho, it's off to work we go."  The wrench was used to tighten/loosen giant nuts of the reverbatory furnances.  We'd place wrench around a nut so the shaft was at say 30 degrees to horizontal, then we'd all get up on the shaft and jump up and down in unison - looked crazy! Rebuilding an electric-arc furnance whose roof had fallen in.  Wore 2 inch thick soles on the boots, into the furnace to jackhammer out the old firebrick/copper for 10 minutes max, or until you feet felt 'warm', then get out fast and get those soles off !Working under the casting wheel at night.  The were two of us:one to hammer the wedge out of the bottom of the vertical mold - allowing the door on the bottom of the mold to swing open and permit an 8 inch diameter dull red copper billet to plunge down into water.the second guy's job was to swing the mold door closed and hammer the wedge back in.Then the wheel would turn - and we'd do it again - ad infinitum.Turns out there were supposed to be three fellows on that job, the third resting for 20 minutes and then relieving one of those below the wheel.  He didn't show up - so we two were stuck under the wheel all night - almost...THe FUN started when a billet only dropped half out, the wheel turned and bent the billet - jammed the wheel.  180 degrees around the wheel, like 60 feet away, the ladle of molten copper finally overflowed and it was like a volcano erupting - white/orange hot molten metal flaring/spraying in fountains!!!  River fingers of molten metal reaching out running over the floor!!! HOLY SH*T!!  Not an experience, I'd care to repeat.1964 Carpentry ShopI started in the carpentry shop and the first day I was shown what I would be doing in 2 weeks - up to the roofs where a thermometer lying down on the black tar surface read 140 degrees F.  "You'll be wearing an asbestos suit and spraying molten tar on the roofs !!"Ah ha, the day before I was due to start spraying, I was transferred to the blacksmith shop - some new student got the job! Whew - that would have been the worst!Blacksmith ShopIt was a great learning experience.  Spectacular effects when we worked a big piece of orange-hot steel with the giant steam hammer - sparks spraying everywhere!  The part of the job I grew to dislike... first thing in the morning I had to rebuild the forge fire while the blacksmiths prepared and drank their coffee. I hated walking on small 'crunchy' chunks of coal and coke - crunchy vibrations seemed to go right through my boots into my soul!  Got to be like the screech of chalk on a blackboard for me - Gosh I hated that!Fun jobs,Rick V 1 Airco Heliwelder 3A/DDR3 CTC 70/90 amp Stick/Tig Inverters in Parallel1 Lincoln MIG PAK 151 Oxy-Acet
Reply:Not something as a welder but I was working as a tire buster at a tire shop right next to a grocer and one fine hot summery sun shine day in July the grease and spoiled meat dumpster sprung a leak filling a new york city block sized area with the smell of hot rancid road kill, it took a month of rain  to get rid of the residue and smell with the help of some detergent.
Reply:Originally Posted by CrawfordWhats was the dirtiest job/place/thing you were contracted to work on as a welder?
Reply:Yep, it's as bad as you think. I used to build up stainless augers and other parts from a couple of chicken plants. The augers would leak the chicken fat out and if it had a pin hole it would look like a butane lighter flame. I'd come home and shower and my hair would smell like wet chickens.  I was building up splined shafts on a part they called a dasher, about a 5" tube with splined shafts on each end. I had built one end up one day and started on the other the next day. There was a bolt broke off in the end of one shaft I had to drill out before I welded it. We thought it was a blind hole, we thought wrong! Very old, very rancid,  used to be chicken meat, under alot of pressure from the welding the day before, GUSHED out and covered my shirt, and the curtain behind me. the guy that welded next to me was already out the back door. Yep, it's worse than you think!
Reply:Originally Posted by afabYep, it's as bad as you think. I used to build up stainless augers and other parts from a couple of chicken plants. The augers would leak the chicken fat out and if it had a pin hole it would look like a butane lighter flame. I'd come home and shower and my hair would smell like wet chickens.  I was building up splined shafts on a part they called a dasher, about a 5" tube with splined shafts on each end. I had built one end up one day and started on the other the next day. There was a bolt broke off in the end of one shaft I had to drill out before I welded it. We thought it was a blind hole, we thought wrong! Very old, very rancid,  used to be chicken meat, under alot of pressure from the welding the day before, GUSHED out and covered my shirt, and the curtain behind me. the guy that welded next to me was already out the back door. Yep, it's worse than you think!
Reply:Hey afab - geting gushed with rancid chicken meat was good!the guy that welded next to me was already out the back door.
Reply:1984, 112 degrees in the shade in Nebraska.  Pivot tire went flat on the 8th tower.  Pivot sits in a corn field.No shade.No dry land to be found.  All muddy from the watering of the field by the pivot.Trying to fix a mud filled tubeless tire, by removing all the mud, patching the inside of the tire, placing a tube back inside the tire, then airing it up.  Takes about 1.25 hours to do in the shop, almost 2.5 hours in the field.Needless to say, there isn't a dry stitch of clothing on you.  It's so hot there, even the mosquito's have left.Oh yeah, the farmer didn't want me to drive the service truck to the flat.  I handed him the jack & star wrench & told him, I'll wait here while he brings the rim/tire back to the truck.  His response, "I guess we won't knock down too much corn".Farmer did need to get a 4 wheel drive tractor out & pull me to/from the flat.  I was just along for the ride.MarkI haven't always been a nurse........Craftsman 12"x36" LatheEnco G-30B MillHobart Handler 175Lincoln WeldandPower 225 AC/DC G-7 CV/CCAdd a Foot Pedal to a Harbor Freight Chicago Electric 165A DC TIG PapaLion's Gate Build
Reply:Not welding but bad.One hot day, a full rendering truck came into the truckstop I worked at with a flat tire.It was so hot the juice and oil from the truck practically sizzled when it hit the pavement.I held an old mudflap over the guy getting the the thing jacked up and the tire off and on.He wore overshoes to keep the juice off of his shoes, and me holding the mudflap kept the raining juice off of his head and the maggots from tumbling down his collar.I suppose things like that shouldn't bother a person.
Reply:used towork as a teen for dairy farmers in ny hudson valley.  every one of them had an old chainstyle manure thrower that needed rebuilt. old bolts, oak boards, rusty metal and manure. compared to what some of you guys  describe, it was pretty nice work.
Reply:I spent a summer working for a large animal vet, lots of shots, pus filled ulcers, etc.  no big deal.  One day we go see some dairy calves who had been dehorned using an electric dehorner; it is sorta like a big soldering iron with no tip. You burn the horn burtton and it comes off and the wound heals.  Problem here, flys had got into the wounds because they were way too agressive with that dehorner. The vet, with me holding the calfs head... looking on real close to learn... just after lunch... on  a very hot day,  poked his index finger into one crusty scabbed over wound hole in the calfs head and then pushed that finger out the other. Maggots, who had "cleaned" the wound were all in there, maybe 100 or so along with a smell that I remember clearly 40 years later.  I lost my lunch right there, no waiting no thinking, just lunch all gone, now>>>   I was green, the vet laughed. Later, we cleaned up the calves, washed the holes out good,  poured iodine thru and into those wounds, added some kind of salve  and went to the next appointment.Last edited by PapaLion; 05-17-2010 at 03:33 PM.Lincoln Power MIG 215Lincoln WeldPak 3200HDLincon ProCut 25Lincoln WeldanPower 225 AC/DCIf all else fails... buy more tools
Reply:I was showing a potential customer an Argon/Helium Mix on a TIG machine and he says "that looks pretty good try it on this deal over here"  Turns out he had a job repairing a bunch of monkey cages from the zoo.  Put the arc on one of the big cracks and all of the monkey whizz (and crap) starts to boil out and evaporate and smoke like the hubs of hell.  I struggle through it and get some really ugly welds laid down and the dude says how did you like all the smokeNot much says IPretty stank and nastyLast edited by Fred s; 05-18-2010 at 03:33 PM.Reason: sp
Reply:Ive done many different alterations for rendering equipment for the local deer butchers and some stuff for chicken farmers.  That stuff stinks but one of the weirdest smells ive ever been exposed to was when I had to build up teeth on a bone grinder from the local crematorium.Have we all gone mad?
Reply:I had to empty a tank of diesel fuel with a sponge, wasn't fun.CWI, CWE, CST for Miller, Lincoln, Thermadyne, Hypertherm & ESABMillermatic 350PLincoln Invertec 205 AC/DCVictor combo torchESAB PCM 1125