Steel, Part 3

Heaving lifting.

click for larger

click for larger

click for larger

Steel, Part 2

When this bad boy gets rollin', the floor shakes.

click for larger

click for larger

Been busy...

I've been really busy at work lately. What you see below is a really large flange.

click for larger image

I had to be on hand to witness and somewhat monitor the fabrication of a few things. Playing field engineer is tiring and sometimes difficult. 12 to 15 hour days will wear you out in a hurry.

click for larger image

Photo to be Published in Tx Hwy 2011 Calendar

I just got word that one of my photos of the bracken ferns in Bastrop State Park (from April of last year) will be used in the 2011 Texas Highways calendar.

click to see larger

Many thanks to Texas Highways for a second year in a row choosing one of my photos for use in their calendar!

Heavy Lifts & Big Trucks

I spent some time in a fabrication yard last week to witness and participate in the testing of some newly built equipment. This stuff is special, custom-built equipment for subsea pipelines. It will be installed thousands of feet deep in the Gulf of Mexico, and we must be sure that it all fits together and operates correctly.

testing in progress

Testing like this always goes about the same: slow. I had some time to check out the other work going on in the fab. yard (work not related to our job).

Jo Ann
(click for larger version)

This is a heavy duty Pacific truck/tractor helping move a Goldhöfer hydraulic platform trailer. The load on the trailer is some sort of large steel framework/foundation. I didn't find out what it was for.

This is the first time I've seen a truck like that, and I had to do a little bit of research on it. Turns out, Pacific built large, heavy duty trucks like this for a long while but are now out of business. There's a great write up of Pacific's history here. Apparently, what's left of the company is now part of this place, which should help keep old Pacifics, like Jo Ann, running for a long while.

Jo Ann is operated by Palletized Trucking of Houston.

Below is a different truck and trailer combo being loaded out with a part of a very large pressure vessel (or a piece of some sort of vessel for the refining industry, most likely).

Pressure Vessel Load-Out
(click for larger version)

The truck is a Peterbilt. My wife's brother is an engineer and works for them. So, this one's for you, Clint.

Peterbilt Loaded and Ready
(click for larger version)