What do you do?

Borzak_sl said:

I think at one time I did more pipe supports than anyone in the nation. The shop next to ours was IPS (internatioanal piping supply) which did piping for the petro chemical and nuclear industry. All their pipe supports they farmed out to me. A subsidarary of Jacobs. which in itslef is huge.

They are actually quite profitable. More profit per pound than building an entire refinery or a high rise.

What was your problem? Every place has their own standards. My favorite is they don't want built up pipe shoes and spec out stainless beams/T's....umm please tell me where to buy those lol. I'm going to build it up out of plate moron.

Standards in the petro chemical industry are big on inertia. But I udnerstand it. My dad who is 75 has been doing pipe supports for Exdon for 50 years why change it and make it more complicated. Just like Dow has their deal etc...I know when Exxon changed their standards for ladders it caused a major problem and after a year they went back to the old standard. I forgot the phrase they used but because it became too big of a pain in the ass to set standards to companies that might do 5 a year but have done them that way for 50 years.

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It was basically a for dummies guide for compressor station operators and new engineers. No special metals or hazardous/corrosives but atmospheric corrosion and inspection ease are huge concerns. There's some language in the ASME B31.8 that indicates you're not supposed to constrain pipe expansion at all which seems like you'd need the whole system on springs if you have some bends to me. Grey hairs got ahold of it and said fuck that you have to clamp it.

Half the problem is the language relating toit seems like lingo and means different things to different people. I found some decent online guides but none of them were cohesive, never did find an actual company standard though.

I got no time for that lol. I was lucky the boss at my company was an engineer (we only had 40 people total and that included the shop) and we had the contract to provide all maintenance in reference to structural and plate work (non mechanical) at the Exxon refinery, chem plant, plastics plant, and packaging plant. We really didn't have standards. I measured or was told how big of a span and designed how to support it, how much it would weigh full of water. Have him stamp it. 10 minutes at most.

I've done a crapload of hangers, cans, and such. Normally for a plant we didn't have a contract with they had a spec of a few pages giving expamples and that was pretty much it. Use a minimum support size per pipe size, maximum span, and detail out the shoes or retraints (like simple stuff 2 angles over the base slide to capture it) and stuff like that. Pretty easy 1,2,3 stuff. Anything that follows their standards (and they have them for everything, pipe supports, ladders, handrail, light post, guard rail etc..) didn't need a stamp.

If it was found in the grinnell catalog and fit their standards/recommendations from grinnell it was good to go. Scary huh considering what they were supporting etc...

I understnand the lingo deal 150%. Guys in the field (where most of the request for stuff we got came from) and the shop had an entirely different language than the engineers that didn't work on site. That's my job to translate redneckk and coon ass to proper english kind of.

Guess I do. I only deal with civil engineers mostly in the petro chemical or power plant industry. Most of them don't have to fill out a time "sheet" for billiable hours because they are getting paid to be at work and not billed per job. Very few of them are consulting engineers. They are working full time for the final customer so to speak.

Anyway, spent a good part of the afternoon preparing for my new part time job Sunday as DJ on the raido. Station has a large enough signal to almost reach across town (not a big town) and covers about 1/4 of the county lol.

I admire you. I had enough just learning what I needed to pass a FCC test and it was aggravating enough.

Vinen_sl said:

Timecards for no reason other then timecards explains explains how the company is run.

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I dunno man, it's not a big deal at all. Takes like 10 seconds every couple weeks. I know the interns are paid hourly and use it for real. For us it's just tracking.

I've had deltek at all 3 jobs so far, even if they don't need it for billing i think they love it just because you have to explain how you spent your time and for estimate prep.

Cad_sl said:

I have to keep my time in .1 hour increments, fuck you

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Something humorous about a lawyer complaining about how they have to keep time while stll making more than 99% of the population

Cad_sl said:

I have to keep my time in .1 hour increments, fuck you

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You don't charge with a 1 hour minimum? I thought that was pretty standard for any business. If I have to draw a base plate that is 12 inches square with 4 holes in it and takes less than 5 minutes I charge an hour.

I just thought everyone did that.

99% of their workload is people calling and saying "quit fucking billing me" as fast as they can and hanging up.
All you have to do is get more than ten of those calls an hour and you're putting in overtime.

Cad_sl said:

No, ethically I cannot do that.

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This part cracked me up. Well played, sir.

Edit: That sounds more dickish than intended.