Foundry Life

Tom managed what we considered to be another “win” a few months after the turquoise incident. In those early days the Pima County Department of Environmental Quality was well-funded and focused.

One day we were in the “burn out” process, where we put the wax replica of the sculpture’s pieces that are covered with a hard ceramic shell, into a furnace to melt out the wax. Sometimes the wax would catch fire as it exited the furnace, resulting in a brief but dense cloud of smoke.

On this particular day an inspector from the PCDEQ had arrived at our door, requesting to be allowed to observe our process. We did not have to admit him unless he had a warrant, which he did not, but we knew that if we forced him to get one, when he came back he would apply the very strictest standards. So we let him in.

He had been trained, he said, to grade the “opacity” of smoke by looking at it. And there was a numerical standard by which he could award a “pass” or a “fail” grade. A “fail” meant the smoke being emitted was too opaque and was fouling the air of Pima County.

And the offending party was subject to fine.

Our foundry was located across the street from the very end of the runway of Davis Monthan Air Force Base, and about a half mile away from a mainline track of the Southern Pacific Railroad.

Of course this was one of the rare times the wax caught fire and belched a plume of black smoke. The inspector raised an eyebrow as he looked at Tom.

At that very time, Providence arrived, in the form of a bomber landing at DMAFB, and of a Southern Pacific freight train beginning its hard pull out of Tucson.

Without a moment’s hesitation, Tom asked, “What would you say is the opacity of that smoke layer the aircraft just laid on us, and by the way, what do you think is the opacity of the smoke pouring out of that railroad engine over there? Oh, and  have you ever observed the huge plume of ultra-black smoke that the airbase leaves behind after one of its crash firefighting training exercises?”

The inspector smiled and chuckled. “Unfortunately, none of those fall under the purview of the PCDEQ. The airbase has federal rules, and the railroads have their own rules. But don’t sweat it. I’ll give you guys a pass.”

The arrival of this month’s issue of Arizona Highways magazine brought back a memory chuckle from the late 1970’s. It seems like the “wins” in those days were too far apart, and even a small one always felt good.

We had a good customer who was particularly demanding that any sculpture we cast for him turn out to look exactly as he had envisioned, and we strived to accomplish exactly that. We had just completed one of his pieces and phoned him that it was ready to pick up.

The patina (coloration) he had specifically ordered for this piece was “turquoise.” I was pleased with the result we had achieved, and was looking forward to his response.

His reaction, however, was initially disheartening. “TURQUOISE!” he exclaimed. “John, I told you TURQUOISE!”

I quickly moved past the shock of his rejection as I remembered the source of our choice of coloration. Retrieving our copy of  the January 1974 edition of Arizona Highways, headlined “Focus on Turquoise,” I opened it to a page that featured a turquoise stone that was a drop-dead match to the color of his sculpture.

What could he do? He smiled and mumbled as he flipped through the magazine and selected a different colored turquoise stone that he would like his next patina to resemble.

Remember a previous blog, titled “Much Ado,”  where I described a situation where the Fire Department descended on the foundry with a full-blown Hazmat response?

Well, this is a follow-up to that story.

About a week after the hazmat incident – look out – here they come again. Officials. Guys in suits and ties. Two inspectors with the county Department of Environmental Quality. Seems it was not OK with them for us to pour out onto the ground the water from the 5 gallon bucket from the shell room in which we had rinsed our hands.

“What? Why not?” 

“Because it is industrial waste. And there is a prohibition against dumping industrial waste on the ground.”

“Industrial waste? Gimme a break. That is nothing but powdered silica sand in a distilled water solution, with a very small amount of a totally inert dye!”

I proudly produced from the files a document that was the gold standard of proof approved by the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration – the Material Safety Data Sheet provided by the manufacturer of the product.

Didn’t matter! “It’s industrial waste and you can’t dump it on the ground.”

“Wait! The worst the water can do is seep into the water table and it’s distilled water at that. And that leaves nothing but silica sand behind on the ground. Prohibition against sand in the Sonoran Desert environment of Tucson?”

“If you continue to do it we will fine you.” And they departed, saying the would be back to re-inspect.

So what to do? Briefly considered letting our attorney handle it. “Naw, we know what to do with this stuff. But let’s jack these guys around a bit.”

We went to the hardware store and bought an aluminum garden hose bubbler, a 5-foot length of rubber hose, a fitting to attach the other end of the hose to our shop compressed air line, and a valve to turn the airflow to the bubbler on and off.

We set up a station outside where we dropped the bubbler end of the hose into an empty 55 gallon drum and poured about 15 gallons of the “industrial waste” into the drum. Next to the drum we put a half-drum into which we mixed a little sand, a little powder, and just enough water to make a semi-dry paste.

When the suits returned a few weeks later, one of us ducked outside to turn on the air valve. We assured them we now had the problem under control. We had an apparatus that evaporated the water and just left the pasty sand, which we put in the dumpster, which was periodically emptied at the county approved landfill.

They inspected the bubbling evaporation apparatus, and the nearly dry “result” next to it, congratulated us on our innovative solution, and departed.

Upon which we turned off the air valve until the next unscheduled inspection.

That Rube Goldberg apparatus would probably have worked – but at a speed that would have taken us into the tricentennial.

What did we really do with our “industrial waste”?

Well, if you read my previous blog “Dudes in 3-Piece Suits,” you will recall that we had a large advertising billboard removed from the back yard that was held up by a 36 inch diameter steel column. That extraction left a deep hole.

One piece of equipment we found to be vital in our foundry operations was the sandblaster.

After molten bronze is poured into a ceramic shell to produce a desired casting, the bronze form shrinks slightly as the metal cools, causing the ceramic shell to crack and begin to break away from the metal.

Once the bronze in its ceramic shell cools, the cracked shell is removed by hand by the use of hammer and chisel. Inevitably, some of the shell stubbornly adheres to the metal in difficult-to-reach crevasses in the casting. This shell residue is removed by blasting it with air that contains either sand or glass beads.

The sandblaster is a steel cabinet measuring about 4 by 4 feet by 6 feet tall. It has an internal space that begins about waist high and has a sealable side entry door through which the item to be blasted is placed inside onto a perforated steel plate. Sand that is used in blasting falls through the perforations into a collecting bin where it is recycled.

A pair of thick rubber gloves and forearm extensions are attached to the front of the cabinet and extend into the interior space. Just above the glove access is a glass window that provides external visibility into the cabinet.

Also inside the cabinet are an electric light, a rubber air supply hose that has the “sandblast gun” attached at one end and leads outside the cabinet to the compressed air supply line on the other end.

Externally on the cabinet are an electric blower which blows a dust-clearing stream of air into the cabinet, and a large fabric exhaust bag which collects the dust and small bits of debris for later disposal.

The operator of the sandblaster puts the casting inside and seals the door shut, turns on the light and blower, puts his hands and forearms into the rubber gloves and reaches into the cabinet and adjusts the position of the casting, aims the gun at the area to be blasted, and depresses a pedal at the foot of the cabinet. A compressed air blast of sand then begins to eat away at the ceramic, without damaging the bronze.

The sandblaster is an efficient piece of equipment for rapidly cleaning and unifying the surface of a bronze casting.

One day an employee approached me with a concern about the sandblaster. He was worried that the internal surfaces of the rubber gloves, which of course are never exposed to external light, and which are constantly exposed to perspiration from the operator’s hands, might be a fertile breeding ground for fungus. He thought that his hands might be beginning to itch from exposure.

I replied that although I had never heard of this being a problem it might potentially be one, and I suggested we could deal with it by dusting the inside of the gloves with an ant-fungal powder. That evening I stopped at a drugstore and purchased an anti-fungal foot powder, returned to the foundry, and dusted it into the gloves.

The next day, at the end of his shift, I approached the employee to ask if he felt that we had adequately resolved his problem with the sandblaster.

His disgusted response: “Aw, MAN….Now my HANDS smell just like my FEET!”

As our business grew over time it became obvious we needed more working space. A building about a block away became available for sale.

We bought it, even though it included a feature that was for us a two-edged sword.

Ownership of the property included a contract with a major outdoor sign company under which the sign company had erected a large billboard at the rear of the property, and they made periodic payments to the owner, derived from ads on the billboard.

On the one hand, this feature was good, as it brought in fairly steady revenue stream from the billboard ads.

On the other hand, it was the dominant feature of the rear yard. It was a steel frame structure that displayed ads measuring about 15 feet high by 50 feet wide. It was supported by a double wall cylindrical steel column about 36 inches in diameter, and it stood some 30 feet tall so as to be seen from the highway.

Frankly, it was big and obtrusive and ugly, and it attracted pigeons and the mess they make, and it stood in the way of improvements we thought we might like to make in the yard. But, all things considered, we went for it.

We did not know at the time of purchase of the property that the seller was a former employee of the sign company and that he had been given a “sweetheart” contract.

About a year in, we had moved some of our operation to the rear yard. And we got to looking at the billboard framework and noting that it was ideally positioned to provide lighting to the yard. It could easily be done by clamping lighting fixtures to the support structure of the billboard (with no adverse effect on the billboard) and we could supply the required electrical power through our own outdoor connection.

So …. Having diligently scoured the sign company contract and finding nothing prohibitive of our idea, I made an appointment with management of the sign company to discuss possibilities. We were simply looking for their permission for us to clamp outdoor lights to their structure that we would use to illuminate our rear yard.

I did not envision the meeting to be a big deal, and I arrived directly from the foundry in the sweaty clothes I was wearing, having just assisted with a molten bronze pour. I was greeted by a receptionist and escorted to a conference room.

To my surprise, a team of guys in 3-piece suits filed into the room and took their places at the table. What the ….?

We never got to the purpose of my visit.

It soon became obvious to me that my request for a meeting (I had not specified its purpose) had caused someone in their organization to re-read the contract, and they apparently found that the ex-employee seller of the property had been given a contract that specified payments to the property owner that exceeded the norm.

These dudes were there specifically to brow-beat me into a new contract.

I think at least two of these guys had come in from an out-of-town corporate office. I had to smile to myself at how ridiculously out of place I, an unkempt, probably stinky working man in ratty looking clothes, must look in that room full of suits.

After listening to what they had to say, I retrieved my copy of the original contract from the file folder I had brought with me, and asked the question, “Do we have a contract or not?”

They squirmed uncomfortably in their seats and finally came directly to the point. They considered the old contract to be legally invalid, they intended to sue the former employee who executed it, and I would now be required to sign this new contract.

“And if I don’t?”

“If you don’t, we will remove the billboard!” was the dramatic response.

“OK”

“OK what? You are ready to sign?”  The new contract and a pen were again slid across the table in my direction.

“No, OK remove the billboard.”

The reaction in the conference room was nothing if not explosive. One of the suits all but screamed at his colleagues, “We are in business to ERECT billboards, NOT tear them down!”

Bottom line: About two months later a crew arrived (without notice) with their heavy equipment and dismantled and removed the billboard.

Good riddance.

Illegitimi non carborundum.