Gallaway steam engine

As an apprentice I worked in the billet mill at AIS Pt.Kembla. On down days we were assigned to work in various parts of the mill. In the soaking pits the billets were red hot and in the crane over the the soaking pits had to be worked on while the operation could not stop and the temperature was over 140 degrees and you could not put your spanners down cause if you did they were too hot to pick up again. We worked five minutes on and half an hour off. On one occasion I worked in the Galloway steam engine the largest horizontal steam engine in the southern hemisphere. I could stand in the high pressure cylinder and the stroke was probably 10 feet long. This engine drove the mill to produce railway lines, the rolls were 36 inches diameter and this engine nearly stalled when the rolls were squeezed to close. It was about 5 thousand horse power. They also squeezed down steel ingots to be used in the billet mill, the steel started as from memory 3ft square and went into the mill at about three miles an hour and came out the other end at thirty miles an hour. Some times we had a cobble, that's when the steel goes the wrong way and comes out the side of the mill and goes any where and the process can not be stopped till the steel stock is threw the last rolls. There is a fifty ton billet that is squeezed into a three inch billet and all this steel is wrap around the mill like spaghetti then it cools and hardens and has to be cut up with oxyacetylene. At the end of the mill the steel is cut into billets to feed the wire mill, this is done on the flying shears at thirty miles an hour the blades slam shut every two seconds at the end of each billet, each billet was about forty feet long. From the billet mill the billets are reheated to white hot again and put threw the wire mill rolls and the length of the wire is a mile or more long after this. The blokes who worked there were cool to watch as they grabbed the red hot steel and sent it back the other way threw the second rolls and again threw the third rolls.

woodchip power

The following add appeared on the internet.

Say no to woodchip power
Burning native forest wood for electricity is bad for the climate!

I think this statement should read...."Say no to woodchip power".
Burning native forest wood for electricity is bad for the Trees.

The solution to global warming

The biggest thing to warm the globe is the electricity . So if you want to reduce global warming turn off the globe!:) cheers Stewart

Blinky Bill is dying

The habitat for all native animals in Australia is under stress, I personally have found platypus that have been mauled and killed by domestic dogs. It is not a nice site, Kookaburras that have been taken in flight by domestic cats, the height that a cat can leap vertically is amazing (2 metres). The photo shows a lizard that frequented our place. It was about 6 feet long and stood two feet high even the dogs were afraid of this fella, I saw him take down a wild cat with the snap of his jaws, the cat didn't see it coming. He waited till the cat was in snapping reach and that was it. Then there was the time I was mowing the long grass near the house on a hot day and was confronted by a brown snake. He had me dead to rights and was standing with his head three feet off the ground and was swinging side to side ready to make a strike. I froze on the spot and he knew I was there and didnt know where to strike as the mower was going and giving off heat. He had a heat source but wasnt shore which to strike at. It stood what seemed like 5 minutes, waving from side to side. When these fellas bite they keep up the attack until the prey stops moving, biting multiple times with deadley results. It was my fault as I came on him by supprise and he didnt want the fight and he lowered to the ground and slithered away. This brown snake frequented the house and could get into the roof and would lay in wait for mice and you could here the recoil when he struck his prey at night .I think it was pretty neat to have wild life so near the house. We had to keep our food in an old fridge that didnt work but it kept the mice out of the food. Every one used to ask why we had two fridges in the kitchen. cheers Stewart