I recently was able to speak in front of a group of 40 engineers representing some 1,000 years of experience in bulk solids material handling at the October meeting of the HMHS (Houston Material Handling Society).  This was truly a humbling experience for me ....... and one I took very seriously so I was not going to present a commercial.

A friend of mine recently wrote an Op-Ed for an automation magazine and in his editorial he said some things that I really identified with and I felt the HMHS engineers could benefit from so I started of the meeting with some quotes from Dr. Peter Martin's editorial in the September issue of InTech magazine where he stated that "engineers must step up and assume a leadership role within their companies by helping drive new levels of business performance". 

He further stated that the reason most companies don't understand the true benefit of the engineering discipline is that "most financial systems cannot measure the improvements" that engineers make.  I decided that my discussion about "recent directions in level monitoring and measurement of bulk solids" needed to provide these engineers some tidbits they could use to "add value" to their companies performance.

Want to know more? Click here for the rest of the story.

With "Infrastructure: A Field Guide to the Industrial Landscape," Brian Hayes brings to public attention the essential underpinnings of the modern world. Like the air we breathe, and the water we drink, the technological structures Hayes documents in "Infrastructure" are easily taken for granted. Yet without these engineered structures and transports, civil life as we know it could not be sustained.
 
This guide to the industrial wilds takes us to places often set in remote locales, surrounded by chain link fences. We go inside plants filled with mysterious machines that few non-engineers could comprehend without an expert guide to show where to look and explain what we’re seeing. Hayes helps us see the beauty and art in the common and unglamorous, such as the sludge digesters in Deer Island, MA. You can see this and 48 other sample photos, plus read excerpts from the chapters, at http://industrial-landscape.com/.

Hayes spent 12 years crossing America, photographing and gathering the stories of our industrial landscape. The book contains more than 700 photos, taken from afar--from the air and from the roadside--and close up and inside the structures and machines built to work so well that we seldom give them a thought. Hayes compliments his pictures with a narrative that helps the reader appreciate both the industrial history and the engineering behind the visual revelations his camera sets before us.

Hayes received support for his project from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, which helps fund efforts to promote public understanding of technology. A senior writer for American Scientist, Hayes talks about his book in an interview at American Scientist Online. In the interview, he says he grew up in the era of Sputnik and expected to become a scientist or engineer. But "somewhere along the way," he says, "I neglected to collect a university education, or even a high school diploma. Lacking those credentials, I found it a good deal easier to get a job as a writer…"  After a brief period working as a news writer, he joined Scientific American, "a splendid place to learn both science and writing," he says.

Hayes takes us on a grand tour of our dams, mines, power plants, refineries, waterworks, highways, railways, electrical grids, waste and recycling facilities, shipping, aviation, bridges, tunnels and communication systems. It’s great introduction for the uninitiated into the engineered world, and for the engineers who build and maintain them, it’s a long overdue acknowledgment of the works they create and sustain.

Infrastructure:
A Field Guide to the Industrial Landscape
By Brian Hayes
W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 536 pages, $49.95 ($32.97 on Amazon)

Don Dunnington

Rob Powell sent us a note that EngineerSupply has launched a new blog. The blog is a mix of personal perspectives and useful insights about some of the engineering tools and supplies you can find on their website.

The Value of Hard Work and On the Job Training
"Trained to work or work to train" is a nice little item on how the author (presumably Powell, though he goes unnamed on the blog) developed his work ethic. He tells two short stories about encounters in his early work experiences that still influence his work habits today.

Both incidents ("You Can Talk, Just Dont Stop Working" and "Never Let Me See Your Hands In Your Pockets") revolve around negative feedback from supervisors in his first days on a new job. I wonder if young people today (outside of military training) still have the opportunities learn the lasting lessons that come from a good chewing out.

Blueprints Explained
If you ever have occasion to need a blueprint (or you’re just curious about how they’re produced), don’t miss the lengthy tutorial on how to make a blueprint. According to the author (Powell?), "blueline prints are very impressive since they are blue and show off your work nicely." He writes that some shops don't like large format copiers that only output black and white, adding "I have seen many shops that have both machines, a blueline, and a large format copier and use either depending on the desired results."

Long Machine Life, Low Cost Per Copy
The diazo process that creates a blueprint is inherently simple. The copiers have few complicated parts, are inexpensive to maintain, and can easily function for 20 years with little down time. According to the story, diazo-coated papers and associated supplies are competitive with plain paper. The aqueous ammonia developer is also said to be low in cost and environmentally safe, and in most cases there are no per-copy charges with diazo copiers.

In Praise of Ammonia
The author waxes enthusiastically about the blueprint’s amoniai developer:

"It is a basic building-block substance, which is crucial to life on our planet. It is composed of only two elements - nitrogen and hydrogen. Ammonia is produced by all animals, including humans, as a natural product of the metabolic process. Each person generates about 550 grams per year. According to one source, 500 families release more ammonia each year than 20,000 diazo copying machines. Ammonia is a natural product that poses no long term health hazard when used properly and is no threat to the environment. Ammonia helps reduce acid rain; it is not one of the substances responsible for the greenhouse effect; it is not a known carcinogen; and, aqueous ammonia solution is not flammable. Ammonia is recycled by rain and soil in a process known as the "Nitrogen Cycle". Accumulation in surface water, soil, or in the atmosphere does not occur. This naturally regenerating cycle is vital to our ecology and life as we know it on this planet."

One Important Item Missing
The EngineerSupply blog doesn’t appear to have comments and trackbacks enabled. That may be a limitation of the Blogger platform they have used, or perhaps it simply reflects the increasing nuisance of blog spam. The lack of author identity seems odd because the posts actually have a lot of personality to them. As can be seen in the posts referenced above, the author naturally lets his personal perspective shine through; for many who are new to the art, this is the hardest part of blogging. To have that authentic blog feel, all EngineeringSupply blog needs to do is sign their articles.

Don Dunnington