"If I tighten it any more, it will break!", I shouted over the escaping steam down to Roy for the second time.
Or, was it the third. I dunno, it's been so long ago.
"You do what I say, now, and tighten that damned packing nut!" Roy shouted angrily back, "But don't you dare break the flange!"
I was about 22 feet above the floor, on top of the high pressure steam boiler that was the heart of the ham processing factory called Garland Foods. Garland Foods was located in the old industrial district of Dallas on the banks of the Trinity River. The processing plant was originally built by Safeway around 1910. The original refrigeration compressors operated on two big direct current (DC) motors, but they were only brought on-line now in case of emergencies. (I would take a guess that the motors were in the 50 to 100 horse power range.) Fortunately, I never saw them operate.
The time was the winter of 1979. Roy Reed was the maintenance engineer, an ancient man of 74 years that always wore coveralls, just like my grandpa.
I was not even 20, newly married. I thought I knew it all.
The packing nut and flange Roy was referring is on a valve that was badly leaking steam. The main steam cut-off valve on the main boiler of the plant. Steam was used in all the cooking and cleaning in the plant. There were about 150 employees. When the boiler goes down, the plant goes down. Nobody works. Nothing gets shipped. Simple as that.
There are two, 4-inch main steam valves on the boiler. On each valve, there are two packing nuts that hold the packing-gland flange in place. Roy was hoping to slow the leaking steam until there was time for proper repairs. What Roy didn't want is for the valve to fail during the week--that would be bad.
"I can't tighten any more without breaking the flange!," I shouted, for the third time, or, possibly, the fourth.
Why didn't Roy understand?
Roy repeated his instructions with a few more salty words added in, finishing up with, "But don't you break it!"
A little steam leak can eat the steel pipe surprisingly fast, and turn what was a little leak into a big one. Normally, steam leaks were not that big a deal to fix. One had a valve upstream to cut the steam pressure off, open the pipe up to let the remaining steam pressure off and cool the hot metal down. After the problem is fixed, then the pressure could be applied to the newly repaired section. No big deal.
But this leak was different. It was about a 8 to 10 hour job to slowly remove the steam pressure and cool the boiler down. Putting the new packing material takes less than 30 minutes, and then another 8 hours to fire the boiler, slowly bringing the temperature and pressure back to normal, operational levels. If you put the pressure on or take off to fast, something bigger within the boiler may fail. The result will be the plant will be shut down days and weeks instead of hours.
I was young, I was lithe, so I was elected out of the small maintenance crew to climb the boiler. We had spent the a long Saturday repairing the plant's brick flooring. I was ready to be home after this one, small job was finished.
But, the valve packing nut would not tighten anymore. What to do? I had a feeling that I would not be home for dinner and Sunday's plans were shot.
"Fuck it," I said not very loud so that the sound of the escaping steam would be sure to drown out my cursing. I was tired of arguing with Roy.
I braced myself and applied pressure on the nut would either slow the leak or break the flange. The steam kept leaking at the same rate it was before as I applied pressure. The flange then broke. There was no need to announce what I had done; the surge of escaping steam told the group below.
"I told you not to break the flange!," Roy screamed as I climbed down off of the boiler. "Now, it's your fault we have got to now fix it, goddammit!"
"Why can't you follow simple, goddamned directions?" Roy continued to shout and rant as I walked out of the boiler room, looking down at the ground to avoid eye contact.
I was going to call my wife and tell her that I won't be home that night.
Or tomorrow.