4 ms·

Exciting fact: Similar jams happen in hot steel rolling mills too. The YouTube videos are just prettier: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVZ1DY0r4y4 https://www

by jws 9y ago

Exciting fact: Similar jams happen in hot steel rolling mills too. The YouTube videos are just prettier: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVZ1DY0r4y4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVZ1DY0r4y4 In general the rolling mills call it a "cobble" when a whole or partial bit of steel escapes the rolling mill. Lots of exciting videos.

djsumdog 9y ago
That's pretty insane. Wow, look at those coils of hot metal. It's interested how much of it is still hot after they clear the jam and run it through. I remember years ago hearing about how the US mint misprinted over a million and had to destroy it (and on the Colbert Report, he joked about how them destroy it by burning it in front of poor people). We were talking about it at a party and someone asked, "surely they noticed? Why didn't they shut it down?" An engineer in our group said, "Have you ever been in a factory? It's so fast!" He worked in a toothpaste tube factory where you'd see hundreds of tubes come out every minute. If something went wrong, you'd have to wait for the whole pipeline to clear. Fab shops in China are even more insane. I wonder if the mill would just sell those sheets at a reduced price as low grade/for non-visible construction or if they re-melt them down and run them again.
- rzzzt 9y ago
  Or as a piece of artwork.
- bartread 9y ago
  On the speed front, I concur. Back in 1998, when I was on summer break from university, I worked in a wines and spirits bottling plant. One day the labelling machine started applying wonkey labels to the wine bottles and a couple of hundred had gone through before the guy running the machine had noticed. They weren't wildly misaligned, but far enough from true that we had to wash them off and run them through the line again. Took a couple of us most of an afternoon to sort it out.
  - giarc 9y ago
    At what point is it just more economical to sell them at a reduced price to restaurants (where the customer might not see the label)? I'm sure the guys (you) peeling the labels are probably the lowest paid in the factory but a few staff doing the work for the whole afternoon adds up.
    - yock 9y ago
      Just speculation, but might there be regulations regarding the labeling of alcoholic beverages for sale that prevent accepting crooked labels or even price reductions?
      - astrodust 9y ago
        It's called quality control.
        unixhero 9y ago
        Boom
    - djrogers 9y ago
      At $10/hr for 2-3 people, assuming they could clear up 30 bottles an hour you're only talking $1/bottle. I don't think that small of a discount on a bottle of wine would encourage a restaurant to buy a veblen good that didn't look perfect. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good
      - giarc 9y ago
        This is totally an n of 1 type story, but perhaps relevant nonetheless. I worked at a bar during university during a time where the popular beer sale would be "28 bottles for the price of 24". The bar owner would send me and a few guys in a truck to a beer store in another town to buy as many cases as the truck could handle. This was illegal as we would sell it at the licensed bar (all liquor was supposed to be purchased with the license, for which the sale wasn't applicable too). So the owner was willing to risk legal action for 4 free beers (x50 cases or whatever). The point is... restaurant owners sometimes go to great lengths to save a few dollars.
cptskippy 9y ago
Any idea what the dimensions of that steel was? I'm imagining it was over 6ft across and seeing that jam being cleared was amazing.

by jws 9y ago

djsumdog 9y ago

That's pretty insane. Wow, look at those coils of hot metal. It's interested how much of it is still hot after they clear the jam and run it through. I remember years ago hearing about how the US mint misprinted over a million and had to destroy it (and on the Colbert Report, he joked about how them destroy it by burning it in front of poor people). We were talking about it at a party and someone asked, "surely they noticed? Why didn't they shut it down?" An engineer in our group said, "Have you ever been in a factory? It's so fast!" He worked in a toothpaste tube factory where you'd see hundreds of tubes come out every minute. If something went wrong, you'd have to wait for the whole pipeline to clear. Fab shops in China are even more insane. I wonder if the mill would just sell those sheets at a reduced price as low grade/for non-visible construction or if they re-melt them down and run them again.

rzzzt 9y ago
Or as a piece of artwork.
bartread 9y ago
On the speed front, I concur. Back in 1998, when I was on summer break from university, I worked in a wines and spirits bottling plant. One day the labelling machine started applying wonkey labels to the wine bottles and a couple of hundred had gone through before the guy running the machine had noticed. They weren't wildly misaligned, but far enough from true that we had to wash them off and run them through the line again. Took a couple of us most of an afternoon to sort it out.
- giarc 9y ago
  At what point is it just more economical to sell them at a reduced price to restaurants (where the customer might not see the label)? I'm sure the guys (you) peeling the labels are probably the lowest paid in the factory but a few staff doing the work for the whole afternoon adds up.
  - yock 9y ago
    Just speculation, but might there be regulations regarding the labeling of alcoholic beverages for sale that prevent accepting crooked labels or even price reductions?
    - astrodust 9y ago
      It's called quality control.
      - unixhero 9y ago
        Boom
  - djrogers 9y ago
    At $10/hr for 2-3 people, assuming they could clear up 30 bottles an hour you're only talking $1/bottle. I don't think that small of a discount on a bottle of wine would encourage a restaurant to buy a veblen good that didn't look perfect. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good
    - giarc 9y ago
      This is totally an n of 1 type story, but perhaps relevant nonetheless. I worked at a bar during university during a time where the popular beer sale would be "28 bottles for the price of 24". The bar owner would send me and a few guys in a truck to a beer store in another town to buy as many cases as the truck could handle. This was illegal as we would sell it at the licensed bar (all liquor was supposed to be purchased with the license, for which the sale wasn't applicable too). So the owner was willing to risk legal action for 4 free beers (x50 cases or whatever). The point is... restaurant owners sometimes go to great lengths to save a few dollars.

cptskippy 9y ago

Any idea what the dimensions of that steel was? I'm imagining it was over 6ft across and seeing that jam being cleared was amazing.