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 Writings about things that have occurred in my life. Not in Chronological Order |
| Things that have happened in my life, good or bad. The entries will not be in Chronological order |
| M y Early Days In The NavyMy Early Days In The Navy My first patrol had to have been something else as far as maintenance goes. To get in the Nuclear Power Field and succeed, you have to have a decent IQ. No, I don't know what mine is, but it's up there a bit. I got in that field because I had that brain. However, I had no hands-on experience, or shall I just say, I had no experience in fixing things at all! I gained that as time passed though. So let us discuss my early maintenance efforts. I think I've written about this one before, just in case I haven't, I'll write about it again. As Electricians, we were responsible for just about everything that needed Electricity. We didn't fix all the equipment, we made sure it had power. During my first refit, a light in crew's berthing was not working. My LPO told me to fix it before Liberty Call. Like I mentioned, I had that brain, but no experience. I looked at it, replaced the starter and bulbs, but it still wouldn't work. Silly me, I told my LPO we needed to send it to the Tender for repair. He looked at me and said something like, "Are you on Duty tonight?" I replied, "No." He then said, "Were you planning on going out on Liberty?" I said of course I was. And he dropped the bombshell by saying, "You're going no where if that light isn't fixed. By You!" I gained some experience that day, without asking for help from other Electricians. Yeah, I had it fixed long before Liberty Call. On another occasion I was tasked with replacing heaters in the CO-H2 Burner. First, other than knowing where it was on the boat, and what it must do (I was a bit off in my assumption), I had no idea how it worked. At least the grounded heaters were marked for me. The Repair Parts Petty Officer (RPPO) had already pulled the heaters from Supply, so I was left alone to replace them. I did need some help getting them out of the unit. They were heavy, and their location was not conducive to them being removed by one person. Still, with a little muscular help, we removed them and placed them on the deck (floor). I knew enough to draw the schematic diagram of how each heater was wired, and started replacing the bad ones. The heaters were connected with small bus bars, I removed what I had to, replaced the faulty heater, then put the bus bars back in place. I tightened the nuts on the bus bars hand tight, then used a socket to complete tightening it. Imagine my surprise when the nut on top of the heater snapped off! I went to the Leading First (a first class petty officer) and told him what had happened. He said to pull another heater from Supply. I did, and repeated what I had done, only to have this one snap off too! I was cursing up a storm using every foul word I knew and then some. I told the Leading First what had happened again. That's when he took me aside and asked what I was doing. I showed him. He stopped me when I started torquing the nut again. Then, he taught me how a CO-H2 Burner works. Those heaters heat the air flowing through the to over 700 degrees Fahrenheit! Then he asked me, "What happens to a metal that gets that hot, but then cools down?" I thought for a second and said, "It becomes brittle!" He smiled and said, "When you tighten the nuts, get them finger tight only. Then use the socket to get 3/4 more turn on them." He walked away, and I never broke another heater. IF someone had explained that to me, we could have saved a lot of money!  Jim Dorrell |
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