Ebay plasma CUT40.....Maybe not!

[Alfaman]

Saw this on the local BBC news feed earlier, very much doubt we'll be seeing a post along the lines of "Newbie looking for help!!!!!!!! Cheap Plasma Cutter needed for new project"

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/highlands_and_islands/8562829.stm



Cutting gear

In development is the 75-tonne Reactorsaurus. It is due to be built by 2013 to tear out the insides of the site's Prototype Fast Reactor.

Its robotic arms will reach 16m down into the reactor vessel.

Activated from a central control room, these arms will use diamond wire and disks, hydraulic shears, oxy/propane and plasma cutting gear to slice up the reactor's innards.

Six radiation-tolerant cameras will relay images and sound back to the control room.

The seabed is a key area of the clean-up work.

Radioactive hot spots have been discovered on the beaches and seabed around the plant for years.

They are believed to come from historic discharges of waste from the site.

 

[Wedg1e]

I was at Dounreay a handful of years back. At that time (and it may have changed, but probably not) they still had a stockpile of fuel rods that needed reprocessing.
To handle the fuel rods they had a line of 'hot cells' - radiation-shielded rooms with thick glass windows and those robot arms that allow the operators to perform tasks remotely. Alas the line had been dead for 10+ years and most of the robots needed repairs. Unfortunately the hot cells were still 'hot' with bits of Plutonium, Uranium etc that had fallen from the rods so it was impractical to send humans in to effect repairs; they were having to design robots that could repair the robots!
At the end of the line of hot cells was an x-ray facility, essentially an upper and lower chamber, where the lower chamber housed one of the most powerful x-ray systems around. As they needed the whole line back up and running, someone figured that the quickest part to get back online would be the xray system, so without any servicing or preparation some bright spark switched it on and wound it up. At which point there was an almighty bang.
Ten grand's worth of repairs later I had to reinstall and recommission the x-ray tube in the lower chamber. Hanging from the ceiling was a tube into which the fuel rods were lowered in order to be x-rayed (I know there are some of you wondering how you x-ray something that's radioactive anyway, but it can be done!). However when the line was built, nobody had thought to allow for bits of fuel rods dropping into the tube with the result that the lower chamber was hotter than Emma Bunton in her pyjamas, handcuffed to a Harley.
The staff had to manhandle NINE TONS of lead shielding into place before I could go in there, and they still had a few leaks, which they'd marked with lengths of tape like the bullet tracks in an American forensics drama.
It was like the bloody Krypton Factor, trying to step through, under, over and around all these tapes, liberally covered in radiation-detecting widgets and carrying a £16,000, 60Kg x-ray head on my shoulder.

One of the guys up there wa a bit cynical about the whole decommissioning thing: he said the site will have to get much bigger before it gets smaller, in order to accommodate all the dirty stuff they take out, and the machinery which gets contaminated as a result, and the machinery which handles the machinery which...etc etc.
He reckoned there are people as-yet unborn, who will spend their entire working lives on the site and it STILL won't be finished. Which is a bit of a bu99er, because the Government had given them a deadline of something like 15 years to tidy it all up...

 

[Alfaman]

hotter than Emma Bunton in her pyjamas, handcuffed to a Harley.

nice one!

He reckoned there are people as-yet unborn, who will spend their entire working lives on the site and it STILL won't be finished. Which is a bit of a bu99er, because the Government had given them a deadline of something like 15 years to tidy it all up...

Just how disappointing was the fast breeder fission technology? I wonder if the effort to 'breed' tritium for use in fusion reactors will be similar, I really hope not!

 

[Wedg1e]

nice one!

!

Hey, I'd use padded handcuffs, I'm not some sort of sadist...

 

[Alfaman]

Hey, I'd use padded handcuffs, I'm not some sort of sadist...

Understood.

Also, there's also the possibility of including additional members of the Spice Girls to the motorbike/handcuff scenario... Mel C is top of my list, personally!

 

[Wedg1e]

Understood.

Also, there's also the possibility of including additional members of the Spice Girls to the motorbike/handcuff scenario... Mel C is top of my list, personally!

Well, quite. And to be fair to non-Harley aficionados, there must be scope for alternative wheeled immobilising devices in the plot...

[Countdown to thread being locked...]

 

[Shox Dr]

Well, quite. And to be fair to non-Harley aficionados, there must be scope for alternative wheeled immobilising devices in the plot...

[Countdown to thread being locked...]

That'll be a first; non-Harley aficionados that is


Your antics reminded me of the poor Russian dudes running in and out of chernobyl, with a spade. I bet there aren't any of those lads about now

PS


Holly smoke, that was 24yrs ago. A linky for those lucky sods too young to know about it.

 

[Alfaman]

there must be scope for alternative wheeled immobilising devices in the plot...

Indeed.

Quite possibly multiple instances of said Spice Girl/motorised bicycle/padded personal restraint, i.e. one tart per bike? Could catch on

 

[Alfaman]

[Countdown to thread being locked...]

Tempting fate

 

[Alfaman]

Your antics reminded me of the poor Russian dudes running in and out of chernobyl, with a spade. I bet there aren't any of those lads about now

Adrian Edmonson starred in a brilliant Discovery Channel documentary about the Chernobyl incident, don't know if you caught it, Shox?

 

[Shox Dr]

No I didn't. What was his take on it?

 

[mike os]

That'll be a first; non-Harley aficionados that is

that would be me then... horrid american tat

Admittedly with the handcuff scenario I could probably live with one

 

[Alfaman]

No I didn't. What was his take on it?

Ah no, sorry! It was a documentary as I remember, but maybe a bit of dramatic license? He played one of the scientists (very well if I may say so), who was ostracised by the scientific community afterwards, and ended up topping himself.

As I only knew him from The Young Ones and Bottom, i was surprised how well he played the role, very moving.

Plus, I seem to remember the programme was quite well done in terms of the science and technical issues. I should still have it copied on DVD if you want a look?

 

[Alfaman]

that would be me then... horrid american tat

Admittedly with the handcuff scenario I could probably live with one

Anyway, quite right Mike....back to the fantasy!!

 

[Wedg1e]

OK then... to expand on the theme, I offer you Sandra Bullock, a roll of duct tape and the bonnet of my TVR.

And if you make a mess there'll be trouble.

 

[Wedg1e]

Your antics reminded me of the poor Russian dudes running in and out of chernobyl, with a spade. whistle:

Oh don't worry, I FELT like one of those dudes...

On another occasion, out in Saudi, I volunteered to help out a client whose isotope projector (an Amersham 660 for those who know what the hell I'm on about) was suffering from a sand-jammed selector. Essentially the selector needed stripping and cleaning but first the 40 Curies of Iridium-192 needed unloading. Except that you couldn't, because the selector keeps the Ir-192 in place. I had to whip out the screws, pop the end plate off and dismantle the selector with the source still held by it, bombing merrily away about 3" from my hands. It would have been perhaps less terrifying had it not been 54 degrees C in there; I couldn't see for the sweat let alone hold the Allen key. Christ knows what dose my hands got but once I started the job I was committed (and some say I should be)... all in the name of impressing new clients

 

[Davie]

Beleive it or not, you can do a tour to Chernobyl now. And apparently get within 100m of the reactor.

Everything has held up so well, but looks so derelict all at the same time. And if I read it correctly, you can be fine stood in 1 spot, and walk literally 5 feet the wrong way and it'll kill you.

I've half considered it myself, it all looks so eerie, but the thought of coming home glowing in the dark, and that being the least of my worries, sort of puts me off a bit.

 

[Shox Dr]

There was a program on TV on about the effects of the disaster, on Pripyat (the local town) and surrounding area. Wild life had not been effected anyway as bad as people thought it would be. It was also interesting to see how the infrastructure had held up.

 

[Alfaman]

Discovery Channel are advertising a one-off special on this very subject, no date as yet, apologies for resurrecting a long deceased thread.....

 

[Shox Dr]

I saw that ad and thought of this thread as well