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Management Side
Week of 20 July 2015: Dimensions
Sponsored by Genesis Energy, LP--your exclusive source for NAHS--1-800-422-6274

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Probably once a month or so, I encounter a client who is having problems. Be it the width of paper rolls, the fit of a pipe, you name it, dimensions are a big problem.

Many people seem to think that mere dimensions are beneath them, that having conquered calculus, such arithmetic is child's play. Let me tell you, it is not and dimensional mistakes, particularly on a construction site, are probably the largest cause of backcharges and overages.

Face it: we live in a three dimensional world and everything has to fit. Some things have to fit better than others. But be it a couch going through your front door or the use of a long radius elbow when a short radius elbow was what would fit and was planned for that pump suction, dimensions matter.

When I was young, I ran an operation detailing steel. This was before computer aided design. The process went like this: you would get single line drawings from the structural engineer specifying beam and column sizes and types of joint connections. Then, as a detailing shop, you had to make drawings of every piece. Those pieces are never assembled until they get to the job site and the erector's attitude and expectation is that everything will fit.

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In our shop, we did everything from paper machine buildings to high rise skyscrapers. I calculated that a fifty story building had 100,000 bolted connections. It was humanly impossible to get more than 98% of those exactly correct using normal care, custody and concern. That meant you had 2,000 missed holes for which they backcharged you (in the late 1970s) $50 per hole for missing one on a project where you were only paid $40,000 to start with. Great business--at that rate you would only lose $60,000 per project. We learned how to be very careful with dimensions, checking and double checking them. We also learned how to negotiate backcharges with great skill.

I am old fashioned, but I think everyone should have to spend at least three months early in his or her career in some sort of assignment that deals with dimensions. It might even be basic bookkeeping. I particularly think this would be very instructive for people with advanced degrees, although I think those with Bachelor of Science degrees should have this experience as well. It is only arithmetic. Yet it is humbling when it is thrown at you in volumes and you are accountable for it being absolutely correct and the tolerance for error is measured in the 1/100ths of a percent.

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Automatic slitters have largely solved the arithmetic problem on roll slitting. We used to see a great deal of errors in this area, too. In one mill in which I worked, they set the slitters with ordinary carpenters' retractable tape measures. The sales service manager was going nuts trying to slit rolls to the tolerance at which they were bought and without gross errors. It was the largest complaint by far that we received in that mill. Yes, our customers' biggest complaint was imprecise roll width.


So, be it bookkeeping, construction, maintenance or papermaking, don't look down on the people who must deal with the nitty-gritty dimensions of your world. Dimensions are important and even in this day of powerful computers, many dimensions still require manual input from humans.

Do you agree or disagree? Take our quiz this week and let us know how you feel.

For safety this week, correct dimensions, sometimes expressed in the form of threaded fittings, can make a difference between success and disaster in a safety incident. Are you sure all your fire siamese connections, for instance, are compatible with the local fire department pumper trucks? That is just one of many places to start.

Be safe and we will talk next week.

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