Page 46 - MY STORY

In the jaws of the tensile-test machine was the metal

specimen to be tested. Massive water cooled electrical
contacts at the top and bottom of the test specimen were
hooked to a power source controlled by a technician

whose name was “Rube Goldberg” (this is really true and
did nothing to make me feel good). His job was to follow
a line on a moving temperature chart that represented 100

degrees F/second and start feeding electrical current to
resistance heat the specimen by manually turning a
control wheel on a rheostat when I said: “go.”

There were high voltage wires, thermocouple leads and

meters, coolant lines - a real maze of Frankenstein-like
mad science equipment along with about six highly
experienced senior technicians doing other things as part
of this complex test series that I was supposed to direct.

The test series seemed to go off without a hitch, and I was
feeling pretty good at day end.

My boss came down near quitting time to see how it was
going and get a look at the preliminary results. It was

then, in a moment of abject horror, that I realized I had not
done the most mundane part of the experiment which was
to measure the width and thickness of the metal test

specimens (area calculation) before testing in order to