Page 50 - MY STORY

Henderson, Nevada, where I continued to sharpen my

knowledge skills. It turned out that Joe knew exactly how
much I would gain by all that “grunt” work, as well as
working with leading industry researchers. When I

finally came back from my sojourn in Nevada, Joe
introduced me to his management as “our new chief
titanium metallurgist”, a great moment for me, except Joe

made it clear to me that this title was provided “in lieu of
a pay raise.”

Only then did I actually go on to evaluate new high
strength titanium alloys for the DC-8, figure out the best

material selection and suppliers, learn to fabricate alloys
into useful product, write the materials specifications and
process control documents, troubleshoot any problems as
they arose, and ultimately become a recognized national

expert – all because Joe pointed me to three five-drawer
metal cabinets.

MY AIR COMPRESSOR TURBINE

I look at this as one of my major accomplishments as a
young, and relatively inexperienced materials engineer.
The cabin-air pressurization system for the DC-8 airliner

sucked in air at altitudes up to 40,000 feet while