Blast Doors Lipstick Artificial Palm Trees Brass Plaques
With a black market for firearms and terrorism a worldwide threat, armed forces need to protect their munitions from getting into the wrong hands. Weapons are often stored in earth-covered concrete bunkers that have special doors. These mammoth steel doors are designed to prevent anyone from blasting their way into a military bunker to access the munitions stored inside. The key to the doors' exceptional strength-- a grid structure core made from steel slats 6 inches wide and 6mm thick. A computer-guided torch notches half the slats so the other half can slot into them to form the grid structure. Workers assemble the grid structure on top of a nearly 1/2-inch-thick steel plate, the exterior face of the door. Because the grids have empty space in the middle, they provide three-dimensional strength without the excessive weight of a solid core. Even so, these doors weigh almost 10 tons each. Once the slats are all assembled, workers weld the bottom of the grids to the plate. Then with a manual gas torch, they trim the ends of the slats so they'll fit inside the channel of the steel framing that will run around the perimeter. Once they've installed framing on all four sides, they clamp everything in position, then weld all around. They run a string line to properly position and weld l-shaped steel tabs to the top of the grid structure. These tabs, two per grid, will support the interior face of the door. Then they fill each grid with mineral fiber insulation. This prevents moisture from condensing on the inside of the door. They take the steel plate for the interior door face, drill several 1/2-inch-wide holes through it... And lay it onto the structure, aligning the holes with the grid tabs. Then they weld the plate's perimeter to the framing and each hole to the grid tab beneath it. Once workers have finished constructing the doors, they weld on hinge pins and locking mechanisms. The frame on which the doors hang is made of two heavy, vertical steel beams with hinge pin receivers and two horizontal steel tubes. In the middle is a temporary cross bracing to keep the frame square and to prevent it from buckling under the weight of the doors before installation is complete. Onsite, the installers first mount the door frame. Then, using a forklift with an extended boom, a type of heavy lifting arm, they carefully descend the door's hinge pins into the receivers on the frame. Crews then build the bunker's concrete structure around the installed door. Once the concrete has properly cured, they remove the frame cross bracing. A handle on the door releases a foot bolt, which slots into the base of the frame. This prevents the locked door from bowing. The lock itself is a massive dead bolt with a tungsten-carbide rod inside, making it impossible to saw through. As an added layer of security, the military installs a monitoring system that sends out a signal the second anyone tries to open the door, even with the key. If the entry is unauthorized, soldiers descend on the bunker to apprehend the intruder. Throughout history, women have enhanced their lips with color. Cleopatra led the way over 2,000 years ago. She used crushed ants and beetles to redden her lips. Today a tube of lipstick does the job nicely. No need to mess around with crushed bugs. Lipstick comes in a case that also serves as an applicator, and that's the beauty of it. Just just twist the stick and apply color to make lackluster lips look luscious. Lipstick ingredients include waxes, pigments, and moisturizers. A worker pre-weighs everything following a formula. The exact blends are usually a company secret. She pours the measured ingredients into a kettle, that melts and mixes them together. She adds a plant-based gel known as plantolatum. It will act as a skin softener and also enable the lipstick to be smoothly applied. Different waxes-- carnauba, candelilla, and beeswax-- add body to the mixture. The waxes will also give the lipstick a certain sheen upon application. With the base mixture prepared, she now whips up a batch of pigment using different iron oxide colorants. She scoops it onto rollers that grind the pigment particles while rolling it into sheet form. It takes three passes through the rollers to fully grind the pigment. It's ready to be added to the base mixture. She lowers the heat in the kettle to avoid scalding the ingredients. She adds pigment until the mixture thickens and becomes creamy. It's now the right consistency to be shaped into lipstick. It's over to the next station where another worker pours the lipstick liquid into a filling machine. This filling system also has a mixer that keeps the consistency creamy. She places a mold under the filling machine and activates a lift. It serves up the mold to nozzles that pump lipstick liquid into the slots of the mold. She continues to fill lipstick molds until the supply in the machine has been depleted. She places the molds on a conveyer, which takes them through a nearly five-foot-long cooling tunnel. The chilly trip causes the lipstick liquid to solidify. The lipsticks are now ready for their swiveling, tubular containers. She places a rack on top of the mold and inserts the cases into slots on the rack. The slots are aligned with the lipsticks in the mold. Then it's over to the turnaround machine. Bursts of air gently push the lipstick out of the mold and up into the cases. To assist, little pushers apply pressure to the bottoms of the cases. The lipsticks have made their transfer without a smudge. She sets them down and removes the transfer rack. On another conveyor, the lipsticks pass by heat guns. The hot air melts the lipsticks just a little to make them shine. Continuing on, the lipsticks travel past rollers that turn the cases to cause the lipsticks to swivel down. A testers samples a lipstick from every batch to determine the melting point. This is important because lipstick should be stable enough not to melt in a purse on a hot day. He smears lipstick shavings onto a glass disk and examines their consistency. He places the sample on a heating element and swings a magnifying glass overhead for a close-up view as the lipstick shavings melt into a puddle. Checking a thermometer, he confirms that the melting point is within an acceptable range. Another worker then compares the color of the freshly made lipstick to the standard, and it's a match. So they wrap up production with a plastic cap. The cap is clear to showcase the shade of the lipstick. It has taken about a day to manufacture this lipstick. It's time to freshen up. There's no need to close your eyes and imagine you're in a tropical paradise when artificial palm trees are part of the landscaping. They can provide a touch of tropical in any climate, but making a synthetic copy of one of nature's towering achievements is no small task. With artificial palm trees, there are no watering or other maintenance worries, so you really have it made in the shade. To manufacture a palm tree, a worker wraps sticky mesh tape around a tubular piece of polyvinyl chloride. This tube will establish the shape of the trunk, and the tape will allow the next layers to adhere to it. While all that taping is going on, a welder pieces together the tree's solid-steel skeleton. He welds the base plate to a pole. He strengthens the joint with lateral supports called gussets. The gussets should enable the palm tree to withstand heavy winds. He adds height to the tree skeleton with another piece of steel. Artificial palm trees can be made to exact specifications, while in nature, things are less precise. After a coat of rust-inhibiting paint, they're ready to insert the steel skeleton into the taped pvc pipe. One worker clamps the end of the steel structure to a table, and the other member of the team slides the trunk core onto it. They screw the trunk to the steel skeleton in several places. With a foot pedal, a member of the team activates a spindle, and it turns the palm tree trunk so he can efficiently wrap synthetic rubber around it. The effect simulates natural growth rings. He brushes an adhesive onto the rubber, ensuring complete coverage. The adhesive is high-strength and waterproof, qualities that will allow this synthetic concrete to stick to it in all kinds of weather. The concrete is made of many components, including silicone and liquid rubber, and is the consistency of peanut butter. He spreads it onto the entire palm tree trunk. After an overnight cure, the coating solidifies and he paints it with exterior latex paint using a light touch. He adds contrast with darker paint. It highlights the rubber ridges on the trunk to make it look more authentic. While the paint dries, he turns his attention to the slotted steel trunk cap. He applies some of the synthetic concrete used on the trunk. It will serve as an adhesive as he now presses a cocoa-fiber fringe to the cap. The fringe of fiber camouflages the steel and makes the cap look like a tree husk. He ties it with wire to maintain the arrangement. He tightens it with pliers and snips off the excess. He disguises the wire with more of the synthetic concrete. And after it cures, he paints it to match the cocoa fibers. Successfully disguised by cocoa fiber and paint, he bolts the steel cap to the treetop. The next worker tapes a flat steel bar to the stem of palm foliage which is made of polyethylene. He reinforces the job with two metal clamps. He crimps the clamps tightly to the stem and bar. These palm fronds, as they're called, provide the crowning touch. They insert the steel bars in the slotted cap and then bend the fronds back to a more realistic angle. It's taken about an hour and a half to manufacture this artificial palm tree, easier than waiting a decade or more for a real one to grow. And with the job done, it's time for a piña colada. A brass plaque prominently identifies an important site. Think historical landmarks, memorials, hospital donor walls, walks of fame. Many professional firms identify their offices and many homes display their addresses with an elegant plaque made of brass. A brass plaque makes a bold and lasting statement. Making one begins with a wooden model, minus the lettering, covered in artificial leather where they want a bumpy texture. They use this model to cast an aluminum pattern. A typesetter draws guidelines on the pattern for the inscription, then glues pewter lettering on the lines. Getting the pattern perfect is essential, as this is what they use to make the sand mold for casting the brass plaque. The typesetter hands off the pattern to the molders, who spray the surface with a release agent, the industrial version of nonstick cooking spray. This will prevent the pattern from adhering to the sand mold they're about to make with it. After laying the pattern in a high-edge steel frame, they pour in a mixture of silica sand and resin, filling it to the top and compacting tightly. After 15 minutes, the resin cures, binding the grains of sand. The molders then flip the frame and lift off the top half of it. A hard block of sand is in the bottom half containing a mirror image of the plaque pattern. This is the sand mold with which they'll cast the plaque in brass. The molders now spray the surface with a solution of alcohol and graphite, then they burn off the alcohol with a lighter, leaving behind a film of graphite. This heat-resistant layer will prevent the sand mold from eroding when it comes into contact with the molten metal. Workers charge the furnace with brass ingots, as well as with pieces of excess brass from previous castings. The furnace temperature, 2,300 degrees fahrenheit, liquifies the solid metal in about 20 minutes. Then the molders pour the molten brass through a hole at the top of the mold. The hole feeds two channels leading to the cavity. The metal begins solidifying immediately. However, it's a good hour before the casting is fully hardened, at which point, they open the mold to extract the plaque. Attached to it are runners, excess metal that solidifies in the channels leading to the mold cavity. So, after knocking the sand out of the frame to release the plaque... They saw off the runners, then throw them back into the furnace to be remelted for the next casting. They grind the edge of the plaque with an abrasive wheel, smoothing the nubs where the runners were cut off and making the plaque perfectly round and straight-edged. With a steel scraper, they clean up the surface, removing flakes of metal and remnants of sand and graphite. They dissolve sulfurated potash in warm water. This chemical solution oxidizes metal, creating what looks like a natural patina, a darkening of the surface that develops with age. After preparing the solution, they transfer it to a large basin. A kiddy wading pool does the trick. Then they dip the plaque, keeping it submerged until they get enough patina to make the brass look antique. They rinse off the chemical with water and dry the plaque with compressed air. They gently press a vibrating abrasive belt against the plaque. It polishes the raised surfaces, removing their patina and restoring their brassy shine. This finishing creates depth by highlighting the relief against the dark background. Just one last step before the plaque is ready to take its rightful place. Workers spray the surface with a coat of clear urethane. This prevents the brass from tarnishing and protects the plaque from weathering when mounted outdoors.