On 06/29/2010 08:04 AM, Joe AutoDrill wrote:
Growl... Was NOT supposed to send that until I finished typing.

...

On the back cover of the newest edition of "New Equipment Digest" there is a
very uniquely positioned photo. someone is a marketing genius or made one
fortunate mistake.

http://digital-edition.newequipment....nt/201006#pg64

Upper right corner of the page.

Nice cut-off device. Would have worked perfectly under water to make a nice
clean cut for BP and their "cap" at the oil leak site IMHO. The biggest
challenge might have been getting the thing attached to the pipeline
securely, but I'm sure they might have been able to figure that out.

Am I the only one who thinks this device is both cool and useful for
something like the BP problem.

The marketing genius is showing it making a clean cut in a pipeline-like
situation perfectly situated over an oil and gas refinery photo.

I just can't imagine this was accidental.

If the worst of the proposed scenarios are true, BP has popped a balloon
full of gas and oil that's going to keep gushing for a very long time.
Something like this would be incidental to that.

I suspect that any tool they use down there is going to be pretty
mundane at the point where things are touching the pipeline. The fancy
parts are going to be the bits that make it work at 5000 feet under
water and 5000 feet away from the nearest live human.

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com

Do you need to implement control loops in software?
"Applied Control Theory for Embedded Systems" was written for you.
See details at http://www.wescottdesign.com/actfes/actfes.html