Clearing the air

Complaining much over air quality in Charlottesville may at times seem silly. Given that UVa is still notoriously producing much of its electricity from heinously polluting coal towers in the middle of town... such that it has been passed down by word of mouth that EVERYONE in the city - man, woman, child, critter - smokes the equivalent of 5 cigarettes PER DAY. So on the one hand - Thank you UVa for requiring Faulconer to have these great air scrubbers on their machines. Really. Thanks - we who are living around them all day genuinely thank you. Hint hint, nudge nudge - what about 'dem coal towers (fwiw the nuke lab on O-Hill is mighty rad :)

So anyhow... Hawkins and Graves showed up Wednesday to install diesel exhaust air scrubbers on the heavy machinery - including the IT38 Front-End Loader, the Hitachi Zaxis 350's and 450's, the CAT excavator, and a few others - eight in all... All the machines were installed rapidly and back in service sometimes within half an hour. Thank you Scott and Mike for your help - the scrubbers allegedly cut emissions down by 70% without dramatically reducing horse power. At a cost of $32,000+ total we certainly hope they do some work.



Often times less expensive techniques are sufficient to really help construction worker's lives. When cutting concrete a simple dust mask helps tremendously. You never now what additives may be in the concrete - cover your mouth and cut on through...

Originally purchased to better enjoy metal casting and the lost styrofoam technique - this nuclear, biological, chemical mask really made sewer manholes more tolerable. Granted my boss Andy Fitzgerald regards them as sissy and warns he's going to "flush me" if I have cardiac arrest while wearing one... whatever - time in a manhole may be necessary at times - it is hardly pleasurable - certainly a great task for robots...


One thing to consider too... there's often splashing in live lines and covering them mucous membranes is a fine thing.