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1922 view of Asbestos

asbestos have many properties that make it good for many things.
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too bad its bad for humans. like many things that can take decades to show up many who worked in shipyards and in industrial powerhouses with furnace boilers a lot of workers not directly working with it got exposed. i even had a boss cutting corrugated asbestos siding for a building with a hand circular saw get sick decades later. many worked with it or around it when young only a few years but felt its effects decades later
 
asbestos have many properties that make it good for many things.
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too bad its bad for humans. like many things that can take decades to show up many who worked in shipyards and in industrial powerhouses with furnace boilers a lot of workers not directly working with it got exposed. i even had a boss cutting corrugated asbestos siding for a building with a hand circular saw get sick decades later. many worked with it or around it when young only a few years but felt its effects decades later

American Hoist and Derrick tried many things for friction linings but never really found anything as good as asbestos or at least it was that way before I retired 12 years ago ..An asbestos lined brake will last a long time, it will not score the drum, and it will wear in for really good control of a load with a foot brake....Some think nowdays that if you get within 100 yards of a house with asbestos shingles that you will die... Asbestos is only dangerous if in particulate form...One worker at American in St. Paul when it was still located there worked over 30 years in the lining division with no illness even after retirement.. It is strange how it kills some and not others...I was told by someone who was well trained in asbestos dangers that only 3% of asbestos is dangerous and then only in particulate form...I wonder how much of the stuff I inhaled over the years.. Cheers; Ramsay 1:)
 
American Hoist and Derrick tried many things for friction linings but never really found anything as good as asbestos or at least it was that way before I retired 12 years ago ..An asbestos lined brake will last a long time, it will not score the drum, and it will wear in for really good control of a load with a foot brake....Some think nowdays that if you get within 100 yards of a house with asbestos shingles that you will die... Asbestos is only dangerous if in particulate form...One worker at American in St. Paul when it was still located there worked over 30 years in the lining division with no illness even after retirement.. It is strange how it kills some and not others...I was told by someone who was well trained in asbestos dangers that only 3% of asbestos is dangerous and then only in particulate form...I wonder how much of the stuff I inhaled over the years.. Cheers; Ramsay 1:)
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3% doesnt sound like much but its like if you got in car accident every month with live threatening injuries, than 3% is really bad.
 
When i was a kid, my household chores included keeping the coal fired boiler going, and occasionally patching the lagging on the furnace and pipes. Dad had a bag of (dry) asbestos plaster powder from the hardware store, and you just mixed it up in small batches like plaster, and troweled it on. It floated through the air in a fine haze and made pretty motes in the cellar window light when pouring and mixing. s kids also mixed it up to make dams or small forms for melting stuff in the furnace (mostly lead) and pouring stuff.

Later, as a carpenter, i often sawed up sheets and shingles of asbestos cement on re-hab jobs. We heard it was "bad" but it was in use everywhere, and you don't really take time to appreciate "how bad" when young, when nobody actually drops dead or gets rushed to the emergency room.

65 & hoping... lol.

smt
 
When i was a kid, my household chores included keeping the coal fired boiler going, and occasionally patching the lagging on the furnace and pipes. Dad had a bag of (dry) asbestos plaster powder from the hardware store, and you just mixed it up in small batches like plaster, and troweled it on. It floated through the air in a fine haze and made pretty motes in the cellar window light when pouring and mixing. s kids also mixed it up to make dams or small forms for melting stuff in the furnace (mostly lead) and pouring stuff.

Later, as a carpenter, i often sawed up sheets and shingles of asbestos cement on re-hab jobs. We heard it was "bad" but it was in use everywhere, and you don't really take time to appreciate "how bad" when young, when nobody actually drops dead or gets rushed to the emergency room.

65 & hoping... lol.

smt

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had a boss get sick decades later and all he did was saw cut asbestos siding a few times decades earlier. again 3% dont sound like much. but if you are the 3% than its way too high.
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thats what i meant by furnace boilers fairly common using asbestos. just being in a powerhouse even if working on steel. if masons nearby there was asbestos in the air. all trades got exposed to it on many job sites.
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you see somebody dying slowly gasping to breath for years you see its a bad way to spend retirement.
 
When i was a kid, my household chores included keeping the coal fired boiler going, and occasionally patching the lagging on the furnace and pipes. Dad had a bag of (dry) asbestos plaster powder from the hardware store, and you just mixed it up in small batches like plaster, and troweled it on. It floated through the air in a fine haze and made pretty motes in the cellar window light when pouring and mixing. s kids also mixed it up to make dams or small forms for melting stuff in the furnace (mostly lead) and pouring stuff.

Later, as a carpenter, i often sawed up sheets and shingles of asbestos cement on re-hab jobs. We heard it was "bad" but it was in use everywhere, and you don't really take time to appreciate "how bad" when young, when nobody actually drops dead or gets rushed to the emergency room.

65 & hoping... lol.

smt

I will be 66 in October....No telling how much asbestos I was around.. Usually the first thing we did when working on a crane was blow everything out with air and those big brake and friction linings had dust everywhere...Steam lines were covered with asbestos,old gaskets made from asbestos were buffed off with a wire wheel after all that was easier than scraping...I worked where raw asbestos had been shipped for years and loaded on ships...Someone said I should get checked and I said for what? I always had a choice.. I could have quit my job but then when the bills came in they would not have gotten paid....As I stated before, some feel the ill from it and some don't.. Some worked in ships in the holds where it was being loaded and checked clean....No doubt it is bad but sometimes I think it is a bit overplayed by some possibly for money as with other things.. I know of one man who worked in asbestos for 38 years at Solvay Process co...Lawyers contacted him when he was 90 years old to see if he wanted to get in a class action lawsuit against the plant.. He told them he better things to do.. Cheers; Ramsay 1:)
 
I will be 66 in October....No telling how much asbestos I was around.. Usually the first thing we did when working on a crane was blow everything out with air and those big brake and friction linings had dust everywhere...Steam lines were covered with asbestos,old gaskets made from asbestos were buffed off with a wire wheel after all that was easier than scraping...I worked where raw asbestos had been shipped for years and loaded on ships...Someone said I should get checked and I said for what? I always had a choice.. I could have quit my job but then when the bills came in they would not have gotten paid....As I stated before, some feel the ill from it and some don't.. Some worked in ships in the holds where it was being loaded and checked clean....No doubt it is bad but sometimes I think it is a bit overplayed by some possibly for money as with other things.. I know of one man who worked in asbestos for 38 years at Solvay Process co...Lawyers contacted him when he was 90 years old to see if he wanted to get in a class action lawsuit against the plant.. He told them he better things to do.. Cheers; Ramsay 1:)

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my boss had no health problems for decades but he eventually got sick and when tested they said it was from asbestos. sure i have heard many times people saying it was in the air so thick they could taste it as they spit it out.
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its the unlucky 3% who get sick from even short exposures. none the less its a bad way to spend retirement gasping to breath and literally wives have heard the last words of husbands "i cannot breath" trying as hard as they could to breath
 
Interestingly, the problems associated with asbestos have been know 100 years, but like a lot of other materials, the good outweighed the bad. Probably not as many lawyers too. I haven't found the article, but it is not asbestos as such that is a problem, its the length of the fibers. Fiberglass can have the same problems if the fibers of this length.

Asbestos - Wikipedia

Tom
 
Interestingly, the problems associated with asbestos have been know 100 years, but like a lot of other materials, the good outweighed the bad. Probably not as many lawyers too. I haven't found the article, but it is not asbestos as such that is a problem, its the length of the fibers. Fiberglass can have the same problems if the fibers of this length.

Asbestos - Wikipedia

Tom

fibers are arrow head like, they go in and wont come out like straight fiberglass fibers and since nothing really dissolves asbestos, fibers stay in for life
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not well known but asbestos is a natural material and in many areas where its in the ground naturally when its dry there is asbestos blowing around in the wind
 
Waukegan Ill had a large John Manville plant when I was young. Used a lot of asbestos and recall the lengthy lawsuit that they had against them. My lungs will probably be what takes me eventually. Stripped 4 locomotives of boiler lagging, smoked cigarettes when I was young and a lot of them, paint fumes and all the different thinners used in 1970s chemical coatings back then along with all the weld smoke. The last 12 years I worked long term nursing and I saw many people pass away from just about every DX available. Some younger some older. At this stage 63.5, I believe that God looks after fools and drunks. And that when your time is up your going. I have seen people die when they shouldn't and people live that shouldn't {according to man made law anyway}. End stage is usually not pretty at all regardless of how you are taken out. My take on asbestos is no doubt is can be deadly, but the EPA and lawyers have made it the perfect poison to the point of idiocity. We keep raising the tax and cost of insurance on those who smoke cigarettes but they are still legal? If industry killed as many people as tobacco does and added to the cost of Healthcare like tobacco does the people working at convenience gas stations selling cigarettes would be wearing hooded protective clothing with oxygen hoses. We mfg all sorts of chemicals that are every bit as deadly as asbestos. I think with some safety measures it could still be used in certain applications safely. Just like lead paint people think their IQ is going to diminish if they come into a room with it on the walls.

Any disease that takes away your ability to breath is horrible. Not trying to make lite of it. I saw some awful cases of COPD and in the old days we tried harder to keep people going. Now days the medical world lets go of people faster and often does not keep them lingering so long. Not out of compassion but out of "who's going to pay for this". This has been my experience. Also lost one uncle to Asbestosis worked in power house in Milw. Our great industrial past came at a cost that is for sure, some of it great and some of it down right shady. Regards, John.
 
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my boss had no health problems for decades but he eventually got sick and when tested they said it was from asbestos. sure i have heard many times people saying it was in the air so thick they could taste it as they spit it out.
.
its the unlucky 3% who get sick from even short exposures. none the less its a bad way to spend retirement gasping to breath and literally wives have heard the last words of husbands "i cannot breath" trying as hard as they could to breath

Speaking of wives, I know of one person who got 800 k right off the bat then he got monthly installments until he died at which time his wife got a lump sum for "wrongful death"..She started getting a settlement when he first started getting his because "she caught it from washing his clothes." The man admitted that the company issued employees respirators but they didn't wear them because it was too hot to wear them....Anyone see the lawyer lineup?
 
Waukegan Ill had a large John Manville plant when I was young. Used a lot of asbestos and recall the lengthy lawsuit that they had against them. My lungs will probably be what takes me eventually. Stripped 4 locomotives of boiler lagging, smoked cigarettes when I was young and a lot of them, paint fumes and all the different thinners used in 1970s chemical coatings back then along with all the weld smoke. The last 12 years I worked long term nursing and I saw many people pass away from just about every DX available. Some younger some older. At this stage 63.5, I believe that God looks after fools and drunks. And that when your time is up your going. I have seen people die when they shouldn't and people live that shouldn't {according to man made law anyway}. End stage is usually not pretty at all regardless of how you are taken out. My take on asbestos is no doubt is can be deadly, but the EPA and lawyers have made it the perfect poison to the point of idiocity. We keep raising the tax and cost of insurance on those who smoke cigarettes but they are still legal? If industry killed as many people as tobacco does and added to the cost of Healthcare like tobacco does the people working at convenience gas stations selling cigarettes would be wearing hooded protective clothing with oxygen hoses. We mfg all sorts of chemicals that are every bit as deadly as asbestos. I think with some safety measures it could still be used in certain applications safely. Just like lead paint people think their IQ is going to diminish if they come into a room with it on the walls.

Any disease that takes away your ability to breath is horrible. Not trying to make lite of it. I saw some awful cases of COPD and in the old days we tried harder to keep people going. Now days the medical world lets go of people faster and often does not keep them lingering so long. Not out of compassion but out of "who's going to pay for this". This has been my experience. Also lost one uncle to Asbestosis worked in power house in Milw. Our great industrial past came at a cost that is for sure, some of it great and some of it down right shady. Regards, John.

With me, asbestos, smoking 3 packs a day, welding fumes, paint fumes, sandblasting sand dust, chlorinated solvents, drank liquor just about every night, industrial chemicals related to heavy equipment, etc etc...I am glad that someone entered God into the picture as in my case he surely deserves mention..Cheers from a man soon to be 66.. Ramsay 1:)
 
If you care to explore this subject in detail, there are a lot of articles available. According to the NIH the critical fiber length is 5-10 micro meters. Asbestos fiber length and its relation to disease risk. - PubMed - NCBI

A lot of good stuff here. http://www.euro.who.int/__data/assets/pdf_file/0015/123072/AQG2ndEd_6_2_asbestos.PDF?ua=1

The articles do not mention anything about have an arrow point.

If you want to explore other hazardous materials, you will find that most of the properties of stuff like lead, cadmium and so forth were known by the 1920's or so.

Tom
 
"Any disease that takes away your ability to breath is horrible. Not trying to make lite of it. I saw some awful cases of COPD and in the old days we tried harder to keep people going. Now days the medical world lets go of people faster and often does not keep them lingering so long. Not out of compassion but out of "who's going to pay for this". This has been my experience. Also lost one uncle to Asbestosis worked in power house in Milw. Our great industrial past came at a cost that is for sure, some of it great and some of it down right shady. "

FAKE NEWS!

Asbestos is good for you, we need more of it. Industries have been hamstrung by excessive Gooberment regulations! Costs too much, holds down profit.
Don't like asbestos, stop breathing. It.

Our glorious leader is taking rapid steps to be sure mr. pruitt is rectifying the problem!

FACT CHECK: Is the EPA Allowing for the Approval of New Asbestos-Containing Products?
 
Here are some links to searches I did for pictures I had seen before from Thetford Mines Quebec showing some of the Asbestos mines and machinery used in that area in the early 1900 s
Asbestos
Musee McCord Museum - Results
Thetford Mines
Musee McCord Museum - Results
There will be some overlap in the two searches.
Thetford Mines - Wikipedia
While Asbestos mining in that region had largely closed down there may be still some activity in the area.
Some searching on Google on Asbestos mining in Quebec should turn up lots more info. if someone is interested.
Regards,
Jim
 
I work mostly in the power generation industry. We have asbestos training regularly. 94% of the people who get mesothelioma also smoked tobacco.
 
I served my apprenticeship at TBA. That stood for " Turner Brothers Asbestos Co " before they sanitised it by shortening it to TBA. It was at one time time the biggest asbestos factory in the world employing about 3,000 people and without a doubt the biggest employer in my home town. Now this huge site is abandoned and plagued by the idiots who thinks it's fun to wander about in old sites and the ever present scrap metal thieves who are slowly destroying the place.

It is known now as the " Chernobyl of Lancashire " and the source of a three way argument between the local council, the national government and the developers who bought the site hoping to build houses on it ! Nobody wants to pay for the cost of cleaning up the site so nothing happens.

I was lucky in that most of my time there I was out of the most dangerous departments being in the " Design and Development" prototype shop. I got out as soon as I could at 22 years of age when I realised how dangerous it was but I lived for a while within sight of the factory. One of my GP's lived directly down wind of the factory and when he realised that he sold what was a beautiful house and moved well away.

Since leaving there one or two jobs have brought me back into contact with asbestos but I was pretty careful to keep my contact to a minimum. In the old machine tool re-furbing days we lined the ways with " ferro-bestos " , you can guess what the " bestos " bit refers to.

I look on the bright side regarding my time there and being a sportsman I've never been a smoker.

As an aside - TBA had their own guest house for visiting high profile customers from all over the world. Everything in it that would normally be made of wood was made of sheet asbestos as a sales gimmick ! I pass it every time I go to my local pub. It's yuppy apartments now, I often wonder if any of the current occupants know it's history !

Regards Tyrone.
 
Over in the west of this continent, they have a town that's declared too dangerous to live in due to blue asbestos, not surprising with big tailings dumps and the stuff was used for the roads too.

Do have some misgivings now about sawing up asbestos sheeting over 40 years ago when ignorant of the risks, the old man had spots on his lungs probably from the same practice....working on ships and plumbing wouldn't have helped him either. They've gone crazy overboard now, second hand cars imported here now require asbestos inspection and declaration - if that's not done offshore, there's a strip down of all gaskets, brakes, windscreens, body sealant that can run tens of thousands, of course some of the new Chinese vehicles get a free pass, despite the presence of the material!
 








 
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