[ RadSafe ] SI units

[Doug Huffman]

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Part of the issue of technical language is conflating/confusing slang,
jargon and 'proper' language.  Yes, activity was taught in Curies (the
field's founder units) and pico was often spoken as micro-micro for
emphasis of magnitude.

Gallons were *likely* used for the familiarity of its meaning as we used
to sit in a reactor compartment and ask a trainee (gas station attendant
officer or enlisted?) to watch/imagine loop transport time and point out
the passage through components.  The grasp of that magnitude is more
meaningful than reciting, 'one pump provides so many gallons per minute
flow' in preventing a Cold Water Accident reactivity addition or thermal
shock to the most susceptible location/component.

"Four hundred and fifty micro micro Curies per one hundred centimeters
squared" described the presumptive surface contamination limit when
measured with an RM-3 radiac and using a DT-304 pancake probe.  The 100
cm^2 is the formalized estimate of the area covered by an eight inch
long and 'S' curved swipe sample with approved media.  Were the
Fukushima NPP workers so drilled they might not be having some of the
issues we're hearing.

What was the energy transported?  Since the Mollier Diagram was
carefully taught, waay back then, and where the various physical process
occurred on it,  it was easy to remind that a component operated near
the peak of some curve.  If I recall correctly, no, I just looked at my
Combustion Engineering Steam Tables' h-s diagram to see English units.

The training has changed.  When I was being trained (and Rickover knew
the difference between education and training) the metaphor of a filter
was used, "only the finest passed."  My instructor-correspondents now
complain that training is like a mud-pump (a low pressure diaphragm type
positive displacement pump) that'll pass a stone.  Read Rickover's
Congressional addresses on management theory and his best source of
junior managers - the "shop floor".

Still there have been no notable accidents.

Doug Huffman
Shift Test Engineer
CNSY C.2340X retired
http://www.navsea.navy.mil/shipyards/norfolk/nnsy/NuclearTED.aspx
Washington Island
Wisconsin

On 3/26/2011 17:47, Larry Addis wrote:
> Doug,
> 
> Like 450 MikeyMikes? That's micro,micro (pico) Curies for the uninitiated. I
> was never in the Navy, 
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