"Cool down, boss. You neva hoid of an applique? I made all dat fancy stuff one Sunday a few munts ago, and glued it on wit epoxy."
I just grumbled, since I couldn't tell if he was lying or not. "So how did you get the boat turned over?" I asked.
"Easy. You know when we had to hire a crane to get dat big Ford Flatrock job on da railroad car? Well, when da crane and crew was here, it only took dem a coupla minutes extra to flip da boat for us, so dey did it, no charge."
"I'll bet. What about that cast-iron keel? Where did it come from?"
"Well, da guys at Chevy Grey Iron, dey needed a hardness tester, but dey didn't have no budget for it, an we needed an iron keel, an we had a little extra time left over on a job, so we bote did da obvious ting."
"And the rest of this work?"
"Da paint, you mean? Well, you know when we had to buy all dat weird paint for dat Brazilian job? Well, I just ordered some udder kinds of weird paint at da same time an nobody noticed."
"Dammit, Adam, I meant to pay for the paint in any event, but as an employee, you shouldn't pull shit like that! It sets a bad example! I mean, if you want some real authority around here, you should take me up on that partnership." I went up a long, shaky ladder and climbed into the boat.
"Nah. Like I told you before, boss, I like bein a lowly peon. No worries, no hassles."
"You'll have lots of worries and hassles once I call the police and have you charged with theft. Where did this hydraulic power unit and all these valves come from? I mean, those are Vickers valves, worth hundreds of bucks each!"
"Well, you know. Sometimes you get trough wit a job, you got a lot of parts left over. Da distributors, dey charge you a hefty restockin fee if you send 'em back, so I figured, what the heck. An you ain't gonna have me arrested. You tink any judge would believe it, dat I stole your stuff, just so's I could come over here on my own time an mount it in your boat? Anyway, look at da bright side, boss. Doing tings my way, you're saving a lot of money on your taxes. I mean dis way, dese valves an stuff came out as a straight business deduction. Your way, after dat restockin fee, you'd have to pay company taxes on your business profits before you got da money for yourself, personally. Den you'd have to pay personal income taxes on dat before you could spend what was left on dese here same valves. I'm savin you a fortune."
"You're putting me in jail if the IRS ever hears about all this."
"And how're dey goin to do dat? Dere's not a ting on paper anywhere dat shows you got anyting to do wit dis boat, let alone ownin it."
"You've got a point there. But next time, let me know what you're doing, okay?"
"Boss, you got no sense of adventure."
"You've made some changes that weren't on the plans. What's this glass thing on the deck?"
"Dat's a solar still. Dey was knocking down some old stores downtown, an I picked up da big plate-glass windows almost for free. It's only tree inches high and it's strong enough to walk on. It don't weigh all dat much and under ideal conditions, it should make about tirty gallons of fresh water a day. A nice backup, hey?"
"I suppose so, as long as we're just distilling water. If I find a barrel of corn mash back here, somebody besides me is going to jail! What about that thing just forward of the still?"
"Dose are solar cells. Just another backup for all da udder generators."
"All what generators?"
"Well, dere's da generator on da engine, right? Just like on a car? But most of da time we won't be usin the big engine, we'll be sailin, so dere's a genset, wit a small diesel engine dat powers nuttin but a big generator. But dat uses fuel, too, so dere's anudder generator dat works trough a clutch off da prop shaft, to give us juice like durin a storm or sometin. And of course da solar cells, because it's free power, so what da heck."
"What? No windmill?" I said facetiously.
"I looked at dat, but a windmill would have to go on top of da mast, an a generator up dere puts too much weight right where you don't want it. We got backups enough, for power, anyway."
"Weren't the solar cells expensive?"
"Nah, dey were free. Dere was dis Air Force satellite dat got canceled, an we sort of got da solar panels donated to us."
"We `sort of got donated' government property? You're sure it wasn't stolen?"
"Stolen? Boss, you use such naughty words! How about `was put to da highest an da best civilian use'? Anyway, dose guys, dey owed me a couple of favors and dis was da payoff."
I shook my head and went away with visions of prison dancing in my head.
FIVE
The crew only spent three weeks working on the boat that time, but during those weeks I spent very little on materials. Adam had been squirreling away all sorts of parts for use on the Brick Royal. Some—tubing, fittings, wiring and connectors—came out of our own bench stocks, and others—valves, motors, cylinders and drives—were identical to parts that had been shipped to our customers with the machines we built them. I expect that Adam designed the boat's fittings around the parts he could scrounge. Then again, he might have designed our customer's machines so they needed the same parts he wanted for the boat.
A big old marine diesel engine was being completely rebuilt in our shop, but that I understood. I'd managed to pick it up myself a few months ago, along with the transmission, shaft and packing box, all at scrap-metal prices.
But the radios, the radar, the satellite dish, the forward-looking sonar, the Global Positioning System, and the electronic navigating machine stumped me. I was afraid to ask, and put it off for a week, but eventually my curiosity got the best of me.
"Oh, dat stuff. Well, you see, boss, da guys over at Nautical Micrologic needed some material handlin' stuff—just some conveyors an tings—and we needed some of deir stuff, so we made a deal. No big ting."
"No big thing, is it? Well, where did the materials and labor for the conveyors come from?"
"It was dat Brazilian job again. I mean, we was way ahead on dat one, and it don't look too good to da customer if you make too big a profit on dem. Dis way, everybody's happy."
"Everybody but me and the IRS." I walked away, shaking my head as usual.
One thing I did pay for, and plenty, was the carbon fiber and epoxy needed for the mast. The cost of these materials was about the same as the price of a custom-made aluminum mast, but it would weigh almost half a ton less. Weight way up there you don't need. Also, the composite mast would be a lot stronger. Too strong, as it turned out later. An aluminum mast might not have been strong enough to punch a hole in the bottom of the boat.
The Brick Royal was beginning to look almost finished when we started back on our next real job. The car companies were still a bit slow, but it was looking as though we had a first-class customer in a certain Brazilian auto aftermarket manufacturer.
The first machine that we did for them remachined used water pump housings. They were very pleased with what we designed and built, and they paid for it before the due date. Now they had another, much larger project for us if we could start immediately, and of course, we could.
The new job was a variable remachining line for engine camshafts that would take just about any used camshaft ever made and put it back to the original specs. You could throw in old parts in any order, and have them come out just like brand new, as long as the programmable controller was informed of the proper part number.
When the camshaft machine was about half completed, their rep came by and asked us to quote on five more lines, for engine blocks, engine heads, crankshafts, brake drums, and rotors. We got the crankshaft job within the week.
* * *
Most machinery companies end up spending between two weeks and two months debugging a tool before it's fit to be seen in public. All of the sins of misinformation, improper assumptions, and outright incompetence come out in final assembly and debug.
It's a trial, but it's not like trying to convince a jury you didn't break the laws of man. You're on trial with Mother Nature herself sitting in j
udgment on whether you tried to break her very strict rules.
Rudyard Kipling had it down pat. Machines are not built to comprehend a lie. They can neither love, nor pity, nor forgive. If you make a slip in handling them, you die.
Or at the very least, you can lose your shirt. It's the expenses that you incur during debugging that can make the difference between an almost embarrassingly high profit and a dead loss.
Indeed, my fledgling company had been forced to lose a few not-so-small fortunes, until I hired Adam. It was his fantastic record of ultrasmooth startups that made him so valuable to me. Before long, his startups made him and our company both famous throughout the machinery industry.
And whenever anyone asked him about it, he would invariably say, "Of course it woiks! I got God on my side!"
Super Spooks in the Sky had nothing to do with it. Machines designed and built by Adam always worked because he was incredibly competent. He was one of those rare individuals who was both remarkably creative and absolutely anal when it came to checking every single tiny detail.
As time went on, I got to scheduling less and less time for Tender Loving Care, at least on our own shop schedules, but being a chicken at heart, I left it at three weeks as far as what I told the customer was concerned, just in case.
There is a ceremony in the special machine business called "The Buyoff." Representatives from the purchasing company, usually one senior plant engineer and a couple of juniors, come to the builder's shop. They inspect the machine and the parts it makes, they watch it function, and they sometimes run it themselves while it produces a certain number of parts within a specified period of time. If all is well, they approve the machine for shipment and payment. If Mother Nature doesn't accept excuses, neither does the purchaser's plant engineer.
* * *
Only this time, the Brazilian company's President, the Chairman of the Board and the Chief Engineer showed up, in addition to the usual plant engineers. And they came three weeks early. When the Brazilians arrived unannounced, and asked to see their machine immediately, I was a more than a bit flustered.
"Gentlemen! Of course, you may see anything that you wish. But surely you realize that you are here three weeks early."
A very distinguished-looking gentleman, who turned out to be their Chairman of the Board, spoke through their interpreter. "Of course, we realize this, and it is not our intention to make you anxious. We are totally confident of your ability to ship us an outstanding machine at the proper time. However, we have come north from Bela Horizonte a few weeks early to see for ourselves the truth about the remarkable stories that circulate concerning your Chief Engineer."
Omigod! I thought, Somebody's told them about the shit Adam pulled, padding the account on that last machine we sold them! They know about The Brick Royal!
"My Chief Engineer? He's extremely competent, sir, or, uh, señor, but of course, what a man does on his own time is none of my business, you see."
The reply, after a few layers of translation, and a fair amount of extra conversation in Portuguese, came back, "I am not sure of what you speak, my friend, and perhaps it is best that I do not know. What I was discussing was his remarkable ability to design a totally new machine, build it, and have it work perfectly the very first time it was turned on. You will understand that you are not the first tool-building company that we have dealt with. Always before, they were months late in their deliveries, and never had we purchased a machine that worked to absolute perfection until we received your last excellent effort on our behalf. Therefore, we have come early in order to watch the machine being completed, and to observe the startup."
Vastly relieved, I took the delegation back to the assembly bay, where the electricians and painters were putting on the finishing touches.
"Ah, it will be completed soon, yes?"
"Oh, yes, sir. Perhaps by noon today. We are slightly ahead of schedule."
"Then we will watch."
It wasn't until one-thirty that Adam had finished his own final inspection of the line, and would permit electrical power, compressed air, and coolants to be turned on. With a bit of a flourish, he pressed the start button for the first time, and all of the proper indicator lights turned on.
Adam went over to a stack of old camshafts that we'd bought at the junkyard, selected one at random, and scanned its part number into the machine. He placed the camshaft on the input rack and pressed the palm buttons.
The machine started, handing the part automatically from work station to work station. The cam was washed, its oil cavities were blown out clean, and every machined surface was measured at many different places. The part was magnafluxed, and since it was within allowable tolerances, our machine decreed it to be salvageable.
Those bearings and other surfaces that were worn down or otherwise undersized were MIG welded back up until they were oversized and then ground down precisely to specification. The oil cavities were again blown out clean, the camshaft was pressure washed again, dried, and then lightly oiled for shipment. Finally, it was placed on a storage rack reserved for parts of its type.
And at every step of the line, our machine had worked perfectly, the first time that it had ever operated. Adam had done it again. The VIPs were all excited, and wads of brightly colored Brazilian money changed hands among them. There must have been some hefty bets going.
Then the Brazilians had to play with their new toy themselves, like a bunch of teenagers who had just invented sex.
When they finally ran out of old camshafts to fix, the chairman not only handed me a cashier's check for the full amount owed on the tool, he also gave me a purchase order for all four of the other new lines that I had quoted them.
I could see now where I was going to get the money to buy the sails for The Brick Royal. Dacron was no longer good enough, and the Kevlar sails that Adam insisted on were going to cost me three times what the hull did. One of those little catches that I had known would be there all along. There would be enough money left over to take Helen on a cruise, or even buy her that new house she'd been hinting about. Not to mention retiring for life, if the mood struck me.
While I stood there with visions of untold wealth dancing before my eyes, Adam publicly hit me up for a new company car. He wanted a big new Chrysler convertible. And with the Brazilian's check still in my sweaty hand and all of them watching, well, I had to agree to it.
But still they didn't go home. Adam took them across the alleyway and showed them our boat. I cringed, and stayed behind. I shortly heard a series of loud "BONGs," and knew that Adam was showing off his ferrocrete again. He'd hand you a big sledge hammer and challenge you to knock a hole in the hull. Nobody could do it, and the hull would ring like a cathedral bell. Remarkable stuff, ferrocrete.
The chairman came back in an hour to tell me that the old engine I had purchased was entirely too inferior for so noble a vessel. He announced that he would be sending us one that was only three years old, that had been rebuilt in his own plant and which incorporated all of the most modern new developments, and complete with transmission, propshaft and propeller. All this as a free gift, in thanks for our excellent workmanship.
Then they all drove over to the Tri-County Airport and hopped a jet for Disneyworld.
SIX
In six weeks, a beautifully rebuilt, late model diesel engine arrived with the freight prepaid. Far more importantly, for the first time in the life of my young company, I could see clear sailing far into the future. With this much business spaced out over two years, I could afford to pick and choose among the other work I took on, with no more dangerous underbidding just to keep my people busy. Also, I was now flush enough so that I didn't have to go begging to the bank for every machine I built.
You see, nobody builds a machine more complicated than a hammer completely by himself. For example, almost every machine bigger than a hand tool has a programmable controller, a small computer, to run it. These are built by companies like Allen-Bradley or Westinghouse, wh
o have spent years and megabucks developing them. It would be absolutely absurd for a tool builder to try and make one of his own unless he was designing a standard machine that he figured he could sell a few thousand copies of. Furthermore, the customer wouldn't want anything that they couldn't buy a replacement for in a hurry. Machines break down, and down time is deadly expensive. The same goes for bearings, motors, hydraulic parts, drives, spindles, cutters, gears, belts and the thousands of other things that go into a machine tool. Often, more than half the selling price of a tool is spent on purchased parts and assemblies.
Thus, to build a machine, you must not only pay your people's salaries and benefits, as well as your overhead, you must also lay out a very substantial slug of cash for purchased parts. This makes you a slave to the bankers, a bland, polished and thoroughly despicable brand of quasihumanity. But now I was free, free at last, or so I thought.
I told Helen that from then on, I would be spending a lot more time with her, and asked her to pick out a cruise that we could go on together, sort of like a second honeymoon. I was sure that our relationship was on the upswing.
I was then contacted again by the Brazilians, who had yet another profitable order for me, and also a desperate request to speed up the previously agreed on delivery schedule. They offered some nice bonuses for it, but they wanted all of their machines delivered by yesterday, if not the day before.
Well, you try to keep your customers satisfied. We went over our schedules, and by building all of the lines in parallel rather than sequentially, by not accepting any other new work, by temporarily renting more factory space, by hiring a lot more new people, by farming out a lot of the parts to my friendly competitors, and by floating a bodacious loan with the bank, we could get all of their work out in six months.
The Fata Morgana Page 3
