Discontinuities Jokes

The weld had porosity. It was full of holes and still insisted it was solid.

Slag inclusions are the only things in the weld that feel left out and included at the same time.

Incomplete fusion is just a weld with commitment issues.

The plate looked solid until a lamination showed it had layers of hidden meaning.

Undercut is the weld's way of cutting corners, one groove at a time.

Corrosion is the original slow burn.

A fatigue crack is proof that persistence pays off, a little more every cycle.

Hydrogen cracking is the only discontinuity that waits until everyone has gone home.

Pitting corrosion is a small problem with a deep reputation.

Nonrelevant indications are the ones that show up, make noise, and leave without ever being written on a report.

What's the difference between a discontinuity and a defect?

Why did the welder blame the wind?

Why can't slag keep a secret?

What did the base metal say to the weld bead that never fused?

Why was the crack so confident?

Why was the lamination so quiet?

What does corrosion do on its day off?

Why did the undercut apologize to the base metal?

Why did the crack file a complaint?

A perfect weld is a myth. A weld with only acceptable discontinuities is a Tuesday.

Discontinuities are innocent until proven rejectable.

Cluster porosity is what happens when the gas bubbles all go out together.

A crack is the discontinuity that never needs the acceptance table to be rejected.

The only thing worse than finding a crack is finding it the day after the report was signed.

Corrosion under insulation is the problem you can't see, but it knows you're coming.

You might be an inspector if you've ever looked at a cracked sidewalk and felt professionally responsible.

You might be an inspector if you describe a messy room as "lots of relevant indications, no acceptance criteria."

You might be a welder if you've ever said "it's just a little porosity" and meant the whole bead.

You might be an NDT tech if you've ever described a chipped coffee mug as "mostly surface-breaking."

The welder asked the inspector if the porosity was acceptable. "It's a discontinuity," said the inspector. "So it's fine?" "It's a discontinuity." "Is it a defect?" "Let me check the table." He checked. "It's a defect." "You said it was just a discontinuity." "It was," said the inspector, "before I read the table."

The inspector found the indication on the third pass, circled it, and waved the welder over. The welder squinted. 'Is that a scratch?' The inspector rubbed the spot. Nothing changed. The welder rubbed it. Still there. 'Okay,' said the welder. 'That's a very stubborn scratch.'

The inspector found a lamination in the incoming plate. The receiving clerk checked the order. 'It says one plate.' 'It's two,' said the inspector. 'They just aren't speaking.'

The new technician reported forty indications on his first day. "They're all geometry," said the senior inspector. "The root, the counterbore, and the edge of the weld face." "But they're there," said the new technician. "Yes," said the senior inspector. "First lesson: being there is not the same as being relevant."

The inspector measured the remaining wall under the pump house floor. 'Remaining thickness is 0.210 inch,' he said. 'Required is 0.250.' 'How far off is that?' asked the apprentice. 'Forty thousandths,' said the inspector. 'About ten sheets of paper, all of them missing.'

Discontinuity (n.): What it's called when you find something and haven't opened the code book yet.

Defect (n.): A discontinuity that lost the argument with the acceptance criteria.

Nonrelevant Indication (n.): A signal with no connection to the discontinuity you wanted, like a stranger at a family reunion.

Porosity (n.): A weld with more holes than a colander and the same confidence about holding things together.

Knock, knock.
Who's there?
Slag.
Slag who?

Knock, knock.
Who's there?
Porous.
Porous who?

Knock, knock.
Who's there?
Lack.
Lack who?

Round dots on the film,
the shielding gas left early
and left these behind.

Slag hides in the groove
beneath the next pass, and waits
for the film to talk.

Said a discontinuity, with a sigh,
"I'm no defect, so please pass me by."
But the table said, "No,
You are too long, you know."
Now it's rejected. Goodbye.

Corrosion never takes a day,
It works while others are away.
So check the wall, and check it twice;
Thin steel is not a good surprise.

Are you a discontinuity? Because I can't decide if you're acceptable, but I keep measuring you.

Are you a lamination? Because I know there's more to you than the surface.

Ever notice that the discontinuity the client worries about is never the one that matters, and the one nobody mentions ends up as item twelve in the report?

Nobody warns you that half of inspection is drawing a map so someone else can find what you found.

Ever notice that the crack always shows up on the one day the lighting is perfect and the client is watching?

Corrosion under insulation is the original cover-up.

Jacket peeled away,
rust has painted the pipe wall.
The schedule turns pale.

That pipe elbow has had a rough life. Everything keeps running into it.

Why was the boiler tube so sensitive?

A delamination is just a laminate that needed some space.

Why is a fatigue crack the most dedicated employee on the bridge?

An inspector found a crack at the end of a cover plate and marked it with a paint pen. Fifteen years later, the next inspector found the faded paint stripe and a crack that had not grown an inch. 'So it's stable,' said the owner. 'That's what the last report said,' said the inspector. 'That's why I'm measuring it again.'

Fracture-Critical Member (n.): A bridge part with no backup plan, which is why the inspector has several.

Nobody warns you that a tiny pit on the leading edge looks like nothing from the rope and like a novel in the report.

A forging with a lap proves some parts just fold under pressure.

A supplier shipped 500 brackets with a certificate saying every one was perfect. The inspector found a cracked one on the third part. 'Statistical outlier,' said the supplier. The inspector held it up. 'It's also a bracket.' The supplier took the whole lot back.

Nobody warns you that the casting with the beautiful finish is the one with the porosity, and the ugly one is perfect.

A foundry shipped castings with pride,
All polished and shiny outside.
But the film, when we shot,
Showed a pore-filled spot,
And the inspector quietly sighed.

What is a rail inspector's favorite kind of rail flaw?

Nobody warns you that rail flaws are like trains: you wait for one, and three show up together.

Ever notice the vessel is opened on day three and the findings show up on day twenty-eight?

The old girder told the inspector it was tired.

The inspector found a tiny crack at the end of a weld on the girder. She marked it, photographed it, and radioed the lead. 'How big?' he asked. 'About a quarter inch.' 'Anything to worry about?' She looked at the traffic, the sky, and the schedule. 'Not today,' she said. 'But I'll be writing about it for a month.'

At year-end the production line gets so busy that even the castings feel the pressure.

Why is steel plate such a good listener?

What is a tilted crack's favorite probe?

You might be an Ultrasonic Testing technician if...

Corrosion at last.
The gauge reads half what it should.
The weekend is gone.

Why did the crack escape the eddy current probe?

What does an eddy current technician say about a tube missing a chunk of wall?

Tube after tube clean.
One small pit near the support.
The report gets long.

A flaw is like a good secret.

Why did the beam quit in the coarse-grained casting?

I like my radiographs the way I like my opinions: sharp, well exposed, and free of artifacts.

Artifact (n.): Any mark on the film that was not there when you started and is definitely there now.

Magnetic particles are gossips. They gather wherever there's a leak.

At a crack, the part's field leaks out. It's finally letting its guard down.

Why does Magnetic Particle Testing prefer a crack across the field?

What did the crack say when the particles piled up on it?

In Magnetic Particle Testing, everything attracts attention, but only some of it is relevant.

A part with magnetic writing is the only part that's good at leaving notes.

A nonrelevant indication is just a particle having a conversation that doesn't concern you.

The inspector found a long, bright indication on a shaft. She marked it, photographed it, and was drafting the report when a coworker leaned in and pulled a paper clip off the part. 'Nice crack,' he said. She rewrote the report. The paper clip has been on her checklist ever since.

Developer is the best listener in the shop. It gets every crack to open up and tell its story.

Bleed-out is just a crack finally showing its colors.

Dirt in a crack is the part's best lawyer. It keeps the penetrant from testifying.

Penetrant Testing only has surface-level relationships. If a discontinuity doesn't break the surface, we never meet.

What did the penetrant say to the impatient inspector?

How do you tell a crack from a fingerprint on a penetrant part?

Why did the inspector wear gloves during penetrant inspection?

Why did the crack stay hidden?

Why do cracks lose at hide-and-seek in Penetrant Testing?

The penetrant didn't find the crack. It just helped the crack introduce itself.

'Every casting has an indication at the same spot,' said the new inspector. The Level III looked at where each casting hung on the rack. 'Then it isn't the casting,' she said. 'It's the hook.' The new inspector wrote 'check the hook' in her notebook.

Relevant Indication (n.): Something you can't wipe off, explain away, or blame on the previous shift.

Nonrelevant Indication (n.): A glowing, dramatic mark that has no business in your report, like a coworker's opinion about the weather.

Knock knock.
Who's there?
Wick.
Wick who?

Nobody warns you that explaining the difference between a relevant and a nonrelevant indication takes longer than finding it.

Every inspector has found a crack that turned out to be a hair, and a hair that turned out to be a crack.

The inspector found a dark line along the weld toe. Before writing anything, he wiped it with a solvent rag. Pencil. He cleaned the next one. Also pencil. On the third, the welder admitted he'd been doing his math on the pipe.

Low light skims the weld,
a ridge of shadow appears:
undercut confessed.

A weld seemed quite sound to the eye,
With no flaw that a glance could spy.
Then a light, held down low,
Made the undercut show,
And the welder said, "Grinder, stand by."

Ever notice that a crack is a lot more visible once somebody has told you it's there?

Alternating Current Field Measurement found the crack right through the paint. It was a field day.

Why did the Magnetic Flux Leakage scanner find the pit so quickly?

The new Level II proudly showed the Level III an indication. 'Is this a defect?' The Level III studied it for a full minute. 'It's a discontinuity.' 'Is it a defect?' 'Let's find out.' He opened the code book. 'Rejected.' The Level II beamed. 'So I was right!' 'No,' said the Level III. 'The code was right. You were just standing near it.'

Ever notice the Level III is always the calmest person at a failure? That's not wisdom. That's the third time she's seen it.

The inspector found a discontinuity and checked the code. Table 6.1: acceptable. The client, thrilled, asked, 'So it passes?' 'It's a discontinuity, not a defect.' 'But it's a flaw?' 'Everything is a flaw,' said the inspector. 'This one just fits in the table.'

The weld looked great on the surface. It was going through a lot underneath.

Porosity in a weld is just the weld's way of saying it needed some air.

You might be a welder if you've ever said 'It'll grind out' with total confidence.

Undercut (n.): A groove at the weld toe, and what your confidence gets when the inspector arrives.

The client asked for a flexible scope of work.

What did the casting say to the inspector?

Why are heat exchanger tubes bad at keeping secrets?

Ever notice that operations measures a thin spot in mils and maintenance measures it in weekends?

The turbine blade inspector was always on edge. Leading edge, to be exact.

Why do feedwater heater tubes never win arguments?

Ever notice that a boiler has miles of tubes, and the one that needs attention is always at the far end of the last row?

Tap, tap, tap, then thud.
The panel hides a secret.
The hangar goes still.

Why does a delaminated bridge deck make a hollow sound?

Ever notice a turbine blade looks smooth from the ground and like a road map from a rope?

Why was the casting so honest on the Radiographic Testing film?

A rail inspector drove forty miles on hi-rail to check one reported crack. She found it, measured it, wrote it up, and drove forty miles back. Her supervisor asked how it went. 'Smallest crack, longest drive,' she said. 'It all comes out evenly on the report: one line.'

The demo part has exactly one discontinuity, and the salesperson knows exactly where it is.