My eyes on the door counterbalance assembly
With one hand outstretched towards my partner
Who put my requested ratchet into my hand
I put the tools to work right away
It was below freezing inside the fuselage of the old Lockheed L1011
And I had the shivers already
For some reason it always seemed even colder than it really was
Up inside the dark and still metal air-frames out on the ramp
All awaiting their eventual fate of the scrapper and his cutter
The first four bolts on the spring loaded counterbalance came out easily
Leading me to believe it would be easy as pie
But the last fastener came out hard
Which I just chalked up to it being the last one
So of course it would be harder
Because that's the way things work, right?
The Lockheed maintenance manual paperwork fluttered on the floor next to my tool bag
Silently mocking me
Though I didn't realize it
I asked my partner to reach up and wrench on the last bolt while I held onto the counterweight assembly
There was a bit of weight to it and I didn't want to drop it
Though from the looks of it
It would do more damage to the floor than the floor to it
I grasped the sides of the short cylindrical part
My fingers naturally resting on the safety wire that criss-crossed it's barrel
Going from fastener to fastener in pairs
Little pig tails of twisted wire sticking out of every other bolt head
The bolt was almost out
"Boy, this sure seems bound up...."
My partner started to say
But just then the last bolt popped out with an audible
"Thunk!"
And for half a second I didn't realize what was happening
As I tried to maintain my grip upon the now madly spinning counterbalance
I yanked my hands away with a yell
Pressing them into my thighs briefly
But that made them hurt worse
The palms and fingers of my hands felt frostbitten
I looked at them in surprise and shock
They both looked like I had tried to grab a belt sander
White chunks of abraded skin hanging off everywhere
Red stripes of shallow cuts running across both hands
I looked up at the counterbalance
Still secure in it's place
Obviously held in by design as well as those five bolts
When we had removed that last bolt
The counterbalance
Still anchored by the large gear to the toothed door track
Had spun in place as it unwound all the tension on it's internal torsion spring
And all those bolt heads, and their little metal wire pigtails on the barrel of the part
Had done their best to shred my hands as they tried in vain to hold it in place
The shock was wearing off
And both of my hands were starting to feel a burning sensation
I wrapped two clean rags around them and pouted
While my partner looked at the counterbalance
Then at me
Then picked up our paperwork
His eyes scanned the words and ordered steps on the first page
"Oh, here it is. It says 'Caution: Insert retaining pin into locking hole on assembly; or unwinding spring could damage equipment or personnel'"
I made a face and swore at him
He laughed at me as he tossed my tools back into my bag
And started making his way back forward
With me in tow
Time for him to head back in
And find himself a new partner
In order to try again
To harvest one of the tightly spring loaded hand shredders
I mumbled something about
"There ought to be a warning....."
As he climbed down the ladder
To which he laughed
Because there had been one
We just hadn't read it
No comments:
Post a Comment