Adventure? Nah, It's Part of My Job

If you notice from some of my previous articles, I have been complaining a hell lot about the low activity level at my work place (in short, not much work to do). Pretty boring stayin in the office whole day long doing nothing. Makes u feel even more sleepier and all the energy wil jsut drain off. Tats what i have been facing for the past 2 months plua. It's a bit funny as my current position requires me to go to site, but this is my third month here and yet i havent got the chance to step to any site yet.

But not anymore. I have just been transfered to another team early last month and there is an ongoing project currently. Woo hoo~~ Spent the first few weeks doing some paperwork (pretty clueless and question marks keep on popping above my head most of the time), but at least i was occupied with works. Finally, i feel appreciated and acknowledged by the company. Hehe. I can't go on forever drawing a blind salary doing nothing, can I? But still, doing paperworks such as documentation, speadsheets, printing drawings, plus staying in the office whole day can be rather boring. And again, my motivation level is beginnig to show signs of declination. But thank god one of my colleague asked me to help him out at the site. Yippee~~~ Finally, I have the chance to don the company jacket and go out jalan jalan.

Grabbed a hard hat (those construction helmet) and took a ride on our company car. Err, not exactly a luxuriuos car. Not even a proton. Instead, its a worn out Suzuki Jimmy. Malfunction air cond. Cushion seat is all torn off. Bumpy ride as it has a hard suspension. Typical characteristic of a 4WD.

Just some info regarding my current project - Our company's scope of work was to construct steel structures for a methanol plant for our client, Petronas at Labuan.

And some info on the flow of the work- We wil procure (buy) the raw materials, and these materials wil be sent to the fabrication yard. Over here at the workshop, these raw materials wil be fabricated according to the drawings/engineering designs. Once the fabrication works completed, these steel structures wil be sent for hot-dip galvanization (which literally means, dipping into hot galvanized pool). Yup, steel can rust easily if exposed to weather, therefore the galvanizing process will keep these steel from rusty. After these steel has been galvanized, they wil be transported to a freight forwarder company for packing and bundling. After packing/bundling, they wil be sent to the port to be shipped out to Labuan.

It wil take about one week to reach Labuan. Then once these goods arrived at Labuan, our ppl at Labuan site will erect these structures accordingly. Tats basically the whole picture of wat our company do. Of coz there are lots of things which i hav left out of the picture as it is quite impossible to type out all the things from A to Z. Wont go deep into all this technical stuff as it is rather boring i say. :)

Here are some of the photos of the places that i went.


Steel structures after being fabricated at the workshop.


Steel structures stacked up at the galvanizing shop. Notice all the orangy-redish colour? Those are the signs of oxidation or rust in layman terms.


These steel has to undergo a chemical treatment prior to galvanising. They have to be dipped into certain chemical which wil remove the rust from the surface.
One can notice a very pungent smell here as those acids interact with the rust and corrode them.


After acid treatment, they are dipped into a pool of hot molten galvanize. These galvanised liquid can reach temperature of 400 plus degree Celcius. As the steel are dipped into the pool, bubbles wil start to form on the liquid surface and burst. If one is standing too near, he/she better pray hard that these burst bubble wont hit them. Ouch~


Voila!! Finised product of hot-dip galvanizing. Shining like brand new!


Packaging/bundling/tagging being done at the freight forwarder's yard


Goods finally being sent to the port to be shipped out


A peek into the ship

Working under the hot sun, sweating all over, driving in a almost worn out Suzuki Jimmy without aircond, bumpy rides, dirty condition of sites, smells of acids, running around under the sun, going to the port, walking around on the ship checking stuff, hand getting dirtied. I just love it. For first time, I felt so alive. Hahahaha.