What Could Be Going Wrong – Part 1

When I began my career at The Gill Corporation my position was supervisor of Line #2. We had a huge (for us at that time) order for 990Cs. They used olive-green resin that was mixed in 450# batches. We started the order and mixed a couple of batches so that we could go straight through the order. We made the laminates with the first batch and then started to use the second batch. When the first sheet came out, it was a different color. We stopped immediately and tried to figure out what was happening.

We tried to determine what was going on and eventually we had 9 batches of resin sitting around – each a different shade of olive-green. The solution was simple … blend the colors together by putting 50# from each batch into a new can. We ran the order and shipped it to the University of California- San Francisco.

We figured out what was making each batch different – it was the order in which we added the pigments. Seems obvious now, but it wasn’t at that time. During this whole process, I learned one of the most valuable lessons in working life and I’ll tell you about it next time.