Rust: The Longest War
2 journalers for this copy...
I got this softcover at Barnes and Noble. Looks to be a history of the battle against corrosion...
Later: This was a very enjoyable book, dealing with rust in its iron-oxide form and in its more general use as any type of oxidation of metal. It includes accounts of oxidation issues great and small, from the discovery of the Statue of Liberty's corrosion concerns to the development of cans that can safely contain a variety of substances, many of them corrosive in themselves, without exploding. (Yes, this book presents more fears than simply those of having a bridge collapse under you - though that's here too!)
The book touches on the discovery of oxidation, the invention of stainless steel, the marvelously intricate art of tweaking the coatings inside cans to hold soda, beer, soup, milk, and more without either self-destructing or changing the flavor of the contents. (The concerns about whether these coatings leach any contaminants into the foods themselves are also mentioned, as if we didn't have enough to worry about.)
Given all the scientific and commercial data, I was pleased to find lots of humor, too; the author clearly enjoys some of the aspects of the work. There's a bit in the extensive "can" section (which focuses on the Ball company and on its tightly-controlled "Can School") about the degree of accuracy in tasting differences between products before and after canning; this includes a note that canned cat food has "particularly low levels of taint" due to finicky felines {wry grin}.
Fun fact: it's probably best NOT to store pull-tab cans on their sides, as the scoring around the opening renders the coating weaker; if they sit too long with the contents up against the thinner bits of the lid, you could wind up with a nice mess to clean up.
Another excellent section deals with rust as art, with the author interviewing photographer Alyssha Csuk - and accompanying her on an illicit visit to the decaying remains of the Bethlehem Steel plant.
Then there's the chapter on the robotic "pig" that crawls through the Alaskan pipeline scanning for weaknesses. And there's more - a nicely varied and quite fascinating book!
Later: This was a very enjoyable book, dealing with rust in its iron-oxide form and in its more general use as any type of oxidation of metal. It includes accounts of oxidation issues great and small, from the discovery of the Statue of Liberty's corrosion concerns to the development of cans that can safely contain a variety of substances, many of them corrosive in themselves, without exploding. (Yes, this book presents more fears than simply those of having a bridge collapse under you - though that's here too!)
The book touches on the discovery of oxidation, the invention of stainless steel, the marvelously intricate art of tweaking the coatings inside cans to hold soda, beer, soup, milk, and more without either self-destructing or changing the flavor of the contents. (The concerns about whether these coatings leach any contaminants into the foods themselves are also mentioned, as if we didn't have enough to worry about.)
Given all the scientific and commercial data, I was pleased to find lots of humor, too; the author clearly enjoys some of the aspects of the work. There's a bit in the extensive "can" section (which focuses on the Ball company and on its tightly-controlled "Can School") about the degree of accuracy in tasting differences between products before and after canning; this includes a note that canned cat food has "particularly low levels of taint" due to finicky felines {wry grin}.
Fun fact: it's probably best NOT to store pull-tab cans on their sides, as the scoring around the opening renders the coating weaker; if they sit too long with the contents up against the thinner bits of the lid, you could wind up with a nice mess to clean up.
Another excellent section deals with rust as art, with the author interviewing photographer Alyssha Csuk - and accompanying her on an illicit visit to the decaying remains of the Bethlehem Steel plant.
Then there's the chapter on the robotic "pig" that crawls through the Alaskan pipeline scanning for weaknesses. And there's more - a nicely varied and quite fascinating book!
I'm adding this to the Biographies of Things bookbox, which will be on its way to its next stop after the Memorial Day weekend. Enjoy!
Why are there so many books I want to read in this box? This one sounds interesting, AND gets a thumbs up from Gory? okay...I will hunt around my collection to find another book to put in the box so I can take this one :-)
