Electralloy furnaces approved for Arsenal cannon production

SALVOU.S. Army Watervliet Arsenal
March 2016
Story on Page 3
Public-Private
Partner
"Electralloy"
is about to heat things
up here
Tracy Rudolph, president and chief operations officer, and Col. Lee H. Schiller Jr.

Salvo March 31, 2016
The Arsenal Salvo is an authorized monthly publication for members of
the Department of Defense. Contents of the Salvo are not necessarily the
official views of, or an endorsement by the U.S. Government, the Depart-
ment of Defense, the Department of the Army, or the Watervliet Arsenal.
News may be submitted for publication by sending articles to Public
Affairs Officer, 1 Buffington Street, Bldg. 10, Watervliet, NY 12189, or
stop by office #102, Bldg. 10, Watervliet Arsenal. The editor may also be
reached at (518) 266-5055 or by e-mail: john.b.snyder.civ@mail.mil. The
editor reserves the right to edit all information submitted for publication.
Commander, Col. Lee H. Schiller Jr.
Public Affairs Officer, John B. Snyder
Editor, John B. Snyder
Photographer: John B. Snyder
Arsenal Facebook Page @
https://www.facebook.com/WatervlietArsenal?ref=hl
Cover photo by: John B. Snyder
Colonel
Lee H. Schiller Jr.
Commanding
Manufacturer 6
Commander’s Corner
Just about everyone here, travels past our fire de-
partment every week. For many here, they probably
do not think twice about the firefighters who often
work 48 or 72-hour shifts to ensure that our work en-
vironment is safe. Nevertheless, this group of quiet
professionals has a significant
effect on the quality of our
work environment.
If you would take a moment
to think about the awesome
responsibility that this group
of firefighters have here, you
would be simply amazed at
what this small team achieves
every day. Seventy-two build-
ings, many of which house in-
dustrial operations, and about
1,200 workers are the immedi-
ate concern of every firefighter.
But when they aren’t con-
ducting personal training, CPR
training for the workforce,
or working with building fire
marshals, they are responding to calls for assistance.
Last year alone, this team responded to more than 400
calls for assistance from on and off post.
Despite the tremendous capability this team offers
us and the community, I am proud to tell you that we
are about to make this team stronger. We have fund-
ing to increase the size and therefore, the capability of
our fire station.
Although these changes
will not happen overnight, I
don’t want you to wait before
you get too excited about our
firefighting force. They strive
to not only improve their in-
dividual skills, they also want
to improve their value to the
Arsenal. Challenge them by
asking them to provide you or
your team instruction on CPR,
basic lifesaving, fire extin-
guisher training, or anything
else you can think of that will
challenge them.
Finally, as good as this
team is, they can’t protect the
entire Arsenal without your
support. Everyone here is a
safety officer. You are the firefighters’ eyes and ears
throughout the Arsenal. If you see something, say
something, even if you are not 100 percent certain of
the situation.

Story continues on page 4, “P3”
By John B. Snyder
Forge Operator Matthew Briscoe picking up a heated 155mm tube from an Electralloy furnace. From there, Briscoe loaded the tube into the
rotary forge for further processing. What is new is that Electralloy's furnaces were recently approved for 155mm howitzer systems, both self-
propelled and towed howitzer systems. Electralloy has three furnaces located here.
Photo by John B. Snyder
Arsenal turns to its partner,
Electralloy, to reduce costs,
improve capacity
The Watervliet Arsenal announced this month that
heat furnaces owned by the Arsenal’s public-private
partner, Electralloy, have been approved by the U.S.
Army for military cannon manufacturing.
“What this means is that after significant testing
we have learned that we can now use Electralloy’s
furnaces to support our cannon production for the
155mm self-propelled and towed howitzer systems,”
said Joseph Turcotte, the Watervliet Arsenal’s deputy
commander. “The tests went so well that we believe
we will be able to decrease our forge production time
by nearly 25 percent, while using low-cost natural gas
to heat the furnaces, both of which will significantly
reduce the cost of production for those two weapon
systems.”
In the past two years, Electralloy has invested
millions of dollars to install three state-of-the-art
furnaces here, as well as upgrading other forge-area
operations, said Tracy Rudolph, the president and
chief operating officer of Electralloy.
Through this public-private partnership or P3,
which was renewed in 2015 for a 20-year period,
Electralloy uses the Arsenal’s workforce, as well as
the facility’s rotary forge, to produce high-temperature
alloys such as nickel, stainless, and Nitronic® grades
for a variety of demanding end-use applications.
Additionally, Electralloy and the Arsenal were
certified by the American Bureau of Shipping (ABS)
in 2015 to produce stainless steel forgings for marine
applications.
Rudolph added that the relationship his company
has with the Arsenal has gone far beyond the original
agreement.

P3 Cont.
“This partnership, which is rich in interpersonal
relations, has grown far beyond my expectations that I
had four years ago when I first made contact with the
Arsenal,” Rudolph said. “Because of the great, positive
working environment here, we have been able to grow
our capacity by nearly 70 percent in just two years.”
Turcotte said he is so pleased with the results of
the recent tests that he is challenging his team to test
other production line requirements, such as the 120mm
Abrams Tank gun, and the 105mm tubes used for the
Stryker main gun systems and AC-130 gunships.
The Arsenal and Electralloy have been working to-
gether since 2013 in a public-private partnership.
As intended, the partnership between Watervliet and
Electralloy is proving to be beneficial to both parties.
Electralloy has been able to make investments in and
utilize the Arsenal’s forge equipment, while the Arse-
nal has been able to retain critical forging skills in an
era of declining defense requirements. Now with the
approved furnace use, the Arsenal will also be able to
lower the cost of operations.
The volume of forging work that Electralloy has
generated since partnering with Watervliet has in large
part allowed the Arsenal to hire 25 full-time employees
who are now well-versed in forging operations.
This Watervliet Arsenal effort reinforces recent
statements by Acting Secretary of the Army Patrick
Murphy in regards to creating more synergy with pub-
lic-private partners to save money in an era of declining
budgets.
"Public-private partnerships truly have a practical
value ... (they) will make our Army more efficient, in-
vesting fewer dollars to accomplish the same outcomes.
We want to make every dollar count," Murphy said on
March 17 to members of the military and industry who
attended the Association of the United States Army's
Global Force Symposium and Exposition in Huntsville,
Ala.
Today's Arsenal is relied upon by U.S. and foreign
militaries to produce the most advanced, high-tech,
high-powered weaponry for cannon, howitzer, and
mortar systems. This National Historic Registered
Landmark had $138 million in revenue in fiscal year
2015 and has an annual economic benefit to the local
community in excess of $100 million.
Electralloy — G.O. Carlson Inc. company — is a
producer of custom and specialized alloy tubular and
bar products that are used in critical, sea-worthy ap-
plications, such as the advanced Coast Guard Cutter,
aerospace, nuclear, and for Department of Defense ap-
plications.
Helmut Schartlmueller, right, was one of the original
workers from Austria who installed the Arsenal's rotary
forge in the 1970s. He said that he has been working
on forges for more than 42 years and truly loves these
machines. When asked how long the Arsenal's rotary
forge may continue to work, he smiled and said that he
continues to support a forge in Pittsburgh that has been in
operation for more than 66 years. Although he has since
retired from the original manufacturer of the Arsenal's
forge, he said that he has moved to the United States and
continues to service several forges throughout this country
as a freelancer. With Schartlmueller this month, is Dean
Hartman, left, an electronic industrial controls mechanic,
and William Root, a production machinery mechanic.

By John B. Snyder
Story continues on page 6, “Crane”
Crane Operator Antonio Lipari, top, is working with Machinist Bill Sheldon to move a 120mm tube to another machining operation. Despite a
continuous pressure to make delivery dates, when it comes to moving tubes safely, there is not rush.
Military manufacturing is tough, grueling business
as heavy forging machines pound materiel into shape
and milling machines shave hardened metal in cuts
that are often measured in the thousandths of an inch.
But overhead that cauldron of activity on the pro-
duction floors is a balancing act that would rival the
Cirque du Soleil in Las Vegas. Because that’s where
one would find the Arsenal’s crane operators.
Every day, hundreds of large tubes for tank and
field artillery systems are moved or stored on one of
the Watervliet Arsenal’s production floors. And when
the tubes are moved, it becomes marriage, if you will,
as machinists and crane operators become one as they
rig slings and connect hook devices onto tubes ...
tubes that sometimes seem to have a life of their own
once they are lifted.
According to Dave O’Rourke, the Arsenal’s senior
crane operator whose steady nerves were proven in
the jungles of Vietnam where he served as a Marine,
there is never a sense of comfort when slinging and
moving a cannon or howitzer tube.
“I have been a crane operator for 15 years and
there has not been a day when thoughts of runaway
cranes or dropped loads do not cross my mind,”
O’Rourke said. “In my business, you have to ap-
proach each load as if you had never handled that
type of load before. Because if you don’t, compla-
cency may get someone killed.”
A balancing act that
would rival the best
acts in Vegas

Crane Cont.
Left Photo: Crane Operator Charles Moody, top , preparing to move an Electralloy tube that has just come out of the rotary
forge.
Right Photo: Crane Operator Jesus Guerra showing that not all movement of tubes comes from cranes.
Photos by John B. Snyder
Fellow crane operator, Jesus Guerra, echoed
O’Rourke’s concerns as he recalled his last 18 months
here as a crane operator.
“When it comes to moving a load, it doesn’t matter
how much experience the machinist on the floor has
because it is up to us, as crane operators, to ensure the
load is moved safely,” Guerra said. “As cranes and
tubes react differently, you can’t fall into a false sense
of security that what we did yesterday will work to-
day.”
George Pusins, a manufacturing center supervisor
who oversees the crane operation, said that the safe
movement of tubes, which are often valued in excess
of $100,000, is an awesome responsibility not only
due to the cost of the tubes, but also due to the cost of
an injury or loss of life.
“My five-man team safely handle tens of millions
of dollars of product every year,” Pusins said. “But
what I am most proud of is that my team does what
they do with an acute sense of the importance of pro-
tecting every worker here.”
To watch the crane operators in action is like
watching a battle drill in a brigade tactical opera-
tions center. When a light turns on above a machine,
which signals a machinist is complete with a machin-
ing operation and the tube is ready to be moved to the
next machine or location, crane operators immedi-
ately drop what they are doing, climb the ladders, and
put the crane in motion.
In those short moments before a tube is moved,
the crane operator ensures the work area is free of
hazards, the floor along the route is free from tripping
hazards, the load is safely secured and balanced, and
that experienced personnel involved in the transfer,
transition to a role of safety officers, regardless of
their position. It simply becomes a marriage — of
safe, fluid actions.

Arsenal
Firefighters
An occupation
where one needs
to have the best
day of their life,
every day
By John B. Snyder
Being an Arsenal Firefighter means working in an environment
where there are no second chances
Story continues on page 8, “Fire"
Despite their well-known reputation for community
service, firefighters typically do not come face-to-face
with the public until tragedy strikes. Nevertheless,
this sense of inevitability of tragedy is what the Ar-
senal’s firefighters say challenges them to be better
tomorrow than they are today.
“For the most part, thousands of people drive by
our firehouse every week and probably don’t give us a
second thought,” said John Whipple, the Arsenal’s fire
chief. “And so, it usually is not until they are having
the worst day in their lives, when we come face-to-
face with an employee or a member of the commu-
nity.”
Whipple explained that in a time of crisis, the Ar-
senal’s firefighters need to have the best day of their
lives. At first thought, that statement may sound in-
sensitive, but what Whipple means is that all of his
firefighters’ hours of training, years of experience, and
classroom study must come together at the right time
and place to mitigate the pain and suffering someone
is experiencing.
Although the Arsenal’s firefighters have few emer-
gencies that they respond to here, their lives are far
from a life in Sleepy Hollow. Every day they train and
when they aren’t training, they are usually responding
to a mutual aid call off post. In fiscal year 2015, the
Arsenal firefighters responded to nearly 200 calls for
support from outside of the Arsenal fence line.
Fire Chief John Whipple

Fire Cont.
Fire Captain Tim Cuilla said
that when the alarm goes off in the
firehouse the sense of tragedy that
may await them not only raises their
adrenaline level, it also motivates
them to seek a higher level of per-
formance from the last call that they
responded to.
According to Cuilla, there is sig-
nificant value to responding to mutual
aid calls off post that transcend the
immediate value to a resident or busi-
ness owner.
“There is a tremendous training benefit to every
call, even if the call is canceled en route,” Cuilla said.
“As soon as the call arrives, we go into a battle drill
preparing equipment, recalling past experiences and
then visualizing the lessons learned on the current situ-
ation, planning our actions, and communicating our
availability and capability to outside organizations.”
This type of battle drill would be the same process
whether or not the call is canceled, Cuilla said. Each
year, the Arsenal firefighters respond to more than 400
on- and off-post calls.
But as much as the Arsenal firefighters are inte-
grated into the community, they believe they are some-
what different than a local community firefighter. Not
better, just different.
This is not to take anything away from local first
responders, because they do a wonderful job protect-
ing the community and supporting the Arsenal when it
needs assistance, but due to the nature of the Arsenal’s
mission and therefore, its infrastructure, it is important
to be different.
“Because we do not have the daily call volume as
community first responders, we have time to focus
more on prevention versus response,” said Firefighter
Rob Sowle. “From managing a fire marshal program
to conducting CPR training, a lot of our time is inter-
acting with the workforce prior to an emergency in
hopes that it will make us safer.”
The other difference, or what Sowle calls an ad-
vantage, is that due to the heavy focus on prevention,
his team has the luxury of inspecting every building,
which provides Arsenal firefighters with a very good
understanding of how each building is laid out.
Cuilla added, “Community firefighters cannot
visit everyone’s home in advance to map exits and to
identify safety challenges that might preclude a rapid
response. We can here and there isn’t an Arsenal fire-
fighter that doesn’t know the layout of every one of
the 72 buildings here.”
Whipple said he is very pleased with the quality
and professionalism of his small force. Every one of
his firefighters are Emergency Medical Technician or
EMT certified and most have more than 10-years’ ex-
perience as a firefighter. But what he is most pleased
with is something that is hard to measure.
“Not to overuse a former Army tagline, but my
team truly believes in being all that they can be,”
Whipple said. “And that motivates them to train hard
every day, to be better today than they were yesterday.
Better tomorrow than they are today.”
From left, firefighters Jason Moore, Rob Horn, and Matthew Kolodzie demonstrate three of
the types of uniforms that they may need to use when responding to an emergency call.

LEAN Corner...By Karen Heiser
Process Capability, or…..
Ever wonder how so many clowns fit into a seemingly regular car? There’s no hole in the bottom of the car or
a trap door to a hidden room. That would be too easy. But it’s a little more scientific than using sheer force to
cram as many of your friends as possible into a Ford Focus. According to Greg DeSanto, Executive Director of
the International Clown Hall of Fame and Research Center, a clown car is fully functional.
“We remove all of the interior,” explains DeSanto, “including the door panels and the headliner, and paint the
windows except for a small slot for the driver to see through. The driver sits on a milk crate. We remove any in-
terior barrier to the trunk, and we beef up the springs so that the car doesn’t seem to be riding on its bump stops.
Then it’s a matter of shoving in the clowns.”
Let’s say an average clown is five-feet eight inches tall and weighs 158 pounds. Each clown occupies about
three-cubic feet, assuming a 15-inch width and five-inch thickness.
The passenger volume of a 2011 Ford Focus sedan is 93.4 cubic feet, and the trunk capacity is 13.8 cubic feet.
After removal of the seats and the interior panels let’s call it 120 cubic feet of clown space. Theoretically, about
40 clowns should fit into a Focus. Basic math – 120 cubic feet of car/3 cubic feet per clown. There are other
variables because capability is more than just capacity….the clowns need to breathe, carry props and move
enough to get out of the car. If you’re really interested check out http://www.caranddriver.com/features/the-
physics-of-clown-cars-feature. Too many clowns or just a couple of bigger clowns, or a stuffed giraffe you
hadn’t planned for, and the whole formula’s off. So, to achieve your planned capability of 40 clowns in a Focus
you must reduce or eliminate variability.
The same logic applies to the number of cars that fit in a parking lot. It’s not just the total square feet of the sur-
face divided by the average square feet the four wheels need. The square foot allotment per car includes open-
ing doors and maneuvering in and out of a space. Variation – like trucks with trailers or expensive cars parked
diagonally - reduces the accuracy of your lot capability plan.
In manufacturing, process capability is a predictor of how reliably a process can produce good products. Pro-
duction schedules plan delivery based on this calculated capability. Not surprisingly, defects and variation that
interrupt flow make a process unstable and unpredictable.
The lesson here (yes there is one) is that for any process to have a predictable capability you must reduce or
eliminate variability. Variability can come from defects, bad raw material, different ways of running the job….
many sources. Variability is often under-appreciated and causes many, perhaps most, manufacturing difficulties.

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Did you know that SharePoint has a helpful search feature built in that allows you to find
documents that contain a search term in the title as well as in the document itself?
The search bar is located on the upper-right side in SharePoint. To use it, simply enter your search term
and either hit “Enter” or click the small magnifying glass. SharePoint will search for your term in the file
name / title as well as the text in a document.
A new page will open displaying all objects on that page that contain the search term in either the title or
the document. The results are similar to what you would see in a Google search and should be familiar
and easy to navigate. Note that on the left-side you can filter the result type by file type, site, author and
date; this is useful when searching the entire site.
If you have any questions about this or other SharePoint features please contact 266-4000
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Access SharePoint by double-clicking the icon on your Desktop titled “WVA SharePoint” – or by entering
https://tacom.aep.army.mil/sites/watervliet/ in your internet browser’s address bar. When prompted, select your
e-mail certificate to gain access to the WVA SharePoint. You can access the sample below by hovering over “WVA
Documents” in the top navigation and clicking “Controlled Documents”.

CPR: Where learning to do
something, anything saves lives
By John B. Snyder
We are a nation of shoppers. If
anyone has any doubt, all they need to
do is visit a local mall on Black Friday
and see the long lines of shoppers
fighting over heavily discounted
items.
The Watervliet Arsenal
workforce resembles the
nation in that when some-
thing is — “let’s say
“free” —there is a rush
to track down that pre-
cious commodity that
is being offered. That
was evident earlier this
month when the Arse-
nal’s fire department
offered a free cardio-
pulmonary resuscita-
tion or CPR course to
about 20 members of the
workforce. The class was
oversubscribed.
Arsenal Fire Lieuten-
ant Donald Haberski is the
lead instructor for the course,
which he has been providing to
the Arsenal workforce every two months for the last
18 months. The course, which he calls “Save a Life
Instruction,” keeps growing. Not only in interest by
the workforce, but also by the size of the subject mat-
ter.
Haberski explained that in addition to adult CPR
training, he has expanded the course to include train-
ing on infants and children. And what was once train-
ing just for the Arsenal’s security force and summer
camp counselors is now being offered to the 1,300
people who work here.
Given that those 1,300 folks work somewhere on
the Arsenal’s 143-acre footprint and in one of its 72
buildings, Haberski is a man on a mission trying
to get people certified in CPR in every build-
ing and office.
After all, in the first minute or so of
someone collapsing and their breathing
stops, it is critical that CPR is started
to increase the odds of that person
surviving. By the time it takes for the
Fire Department to receive a call and
dispatch an ambulance, precious minutes
of lifesaving may have been squandered
if there was no one there to apply imme-
diate aid.
“The key is to do something, any-
thing,” Haberski said. “Certainly call-
ing 911 is a great first step, but after
that call, CPR must be started im-
mediately, even by someone who is
untrained.”
Just last month in
Washington, a 12-year-
old boy saved his fa-
ther’s life by perform-
ing what the EMTs
called “bystander
CPR.” The boy and
his father were moving their household goods from
one house to another when his father collapsed and
stopped breathing. He had a heart attack.
Without any CPR training, the boy, despite being
very scared, still had the calmness to remember that
he had a cell phone on him. He called 911. The emer-
Story continues on page 12, “CPR"

gency service dispatcher who answered the
call told the boy that he could cry later but
for now, he needed to act and follow instruc-
tions.
The boy performed CPR on his father
until paramedics arrived, which was about
five minutes after his father collapsed. As
the paramedics set up a breathing tube, the
father’s pulse came back and he took his first
breath on his own since he collapsed.
Although CPR was given by someone un-
trained and by a child, a life was saved that
day.
The thought of saving lives is also what
urged many into this month’s CPR class.
“I took a CPR course about five years ago
when I started teaching a motorcycle safety
course because I wanted to be prepared just
in case something happened when I was teach-
ing,” said Colin McCarthy, a fourth-year ap-
prentice. “I was surprised at how much the CPR
process had changed over the years. But with
the new certification, I believe that I am better
prepared to help others.”
McCarthy added that he wished more people
would get CPR certified, just in case something
ever happened to him.
Matthew Day, an Arsenal visual informa-
tion specialist, said he took the course so that he
could help others. Earlier this year, Day arrived
at a car-accident site. Instead of being a “looky
lou,” he got out of his car and helped the injured.
“I came away that day with a feeling that I
wanted to do more to help others,” Day said.
“I plan to become a volunteer firefighter in my
community and I thought that having CPR train-
ing would help me become a better firefighter.”
Haberski said that he has trained more than 160 people
in the last 18 months, which is a little over 10 percent of
the total workforce at the Arsenal. But he has seen the
interest in the CPR training significantly grow in recent
months and expects the numbers to dramatically grow in
the future.
Nevertheless, he shouldn’t have to make too hard of a
sell because who could not justify spending a few short
hours of their time that may one day save someone’s life.
And did we say the course is “free.”
CPR Cont.
Page 12 Salvo March 31, 2016
Photos by John B. Snyder

Come watch the Arsenal commander as he
attempts to hit the ice with the puck

Electralloy furnaces approved for Arsenal cannon production

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Electralloy furnaces approved for Arsenal cannon production