Sean Delaney: Testing twist locks

Follow Sean's weekly blog as he completes a three-year advanced manufacturing apprenticeship.

Week ending February 19

This week, we’ve tested the twist locks on a container for intermediate level nuclear waste. This was interesting because it’s the largest object I’ve been involved in testing and because it was conducted off site where it was built. It was tested off site because it would have been difficult to move such a large and heavy object to the AMRC, only to return it once the test was complete. The test involved jacking up an I beam which was sat on a pedestal on the floor of the container. The I beam had twist locks attached at both ends with load cells in between to measure the force applied, which simulates the force applied to the twist locks when transporting the containers.