I'm sure everybody is familiar with the fact that compressed gas cylinders are required to be tested periodically, and the date is then stamped into the metal. I was working in the garage today, using the torch, and when I was done, I just happened to glance at the test dates on the oxygen bottle. They go from last year, back to "1-17"! I first noticed the row with 32, and 37, etc, but then I looked closer and saw the next row over. I highlighted the dates with my kid's sidewalk chalk so you can read them. I've had tanks older than myself, but this is the first one I've seen that appears to be older than my Dad. Anybody have reason to affirm or dispute what the dates stamped on this tank are telling me?
LoL, gives new meaning to the phrase "they don't make things like they used to".
Did ATCO stamp the "1-17" in that bottle?
Nope, I was off that week.
Hey if they didn't blow up they are still good.
I've seen a lot of them in the '20s, but I don't remember any from the teens. Usually if you get a heavy bottle, it'll be old.
Maybe I should've posted it in "Old Iron"? I was just astounded to see something that old, still being used just as if it was brand new. Just think of the generations of people and machines that have come and gone since 1917, and this tank is still just doing what it was made for. I wish it could talk. I'd love to know where it's been and what it's seen...
Let's see there. Means it went through WW I, the depression, WW II, Korea, Viet Nam, Dessert Storm, Iraq and Afganistan let alone trips into space and tothe moon. What a life.
I never would have believed it but there it is in green and white. A quick search revealed that a DOT AA grade oxygen bottle has an unlimited life and tested every 5 years. HT= 24 year life, CO=15 years.
That's old, I myself always look at the dates,I was told ,not sure if correct, when I pointed out a Nazi symbol that was stamped in a old oxy tank,I was told the tanks were from the war?
The swastika was the symbol for a Linde bottle. After the war they re-stamped with extra lines so they looked like a square with cross in the center. I don't remember seeing a bottle that old either. If that 17 holds as being the original year, it was born before my father.
John c was linde bottle a type of bottle manufacture? or a company that serviced the bottle? now that you mention it I have seen bottles with the Nazi symbol squared off,I wonder how rare the ones are that are not?
Linde is/was until resent times a German Co.that sold welding supply's.I have seen nitrogen bottles back to 1909 and that was the first 10 year inspection.It was also a linde bottle
Wikipedia article about Carl von Linde
Interesting reading. I didn't know that Linde developed the ammonia refrigeration process and the development of refrigeration by using the process of allowing a compressed gas to expand, the very same method of refrigeration, such as air conditioning systems, that we use today.
Over here I pay about $170.00 per bottle per year for service (rental) charges..... x 94yrs = $15980.00 Those poor gas companies must be doing it tough
My bottles are owned and all I pay for is the gas. As stated Linde was the company name and the swastika was the company logo. After the war they changed the logo. One of the welding instructors I had many years ago showed us that with a bottle that had the top sawed off. The wall thickness was impressive. I don't recall the date on the bottle though.
Possibly the month and day date ?
Wikipedia article about the swastika. Swastikas were in use long before Hitler adopted the symbol for the Nazi party. Certainly, since then, it's been a good idea to try and distance one's self from that symbolism. You mean like the 17th of January? No, the marks indicate month and year.
Everything fits for an AA cylinder.....its got to be legit. Unlimited life, 5 year inspection. The dates higher than 31 would be hard to fit into a month/day thingy.
I think the swastika goes back into the mid 1800's or before. I recal seeing them on American Indian things. The only diffrence is the they had the flat lines at 12, 3, 6 and 9 o'Clock where the nazi ones were were rotated about half way in betwee.
The swastika itself goes back many, many years. It is the rotation that determines the meaning of it. In the mid 2000's I sold a house to an Indian couple that was Hindu. Before they moved in they painted a red swastika (the Hindu version which is rotated differently than the Nazi version) on the front door as part of their house "warming" ritual. Needless to say that raised a few eyebrows of folks that didn't understand that the swastika is an old symbol, dating way before the Nazi's highjacked it.