Warning: Hit 500 PSI on a hydrotest and it told me more than I wanted to know

I was pressure testing a used boiler drum last Tuesday for a job in Gary, Indiana. Got it up to 500 PSI and heard a hiss that turned into a steady drip from a seam I'd patched two months ago. That patch job cost me $300 in materials and now I'm looking at a full re-weld or a replacement section. Anyone else ever trust a repair that looked fine but failed under real pressure?

3 comments

3 Comments

lily_cooper20d ago

That bit about "told me more than I wanted to know" really hit home. I had a buddy who patched a crack in his old truck's radiator, looked solid for weeks till he took it up a mountain pass and it let go halfway. Sometimes you just gotta accept that a cheap fix is just a fancy bandaid waiting to fail when you need it most lol.

karen_carter20d agoTop Commenter

Totally agree @lily_cooper, same thing happened with a buddy's carburetor - he kept pouring cheap seafoam in instead of just rebuilding it, then it died on him during a road trip and left him stranded for hours.

walker.julia20d ago

Oh man, that mountain pass story is brutal. @lily_cooper what happened after the radiator let go, did he catch it before the engine cooked itself? I always wonder with those quick fixes if the risk is worth the temporary peace of mind. Like patching a tire with a plug kit, it might hold for a while but I'd never trust it on a highway trip.