The lab review of the hydraulic connection and pump arrived. The connection showed no defects other than a catastrophic failure. They could see no defect in manufacture or any metal fatigue. They destructively tested the other connections, one failed at 3400, the other at 3600 pounds of pressure, nearly twice the system pressure. They had taken it up to 1800 pounds, then started increasing the pressure in steps of 200 pounds at ten minute intervals. Clearly the connector had held well beyond it’s ratings and reasonable safety margins.

All three had failed in the same spot, a weak point, indicating the remainder of the connection was engineered to handle the pressure well above that. A check of the pump showed it was not defective in any way. As a further test they lowered it’s supply voltage and ran it for a couple hours under load. This caused the temperature to go up and the thermal overload tripped within two degrees of the middle of the design temperature range. A check of pump output showed it to be well above nominal limits even at the lower voltage. The pump was good. It just would not take the abuse heaped on it by the low voltage and pumping the oil through the two radiators.

When Martz got to the Bradley Engineering site Jack Dennis was waiting for him. He had a staff of five with him plus a network guy that worked for the firm. His name was Andy Weis but around the office they called him McGuiver. He acted like he didn’t like the name but underneath the façade he knew it was really a complement. No matter what, he made things work. The plan had been to take over unless he got a quick settlement and Jack now knew this would not happen. He told Andy they would be staying. Jack was sure that Martz had made the situation worse. He now had to assess the damage and see if he could mitigate it.

Within an hour the network connections were established with their office. The legal group were operating there as if they were at their desks including their phone numbers. They just connected their laptops to the wireless network and plugged a headset into it. Andy went over to the coffee shop for lunch after telling the people he would be there for a half hour if they needed anything. As he sat there eating he opened his laptop and wrote a note to his boss advising that he had used a lot of spares and since they would be in use for a while he wanted to buy some additional items to replace them. They were a couple more toys as he called them that would be tested, learned about and sit waiting for a day they were needed just as the items he installed today were about six months ago.