It was 1973 and I was finishing off my undergraduate degree. A change from electrical engineering to physics had meant I had one subject to go and I took a job at the nearby Chrysler car factory in Adelaide.
My job on the production line was to walk backwards all day, filling car radiators, first with water, then topping them up with radiator rust inhibitor. The only thing that counted was the number of cars that were produced – 220 a day. The cars only sold because of the high tarrifs on imported cars. The breakdown rate for Australian made engines was six times higher than the same Saturn engine made in Japan.
The job was not only mind-numbing boring, but the tools for attaching the radiator hoses was very worn and the water was the cooling water from the paint shop. I was wet all day and I had to wear leather gloves as the water heater the petrol bowser-type nozzle so much it could not be held with bare hands.
The filling nozzle nozzle was held against the radiator filler and the system was filled till the water spurted out of the water temperature sensor hole. The sensor was then screwed in and the radiator topped up with the full-strength radiator rust inhibitor, an emulsified oil. At this stage it was easy to make a mistake and try to pressure fill the radiator, but then the pressurised system would blast the radiator rust inhibitor all over you.
It was not surprising that after two weeks, I had the most terrible dermatitis on my hand – they looking like weird breadfruit, all lumpy and bumpy and I could not close my fingers. I hate to think what systemic toxicity I was subjected to. I ended up bedridden for my “Swat Vac” with this for a week, though the company did send me to a dermatologist for patch testing. There was no attempt to fix the problem. While I was bedridden, I was paid at half-pay for their culpable behaviour. Somehow, I managed to pass that last exam and got accepted for an honours years in physics
I later found that the last 4 people had also left the job with dermatitis. The experience gave me real first hand experience of wet work and acute industrial dermatitis.
I saw some strange things on the production line. One car that did not have its brakes connected was driven off the end of the line and was written-off on a power pole. I don’t know whether that car was subtracted from their production figures. Another car came off the production line with some of the suspension missing and one corner jacked up in the air. At the end of the line was a group of men with large rubber mallets. they pounded the doors till they closed properly. it was called “Quality Control”. Another person put large ball bearings in the dashboard. Only when the car moved did they roll around and make a noise. Apparently it was very hard to locate the source of the noise.
Chrysler in Australia went bust and the factory was purchased by Mitsubishi. They also went bust recently.
