"Things are so bad in American manufacturing that we cannot even make shoddy products anymore. We have to import them from China."
God hates them.
Do they use the same drywall in CHina?
What caused the gas emissions (gypsum is calcium sulfide)?
Don't we test stuff before using it any more?
- = - Vasos Panagiotopoulos, Columbia'81+, Reagan, Mozart, Pindus, BioStrategist
CaSO4 not CaS
- = - Vasos Panagiotopoulos, Columbia'81+, Reagan, Mozart, Pindus, BioStrategist
They're using an industrial waste form of gypsum leftover from the manufacture of superphosphate fertilizer. It contains lots more impurities than natural gypsum, including a small amount of free sulfuric acid.
You don't test for problems that you are not prepared to handle. If they tested the gypsum, they would have to find another way to dispose of it rather than make it into drywall and sell it to us. Or they could just fake the test results...
Bob
I think this was a fairly short term problem. I have not heard of any new drywall causing the problem. Unfortunately the urban legend is loose and now everyone wants a piece of the pie.
You would think the cost to transport drywall from China would outweight the cost to make it here. It's heavy, bulky, and not a costly product. It also seems like it would not be the hardest thing to manufacture. Some gypsum, some paper, and a press to make it. That surely does not seem like anything that should even need to be imported. Why was it imported in the first place?
The housing bubble created a huge demand for the stuff. Add a couple of bad hurricanes and there wasn't supply to meet demand so they looked elsewhere. AFAIK, the problem is pretty limited in scope. Not good for those with the problem drywall, but not one of the greatest problems facing us either.
Because out of control labor unions have made it so that people won't work factory jobs for less than $60,000 a year here in the USA. That alone makes it more profitable to manufacture overseas.
On 4/4/2010 7:19 PM snipped-for-privacy@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com spake thus:
Before asking that question, you might look in the mirror. After all, it's because of the free-market-uber-alles, deregulation, get-gubmint-off-my-back types like you that we have toothless regulatory agencies and a free-for-all market where all kinds of shit gets sold without adequate testing.
=3D=3D THAT has to be one of the more stupid postings that I have seen in some time. If employers had paid fair wages and had provided healthy workplace surroundings years ago, the labor unions would not have been necessary. There was a need for labor unions then and there is still a need as long as business prefers semi-slave labor to create their wealth for them.
I have worked union shop jobs as well as non-union ones and believe me there are many businesses that don't deserve to exist let alone profit from the efforts of others. If you want inferior drywall from China and elsewhere, then suffer the consequences of your choice.
=3D=3D
well said!
For TEN YEARS we had to live without Silicone breast implants because the GOVERNMENT said they were bad for us. Thousands of women were doomed to spinsterhood and millions of men were deprived of a simple pleasure because of the nanny-state mentality.
Choosing between "Trust the government" or "Caveat emptor," I'll go with my own evaluations every time.
I agree, wholeheartedly. Sometimes a man just has to feel things out. Then decide what is best.
Wow. That certainly explains everything. Although, yeah, who expected it.
DO they use gypsum in CHina?
- = - Vasos Panagiotopoulos, Columbia'81+, Reagan, Mozart, Pindus, BioStrategist
It is unsettling and makes you more careful in the future
- = - Vasos Panagiotopoulos, Columbia'81+, Reagan, Mozart, Pindus, BioStrategist
Insurers and lenders used to mandate UL testing.
Look, it wasn't long ago fire unions insisted we use all that cheap plentiful asbestos they found in Vermont in the 1920s. And then it was so cheap, they added it into just about everything. Or all that spray-into-wall foam that emitted formaldehyde in the 1970s to save energy. ot to mention how the insulation kept the radon in. Or now, the granite tops that emit radon.
I once saw someone say you should buy a house between five and twenty years old, because the worst bugs show up in the first five years.
- = - Vasos Panagiotopoulos, Columbia'81+, Reagan, Mozart, Pindus, BioStrategist
My uncle bought a car in 1975 from a dealer who lied through his teeth. In three years, that dealer was out of business. My dad bought a car from another dealer in 1978. That dealer treatd my dad like his own dad. Now, father and son used to eat at the place my dad was a waiter. But the dealer my dad bought from existed for decades befoe and decades later. I know several people who have bought cars from the guy who sold to my dad, and they all speak the same way. That's why he is still in business. (And yea, that dealer has tradtionally supplied the city with limousines for top officials.)
- = - Vasos Panagiotopoulos, Columbia'81+, Reagan, Mozart, Pindus, BioStrategist
How is being careful going to protect you against risks that are unknown? Your previous post (VT asbestos, urea foam, etc.) shows this to be foolish.
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