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Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by Nition on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @12:19AM (#14642540)
There's nothing in this article about why the containers need to be painted. Could the shipping companies just paint their logo on rather than painting the whole container and save a bunch of money?
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by metafunctor on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @12:24AM (#14642567)
A coating of some sort is probably necessary to limit rust and keep the containers is good shape longer.
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by tesseract on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @12:54AM (#14642670)
My understanding is that shipping containers are usually made of COR-TEN steel, which forms a protective layer when it does rust (similar to the protective oxide layers that form on aluminum and stainless steel). But considering the containers are exposed to sea salt spray pretty much continuously, it makes sense that the additional protection of a coat of paint is necessary.
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by CalChris on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @01:51AM (#14642845)
No, that's not going to work.

CLIMATES NOT TO USE COR-TEN®:

COR-TEN® steel requires alternating wet and dry cycles to form a properly adhered protective layer. Areas that have salt laden air, high rainfall, humidity, or persistent fog are typically not the proper environment for COR-TEN®.

http://www.corten.com/frequently-asked-questions.html

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by Animats on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @02:41AM (#14642979)
Aware of that one. The trail bridge at Pilarcitos Creek on the California Coastal Trail in Half Moon Bay was made of unpainted Cor-Ten steel. That will not last in the coastal zone, where it never dries out. The bridge collapsed when park staff drove a tractor across it.[1] No injuries, but the heavily used trail was out for most of two years.

The new bridge is made of marine-grade aluminum.

[1] http://www.hmbreview.com/news/groundbreaking-for-coastal-tra...

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by givemefive on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @01:12AM (#14642730)
even if the containers are made with corten, it's not good for sea. The protective rust keeps getting washed off by the rain and the salt is too much for it to handle. Ends up rusting just as bad..
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by acomjean on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @01:23AM (#14642770)
Especially in the ocean. A galvanizing zinc paint perhaps to stop rust? I think this is why cars now don't rust as much as they used too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galvanization

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by dsfyu404ed on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @09:22AM (#14645114)
That's not why cars don't rust as much. Coatings have just gotten better and simulations have gotten better so engineers can know in advance that all the salty water that runs down the vehicle will be channeled through a few spots that will rust out in short order then do it anyway.

Galvanization was popular for a brief time while the industry was still trying to find replacements for lead in paint that didn't have crap performance.

Cold galvanization is expensive and involves nasty chemicals. Hot galvanization is cheaper but not as cheap as paint and involves equally nasty chemicals and molten metals.

Basically paint is cheap and good enough.

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by tyingq on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @01:03PM (#14647132)
Unibody construction helps some as well. Less drilled holes, more plastic panels, better sealed seams, fewer dissimilar metals touching.
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by WalterBright on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @12:45AM (#14642641)
The German Me-262 wasn't painted on the inside because it wasn't expected to last long enough to corrode.
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by lugg on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @01:52AM (#14642848)
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by jwilk on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @04:32AM (#14643398)
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by simias on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @04:53AM (#14643475)
Completely off topic but I don't understand why wikipedia doesn't simply select the desktop/mobile version of the website based on the user agent (with maybe the possibility to override the behaviour via a cookie if you really want to use the desktop version on mobile or vice-versa).

The number of times I have to manually edit a wikipedia URL every day to remove the ".m" part is getting frustrating. I'm sure there's a browser extension for that but really, I blame wikipedia's poor ergonomics.

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by venning on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @06:34AM (#14643965)
My guess is that this is similar to StackOverflow switching to HTTPS [1]. Once you get to a certain size, something seemingly simple like turning on HTTPS or detecting desktops and redirecting comes with non-trivial problems. I can only imagine all the nuances that have to be addressed when you're serving the fifth largest site in the world [2].

[1] https://nickcraver.com/blog/2017/05/22/https-on-stack-overfl...

[2] http://www.alexa.com/topsites

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by twobyfour on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @08:15AM (#14644634)
Personally, I love that Wikipedia doesn't coerce you into the desktop or mobile version based on user agent. Being able to switch to the (somewhat more complete) desktop version when browsing on a phone is invaluable.
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by simias on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @08:20AM (#14644665)
Sure, I mentioned that they could put an override, but sane defaults would be good. I don't know how many people actually mean to visit the mobile version of WP on the desktop when they follow a ".m" link, but I'd wager that it's pretty damn low.
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by FrozenVoid on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @06:29AM (#14643930)
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by rsynnott on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @08:06AM (#14644573)
> Completely off topic but I don't understand why wikipedia doesn't simply select the desktop/mobile version of the website based on the user agent

It actually does, but only when deciding to show the terrible mobile site instead of the desktop one. Even on a bloody iPad.

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by tyingq on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @12:24AM (#14642559)
Like why they need to be painted at all? Bare steel and a long journey over salt water. They would rust out pretty quickly.
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by GhotiFish on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @12:44AM (#14642637)
also it seems its not the paint that's expensive, but the retooling, so it's a one time cost.

really seems much ado about nothing.

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by virmundi on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @12:59AM (#14642690)
Amongst other points, the article says that a water based paint takes 5 times longer to dry than the oil. From a production stand point you have a bottleneck. You now need 5x capacity to dry the containers to stay even with the normal production. Since I doubt they have vertical drying racks, production should slow due to that alone.
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by noir_lord on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @03:09AM (#14643083)
It's a classical 'flow shop' scheduling problem.

Either you increase the number of 'machines' (lines in this case) or you increase your drying area foot print to compensate.

Once you do the latter you can produce at the same rate assuming all products produced are identical) since you the ones coming out the dry end do so at the same speed as the input end.

Edit: This does assume production demand is constant, longer pipelines make responding to demand more difficult.

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by jhoechtl on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @03:48AM (#14643256)
I am pretty certain paintings used for containers have little to none in common with paintings you get at the home improvement store but some observations I have made concerning water vs. oil based paintings:

* Water based paintings dry much faster than oil based paintings

* The durability is pretty much the same

* The scratch resistance of oil based paintings, once fully dried, is light years better than that of water based paintings.

In some aspects the green movement has brought us water based colors where you could water your home plants with but are inadequate for some (read: wide) range of application.

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by lostlogin on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @03:05PM (#14648260)
Oil based paint gets brittle and chips and it also yellows. A downside I have noticed in water based paint is the manufacturers have started adding extra water, thinning the paint. Presumably selling more water is more profitable.
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by ddalex on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @05:01AM (#14643505)
You don't need 5x capacity. This is latency vs bandwidth - you're going to delay the orders during the process switch 4x the drying period, but after that, your normal throughout I back up.
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by e12e on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @04:27PM (#14649071)
> There's nothing in this article about why the containers need to be painted. Could the shipping companies just paint their logo on rather than painting the whole container and save a bunch of money?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNCb9fzYBEk

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by esturk on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @12:23AM (#14642557)
My guess would be the paint prevents rust.
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by rangibaby on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @02:36AM (#14642970)
I guess, if you want a rusty container
Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by homelessinsf on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @03:14PM (#14648367)
>> "There's nothing in this article about why the containers need to be painted."

You're right. There isn't. It's taken for granted that you are aware of the fate of unpainted steel in a salt air environment.

Re:A shift in China to less toxic coatings for containers in... by sigi45 on Tuesday June 27, 2017 @03:36PM (#14648610)
I read about so colled 'shunts'. Steelplates you put into the earth to protect your construction site for water. It is also partial used on a river side.

Those things are not painted and google told me that you can calculate how much is oxidized in a year.

I would really love to know how a shipping container is so much more fragile.

Perhaps it is not that relevant but in masses it makes a relevant amount of money. Like steel container 20 years and with color 25 years and that makes it just better.