# This is how i spent my sunday, 3000 hp synchronous motor fail



## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Burnt up rotor coil on a synchronous motor, ugh. 3000hp motor, gonna be an expensive rewind. Coil drug on the stator with no faults, saw small arcs and shut her down. No faults on a newer Siemens synchronous controller, don't ask the model, got to get the motor out first and send it on its way. Got 1 PF fault and got sent out and this is what I found. Who knows what other damage may have happen, I'll let the motor shop determine the rest.


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

By the way, the PF fault occurred on the stator multilin.


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

RICHGONZO1 said:


> By the way, the PF fault occurred on the stator multilin.


Excuse me for asking where in California are you ,and what motor shop is going to handle that? What kind of location is the motor in?


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## micromind (Aug 11, 2007)

Hopefully the rotor didn't hit the stator too hard; it might not be repairable......


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

We are in southern California, cement plant, it's for a ball mill. Yea the rotor coils did drag on the stator and I think I caught it in time to avoid a major catastrophe. It was still running when I got there and told them to shut it down. Saw small arcs so hopefully it didn't damage the stator beyond repair, fingers crossed, it's a 100 k rewind minimum for sure.


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## wildleg (Apr 12, 2009)

need more pics !


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

Any preventive maintenance program? 
what do you guys do to keep the dust ,rocks out of the windings?

cement plant that's a hellish environment.

thanks for the pictures take some more if you're up to it


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Usually they come out to check the rotor and stator windings, this year, our new management decided we were gonna do in house preventative maintenance. We had a dry ice company come out and I ran the PDMA on the motors. 

It is one hellish of an environment, that's for sure

We typically have a motor shop come out and thoroughly go over all our big motors, not last year unfortunately, now we are paying for it.

Lesson learned, now I hope we can get our rewind shop to come back out and do their normal pms. Luckily they agreed to come out for me on my word to pay them.


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

A lot of business related bs that I had no part of. Now I hope upper management sees how important this is and doesn't repeat itself by neglect. Just because we are electricians doesn't mean we know all the ins and outs of motor winding.


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

RICHGONZO1 said:


> A lot of business related bs that I had no part of. Now I hope upper management sees how important this is and doesn't repeat itself by neglect. Just because we are electricians doesn't mean we know all the ins and outs of motor winding.


well I've had some major boo boos in my career I hope you take a better than I did I take this stuff way too hard.

there's a couple motor shops in my neck of the woods 1 in Oakland area an the other in Stockton that's big enough to handle that kind of motor.

like I said if you're up to it post some more pictures if you're allowed to I like to get the education myself.

good luck to you and your company


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Yes I plan to take more pictures once we get that beast out and crack her open. I was in an awkward spot when I took photos so not much room to work with. Side note, the new lumia windows phone takes awesome pics!

This forum has helped me with countless issues, it would be a crime if I didn't post more pics. Hopefully I will remember between fires if you know what I mean!


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## Jhellwig (Jun 18, 2014)

I never did understand the run to failure mentality. I don't see how the cost savings on PMS can justify having large motors expedited repaired. 

The place I used to work for had a 3000 horse compressor motor catch fire twice before they realized that all the tempature probes had been unhooked on the stator and bearings. Then they hooked them up quick and managed to shut down the motor the their time before it caught fire but after it trashed the bearing again. Then they took the time to figure out the problem. A pm would have saved a ton of money but they didn't want to stop production long enough to do it.


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## wildleg (Apr 12, 2009)

i just noticed there's a 3000 hp motor for sale on ebay :laughing:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/General-Electric-3000-HP-1785-RPM-Electric-Motor-/120978162278


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## John Valdes (May 17, 2007)

What was the root cause? Bearing failure?

Maybe its a better idea to install vibration monitoring in concert with annual inspection?
If it was a bearing that failed and let the armature drop, it very well could have been prevented.

I understand how tough it is in this environment.


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

John Valdes said:


> What was the root cause? Bearing failure?
> 
> Maybe its a better idea to install vibration monitoring in concert with annual inspection?
> If it was a bearing that failed and let the armature drop, it very well could have been prevented.
> ...


Could be bearing wear but my guess is debris between the rotor and stator laminations.If it was bearing wear that's some serious neglect .OP was considering that management is trying to cut corners economically on the maintenance on some of this equipment.

The motor shop I used to work at can plant that can tomatoes was the worst environment it would just tear up the motors the tomatoes the acid.


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## John Valdes (May 17, 2007)

Lep said:


> Could be bearing wear but my guess is debris between the rotor and stator laminations.If it was bearing wear that's some serious neglect .OP was considering that management is trying to cut corners economically on the maintenance on some of this equipment.
> 
> The motor shop I used to work at can plant that can tomatoes was the worst environment it would just tear up the motors the tomatoes the acid.


He did say the armature rubbed the stator?
He did not say something got in between the armature and stator. But I get your point.

I have seen this before with dust and dirt build up. But you are usually warned well in advance by the sound of the debris between the two opposing parts.

I have seen bearing get so hot they completely failed and cause this problem.
I wonder what type of bearings are in this? Roller? Ball? Packed?
Also wonder about the frame on this large motor.
Open or closed?
Since we are well out of NEMA specs/range, there is no telling.


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

I have some synchronous motor pictures I took from a past life I need to scan them and post them here sooner or later


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Ok we got this beast yanked out and it's on it's way to a motor shop. We are in good hands, depending on how many coils we blown, our motor shop may have to piece out the work. 1 coil takes 18 man hours and there are 14 total. If we blown more than 25% we need to rewind all the coils. I'm going down to the motor shop either today or tomorrow and filling up my free storage space on my phone. 

Good call on the bearing, this was on the drive shaft bearing, had some shavings that wore a groove.

We are looking at a 10 day repair best case scenario, worse case 3 weeks if our stator is ok, which I believe we caught it in time.

This dude was packed with cement, btw its a 500 rpm motor. We have an even bigger 3000hp motor, but it's 180 rpm. Motor shop said they wouldn't touch that one if it died. They're not equip to handle it and they are a fairly large shop.

I will post more pics when I go to the motor shop


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## dronai (Apr 11, 2011)

Brithinee Electric motor repair in Colton


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## gnuuser (Jan 13, 2013)

i agree the run til it dies mentality is ridiculous.
they dont understand that a failing part can cause collateral damage as well
costing more materials and downtime 
not to mention added labor cost to repair all the damage.

my biggest peeve on this is pure laziness in pm.
dust buildup in a motor retains heat! excessive heat breaks down the bearing lubricants! this will cause premature wear and failure, as well as degraded performance.

im my wood shop classes i have the students clean and blow out dust on a daily basis. my machines are not new but they look and perform like new at all times.

in a harsh environment this is even more important. 
to preserve the life of the motor, to lower downtime incidents, and to lower operating costs by keeping motors running efficiently.

good luck on this motor


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

Koffler electric motors San Leandro California

Stanley electric motors Stockton California


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## MWayne (Nov 8, 2010)

Hopefully they can repair that one, a cement plant would be in ideal situation for a TEWAC motor.


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Yea we have several induction TEWAC, we have a glycol system and also use it on our 4160V ABB VFDS, glycol/demin water. Do they make TEWAC in synchronous? Either way, ours would be a 46 week build time


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## Big John (May 23, 2010)

RICHGONZO1 said:


> ...Do they make TEWAC in synchronous...?


 Yes, seen a couple of low-speed medium-voltage synchronous water cooled. 

For a motor that size are you guys doing any vibration? Heck, you can get permanent online monitors that would dump the protection. It wouldn't have saved the bearing, but it might've pretend the rub.


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

I have worked with Brithinee and stanly, heard of koffler, but never worked with them. These are the largest motors we have onsite and now I'm a little worried about our larger 3000 HP 180 rpm motor. I'm very happy with my motor shop and they were on the ball Sunday afternoon during football season. But they will not touch the lower rpm motor, who's equip to handle this motor? I need to have a game plan for that dude.

Yes vibration sensor is a very good idea. We have vibration analyzers, but nothing to the control system. This thing is ancient and is believed to be on ancient Indian burial grounds. Last year our poor electrician, was instructed to "bypass" an alignment switch and accidentally jumped out all the mills protection devices. This mill has so many relay logic interlocks to engage the clutch to turn the mill. It has high pressure oil pumps to "lift" the trunnions and put a layer of oil underneath the Babbitt bearings. It's so old school and little to no control system feedback, only rtds, symetro temps, clutch air pressure, clutch engage and clutch fault which means an electrician has to prove the mill has been "popped" (it makes a pop when it lifts when it's cold). 

Every electrician, supervisor, control systems guy and anyone else who has played with turning the mill's worst nightmare. If you burn those babbit bearings, you're looking at a million $ a piece to replace.

The most amazing thing I have ever seen in any plant is when they want to enter the mill, there is no inching drive. The electrician goes out, ensures she's safe to run, pushes a momentary jog button to engage the clutch and "spots" the mill? I was like wtf when I first saw it happen. Now I can spot the mill 1-2 try's, mill whisperer, lol.

Very old school and I'm a control systems kinda guy. I look at it as I can have 100 meters on all at once for weeks on end. I deal with a lot of old school guys, but if it means I ain't gotta come out on Sunday, I'm all for it. This mill only shuts down one week a year and 8 hours every 2 weeks, there is the challenge, millions of dollars at stake. It's all or nothing, but I at least want to bring back some indication. 

I will post more pics tomorrow at the rewind shop.


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## LARMGUY (Aug 22, 2010)

wildleg said:


> i just noticed there's a 3000 hp motor for sale on ebay :laughing:
> 
> http://www.ebay.com/itm/General-Electric-3000-HP-1785-RPM-Electric-Motor-/120978162278


This is funny. "May be a floor model or store return"



> Used: An item that has been used previously. The item may have some signs of cosmetic wear, but is fully operational and functions as intended. This item may be a floor model or store return that has been used. See the seller’s listing for full details and description of any imperfections


 
Also, $32,000 is a far sight less than 100K.


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

RICHGONZO1 said:


> I have worked with Brithinee and stanly, heard of koffler, but never worked with them. These are the largest motors we have onsite and now I'm a little worried about our larger 3000 HP 180 rpm motor. I'm very happy with my motor shop and they were on the ball Sunday afternoon during football season. But they will not touch the lower rpm motor, who's equip to handle this motor? I need to have a game plan for that dude.
> 
> Yes vibration sensor is a very good idea. We have vibration analyzers, but nothing to the control system. This thing is ancient and is believed to be on ancient Indian burial grounds. Last year our poor electrician, was instructed to "bypass" an alignment switch and accidentally jumped out all the mills protection devices. This mill has so many relay logic interlocks to engage the clutch to turn the mill. It has high pressure oil pumps to "lift" the trunnions and put a layer of oil underneath the Babbitt bearings. It's so old school and little to no control system feedback, only rtds, symetro temps, clutch air pressure, clutch engage and clutch fault which means an electrician has to prove the mill has been "popped" (it makes a pop when it lifts when it's cold).
> 
> ...



call Koffler in San Leandro for your other motor


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

Management better start building a new cement plant next to the old one,that's more modern so equipment is not down like this.

either that or have the cement shipped in from China

:laughing::laughing::laughing:


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Funny you say that, we are getting a new roller mill in 2015, I still want indication bac


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Back. You know production, they will rock It till the wheels fall off!


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Originally it was the raw material grind so it has been adapted in many ways to suit production before I was born!! Circa early 1970s


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

The plant was the original LA aqueduct built before the 1900s, a lot of history, that I still work on, you should see our shipping and storage. Circa early 1900s!


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

Seeing you're going to get a new production line. Set that old piece of junk synchronous motor out side of the fence let the hobos strip the wire from it.
:laughing::laughing::laughing:

tell the CEO of the company they can write it off as a tax write off donating the motor to the hobo cause


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## JRaef (Mar 23, 2009)

Lep said:


> call Koffler in San Leandro for your other motor


Yeah, I'm pretty sure that Koffler and Brithinee are the only two left in California that can handle big motors now. Most of the other motor shops will farm out the work to one of those two when it gets bigger than they can handle. I've never done anything with Koffler even though they are right down the road from me, maybe because whenever I have worked in this area, they have always been a competitor, all the way back into the late 1970s. But I know the Brithinee owners* because they were my best distributor in California for one company I worked for, their company is great. Off all the motor shops I've ever been in, which is a lot, theirs is the only one I would want to work at. It's one of the cleanest industrial facilities you will ever see outside of the electronics industry. That's saying a LOT for a motor shop, let me tell you. Most of them are some of the filthiest nastiest places on earth, many are EPA superfund sites in fact.

* The owners are identical twin brothers, Don and Wallace Brithinee. Both of them are the genius types, they got their PhD's in Mathematics at age 22 and were college professors before taking over the family business, but are really down to earth and nice people. It is however a little odd to spend time in their offices because you keep seeing the same guy walk by and say Hi, but wearing different clothes.


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

where in So. Cal. is this other motor shop located? Stanley electric motors in Stockton California is very old shop they can handle fairly big Motors and do quite a bit for their size.I worked in a electric motor shop for about 4 or 5 years in the Bay Area I knew a lady that wound motors for Koffler.This lady had been winding motors for ever and ever she had her own shop in her own garage and wound small single-phase Motors and stators.

the shop I worked at was a little grease pit in Hayward California we did induction motors up to 200 300 horse.This shop was right next to the Highway Patrol office one time we burn out a motor it smoked out Highway Patrol office.The next week pollution Control District came by and we got a new burnout oven after they cited the company.

:laughing::laughing::laughing:


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

Jraef
how about your analysis of this situation about this synchronous motor?


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Well 3 of 14 pole pieces ain't too bad I guess. No wire in the country, needed 114x128 heavy film, getting made as we speak, 1000lbs. Had 2000 lbs sitting Monday, went to order and it was gone. Next time I know to order anything and everything without knowing exact quantities. We are looking at a 3 week turnaround from start to finish, would have been sooner, but the wire is holding us up. We suspected 4 so I guess we caught somewhat of a break. 18 hours a piece to wind the rotor coil, not including baking. 

Had an ats breaker fail on me last night, luckily able to reset with some finagling, shipping went down on a slide gate probe issue that took a week to resolve. Shipping is the worst, some jackass incorporated relay logic with a Plc, 2 points of failure per device with no prints and the logic is nearly impossible to navigate through with all the relays involved.

Be a supervisor they say, it'll be fun they say....


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

I have wound
similar type coils ,one big headache and very tedious.Did the stator winding survive?


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

I guess you didn't like my suggestion to set this motor outside your plant and let the hobos strip the wires.
:laughing::laughing::laughing:


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Lep said:


> I guess you didn't like my suggestion to set this motor outside your plant and let the hobos strip the wires.
> :laughing::laughing::laughing:


You know what kills me, the tweekers who steal copper, they work so damn hard and put their lives at risk for not very much money. I can understand back in the building boom/bust copper was ******ed expensive. I remember looking at some thefts thinking " how the hell did they get this out in that amount of time?" I want to find them and hire them.


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## Jhellwig (Jun 18, 2014)

Is this motor just open to air in the plant or is air ducted to it from elsewhere? If it is the first it might be worth having a system made to provide it with filtered air or outside air. That would be a cheaper option than having to go through this again.


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## wildleg (Apr 12, 2009)

found another motor for you on ebay :laughing:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/4000-HP-ALLIS-CHALMERS-ELECTRIC-INDUCTION-MOTOR-SN-46774-Type-ANW-OD-RECONDITION-/290684396865


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

wildleg said:


> found another motor for you on ebay :laughing:
> 
> http://www.ebay.com/itm/4000-HP-ALLIS-CHALMERS-ELECTRIC-INDUCTION-MOTOR-SN-46774-Type-ANW-OD-RECONDITION-/290684396865


Boy I wish my motor was only 85k. The motor I'm looking for is near a million and we are looking everywhere right now. It's gonna be near impossible, but if you got a HR-662 synch motor laying around, I could take it off your hands.


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

RICHGONZO1 said:


> Boy I wish my motor was only 85k. The motor I'm looking for is near a million and we are looking everywhere right now. It's gonna be near impossible, but if you got a HR-662 synch motor laying around, I could take it off your hands.


well it's got to be worth a call to koffler or Stanley electric motors can't hurt to have a few vendors in on this one


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

wildleg said:


> found another motor for you on ebay :laughing:
> 
> http://www.ebay.com/itm/4000-HP-ALLIS-CHALMERS-ELECTRIC-INDUCTION-MOTOR-SN-46774-Type-ANW-OD-RECONDITION-/290684396865


make sure you listen to this guy he's a hell of a frontman.He will only mark it up about 30
%,plus that motor is right down the street from you in Huntington Beach.Have Jraef engineer the retrofit

:laughing::laughing::laughing:


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Wire is in! Now the fun begins, for the winder, I know he hates me. 18 hours in front of a machine per coil. They are only trusting the rewind to a shop foreman which I can respect, management thinks otherwise, but it's a highly skilled trade once you get into that size of synchronous motor. I have to explain to them, once he gets the machine set up and winds the first coil, it's all down hill from there. 37 wraps with epoxy in between the wraps in a slight trapezoid shape with 250lbs of wire.

The wind is the key to keeping the already tight schedule I presented, I tried to be generous and of course the rewind shop thinks its best case. I understand, we are not the only customer, try explaining that to management. Over all I feel confident in our motor shop, they have had to rewind all 14 coils in the past and it has lasted a fair amount of time considering the environment, 8 years. 

And no, we cannot get a spare motor from anywhere, the motor was engineered around the mill. To change the motor, you would have to move the mill. The strongest air tuggers can't even budge the mill with a belly full of ball charge and cement. I'm sure anythings possible, but in a 2 week span, the rewind is the way to go.

We did a dry ice cleaning last years outage and I did not fully agree that was the best practice, first time i seen that. Dry ice will only clean the surface and not penetrate the internals. Any one have any input on that?


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

Stanley motors in Stockton uses dry ice cleaning method I don't know much about it.
I wouldn't push that motor shop too much with that motor if there's a screw up you can be back in the same boat.

I think the company you work for better build a few smaller lines so if there some problem your not totally out of luck.


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## RICHGONZO1 (Mar 5, 2012)

Lep said:


> Stanley motors in Stockton uses dry ice cleaning method I don't know much about it.
> I wouldn't push that motor shop too much with that motor if there's a screw up you can be back in the same boat.all mills
> 
> I think the company you work for better build a few smaller lines so if there some problem your not totally out of luck.


nd were built in the 1920,s

Actually we are building a roller mill with a tph of both ball mills. I think they are hoping to limp along until that baby is done. It's expected to be online in 2017, I just walked the main feeders with a project manager and we have underground tunnels with plenty of spares. He was very happy we could get him within 300 feet of his electrical room. Saved theroject a half million bucks. 

The tunnels are cool and were built in the 1920's with some of the tunnels from early 1900's. Some jackass tried to steal some 13.8 cable and penetrated the shield and nearly killed himself. The then electrical supervisor wouldn't go down in the tunnel when that happen in fear of seeing a dead body.


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## Bootss (Dec 30, 2011)

so what's the status on this big beast!!
:laughing::laughing::laughing:


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