2014 Worthington AL80 Neck Crack found?

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jtsfour

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Messages
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Location
Texas
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This happened a few years ago (December 2018 I think)

We dropped off one of our AL80s for vis. The shop called and said they found a crack in the neck. We didn't question it at the time. We condemned the tank and moved on.

I'm just posting this for a second opinion and to satisfy my curiosity. If it is a real crack then I guess it can also serve to notify others of possible defects.

It is a DOT-3AL-3000 cylinder
Manufactured 04-2014
I believe it is a Worthington made cylinder.
Cast Markings are : A0292 and AAA33

I grabbed my snake camera and took a few pictures of the inside so you guys can take a look. I am not experienced in tank inspections but it looks like a stress crack to me. Is it completely unheard of for an AL80 to fail before its first hydro date?

Here are the pictures (sorry for the low resolution.)
 
From what I can ascertain it is not a crack but part of the forming process from when the cylinder was made.

If indeed made by Worthington I would arrange to get it back to them or XS Scuba the distributor. They should make the final call and if as I suspect the shop condemning it should be getting you a replacement at their cost.
 
From what I can ascertain it is not a crack but part of the forming process from when the cylinder was made.

If indeed made by Worthington I would arrange to get it back to them or XS Scuba the distributor. They should make the final call and if as I suspect the shop condemning it should be getting you a replacement at their cost.
to be clear I am not talking about the straight line. That looks like part of the forming process. What I am talking about is this.
neck_crack_marked.jpg


Just want to make sure we are talking about the same mark.
 
What you have circled doesn't look like a crack to me. It looks like part of the forming process. There does appear to be some pitting though. All the cracks I've ever seen have been in the threads.
 
If you have ever seen the cross section of an aluminum tank you will notice that the area circled falls within the thickest part of the tank. If you can find a video of the tanks being made you will see why the crown would not be totally smooth but have some surface imperfections. I think this was a situation where a second opinion should have been obtained.
 
Those look like folds although really shallow , part of manufacturing process like others said. If it was a crack it would likely extend into the threads and would be visible there.
 

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