General Motors carpet adhesive failure (waterjet contamination)

Story about the GM Ohio shop steward / philosophy major who took Tom's video course and diagnosed a hundred-thousand-dollar-a-year carpet-bonding failure as waterjet-cutter mist contaminating the bonding surface ten feet away. Used by Tom to argue that fundamental principles ("cleanliness is next to godliness") beat consulting expertise.

He calls me up about a week after the adhesive bonding lecture. He says, we're in the plant, we're gluing down the carpeting on the cars, on the inside of the cars, and we've had consultants coming in here, and it just wrinkles, the adhesives are not working. And in adhesive bonding, you said cleanliness is next to godliness. Do you think it has anything to do with this waterjet cutter robot we have right next to it about ten feet away, that's cutting the carpeting to the right shape and is creating a mist of particles and water everywhere? I said, yeah, probably.