gland (o-ring) seals: learn from my mistakes

  In my defense, I have only had occasion to design, specify, have made, or made myself, less than half a dozen o-ring sealed anythings in my entire career, either professionally or for my own projects.

 So a set of good habits had not yet been learned, so there was nothing to save me when I got hasty...

 The photo at right is what happens when you don't do a good job of deburring the receiving hardware's entrance (a bit of taper to compress the o-ring into its groove as the parts are assembled is generally a good idea whenever possible) to the ID, or say, screw holes the o-ring has to pass... I guess I'll be replacing this one.  The good news was that my local Ace Hardware had the perfect size in stock for $0.79ea so this was a cheap lesson.

 (Okay sure: it's only sealing against a few PSI of acoustic pressure in the intake muffler I built for my air compressor, so it's probably fine as is, but if you know ANYTHING about me... I couldn't possibly.  Workmanship.)