A professional who tends tumble drums, screens, and balance scales to test hardness of baked taconite pellets. Respnsibilities include:

• Reads schedule to obtain specifications, such as furnace from which pellets are to be drawn and time of withdrawal, and notifies sampling personnel to prepare sample pellets.
• Pours sample over screen, and weighs screened pellets on balance scale.
• Dumps pellets into drum, and starts drum rotating for specified number of turns.
• Screens tumbled pellets, and weighs them to determine weight loss from tumbling.
• Reads conversion chart to obtain hardness number.
• Records hardness number of samples tested.
• May clean work area, using broom, shovel, and water hose.