AASHTO re:source Q&A Podcast Transcript
 Season 3, Episode 11: Updates to the 42nd Edition of AASHTO Materials Standards

Recorded: June 28, 2022
 Released: July 19, 2022

Hosts: Brian Johnson, AASHTO Accreditation Program Manager and Kim Swanson, Communications Manager at AASHTO re:source

Guest: Casey Soneira, Program Manager for Engineering with AASHTO 

Note: Please reference AASHTO re:source, AASHTO Accreditation Program policies and procedures, and the referenced standards for official guidance on this, and other topics. 

Transcribed by Kim Swanson and MS Teams 

[Theme music fades in.]

[00:00:00] Announcer: Welcome to AASHTO resource Q & A. We're taking time to discuss construction materials, testing, and inspection with people in the know from exploring testing problems and solutions to laboratory best practices and quality management, we're covering topics important to you. Now here's our host, Brian Johnson. 

[00:00:20] Brian: Welcome to AASHTO re:source Q&A. I’m Brian Johnson.

[00:00:23] Kim:
 And I'm Kim Swanson. Who do we have here with us today, Brian?

[00:00:27] Brian:  Well, today I've invited Casey Soneira, Program Manager for Engineering at AASHTO, on to talk to us about the 42nd Edition of hold on. Let me catch my breath. The AASHTO Committee on Materials and Pavements Standard Specification for Transportation Materials and Methods of Sampling and Testing, and AASHTO Provisional Standards.

[00:00:51] Casey: Thanks Brian. Thanks Kim. Thanks for having me. And yes, I'm glad that you included the entire title. I have that on my business card as well.

[00:01:00] Brian: That's good. I'm glad you have extra-long business cards to handle that. So, this is not Casey's first time on the podcast. She actually appeared on season one, episode 22, where we talked about AASHTO COMP the Committee on Materials and Pavements. And in that episode, we get into general understanding concepts of COMP so that people can understand that we're not going to get too much into that today though. So, if you want to hear that you can check out season one, episode 22 either on our website. Or wherever you find your podcasts. But Casey, let's talk about the 42nd edition, which is coming out in July of 2022.  What can people expect out of the 42nd edition of the standards?

[00:01:59] Casey: Well. As always, they can expect world-class standards as they’ve come to expect, and they should. And I just want to say thank you again for having me back to talk about standards development and giving me the opportunity to talk about COMP a little bit more. This is one of three committees oversee and certainly the most involved with standards development. So, standards development is the name of the game and there are a lot of standards development activities that went on in the last year. Actually, the last like 2 years with regard to leading up to this 42nd edition. So, with this year's edition, we actually have a lot more revised and new material for you. This year you can look forward to 6263 total pages of materials, tests practices, and specifications. For a total of 589 standards and we actually had 273 standards that were revised this year, which is a lot more than we typically have. All of our committee personnel were really busy making suggested recommendations for revisions, revising those standards, reviewing them, and balloting them. So, we had a total of 346 balloted standards. Because there's a difference between the revised standards, standards that were reviewed and reconfirmed as is, and then we had one totally new standard that was confirmed.

[00:03:22] Brian: So, you've got balloted and revised standards.  And in both cases, a huge number compared to typical years. And you said one other new standard. What is that new standard? 

[00:03:32] Casey: Ah, that new standard is M 339, and that's going to be a really. Let's at Keystone Corner of this conversation, that is the Standard Specification for Thermometers Used in the Testing of Construction Materials. So, I know that's a really long title, but it's very similar in nature to M 231, which is the Standard Specification for Balances.

[00:03:56] Brian: Yeah, I think this is a long time coming. Having a thermometer standard because I know we've been at AASHTO re:source, we've been over the years spending a lot of time trying to... Figure out what the acceptable alternatives are for mercury thermometers because as you know…quite a while ago some state started outlying mercury thermometers, due to the public safety concerns. Of just the proliferation of use of mercury thermometers by people who are not trained to handle or dispose of them when they break, so that kind of caused an issue where we had just a ton of different options out there right between you have dial stem thermometers and digital thermometers, you know, kind of like meat thermometers that people would have. Non-contact thermometers. I mean it goes on and on. There's tons of different thermometers and makes and models.  How did AASHTO handle this from a specification perspective with M 339?

[00:5:01] Casey: So. M 339 was actually sort of an ancillary specification that came out of the implementation of an NCHRP research project.  And to give your listeners a little bit of background, NCHRP which stands for the National Cooperative Highway Research Program. It's a program that TRB operates. There's an NCHRP project, it's 20-7 Task 427 project, that was accepted and completed. And what the objective of the research from the NCHRP project was to develop recommended AASHTO standard practice for selection of temperature measurement devices or thermometers. Those devices were to be used in lieu of liquid and glass thermometers for conducting tests on transportation materials.  And so, we received the final research report and we decided as a group, the Steering Committee, that committee that we really needed to try to implement this in a very measured and strategic way.  Rather than saying we're releasing this report to the public and to our committee and everyone, every man for themselves kind of a situation.  I think that would have been real pandemonium and, in my role, not a very fun thing to manage, just giving general guidance and letting everyone. Do what they thought to do.

[00:06:27] Brian: Yeah, yeah, that doesn't usually go too well. When you've got volunteers trying to make updates. I mean, I know we've been through this before with a lot of things. When you've got how many standards did you say there are?

[00:06:37] Casey:  There are 589 standards in the 42nd edition.

[00:06:44] Brian: Yeah, so 589 standards…managed by a bunch of different, subcommittees with different members in each one and say OK here it is. Try to take this information and I guess assimilate this into your standards that you manage in a consistent way. So that is a huge challenge. So how did you handle this?

[00:07:05] Casey: Yeah. So, I think we recognize that it was a pretty big undertaking and this NCHRP report is focused entirely on thermometers, so all of these changes are focused entirely on thermometers but that's in addition to all of the other issues going on with new technology, other revisions that need to be made to harmonize with ASTM and other changes that just have been kind of coming down the pipeline. So, to pile this on top. I think would have been really unfair of us to ask our volunteer members. So, what we did was to hire a contractor who has technical expertise and background, a former state materials engineer. And what that contractor did was basically go line by line through this NCHRP report and evaluate the recommendations that came of it and... Made the changes so a big part of the work of COMP is actually doing the, you know, taking a Word document and making the red line changes. There's a lot of discussion involved, but there's quite a bit of labor associated with doing the typing. 

[00:08:16] Casey: And so that's what our contractor did, is that he evaluated the recommendations in the report, considered kind of the overall impact of the recommendations, took what he knew about lab work and lab testing, and he made those recommended changes. The other thing that we did was to develop a task force and that acted as sort of an advisory group. And that task force was made up of technical experts under each of our five groups in COMP. This task force was there to help advise if there's a question of say, I want to update a thermometer in this test, but what do you think the implications will be? You, having been super familiar with running that specific test and all of the things associated with it. And so, between our contractor and the Task Force Advisory Group, we made all those recommended changes.   

[00:09:131] Casey: Now, but that's not where it ended. All of those recommended changes were balloted the same way that any change or new standard gets balloted. At first, it's reviewed by the technical subcommittee, which is the group of technical experts that are appointed to each of our technical subcommittees, and then if those revisions were approved then they got balloted again by the Standing Committee, which is the CEO appointed voting members from each state. So. In this process of making those revisions. Something came up that it was our contractor pointed out and he said, while I'm making these revisions, I notice that the standards are getting longer and longer because I keep having to put all of this very specific information about a type of thermometer in each standard. And you have this idea of, well, what if we have a thermometer standard the same way that you have a balanced standard and that'll it'll save space, and then if anything changes with any of these thermometers, all we have to do is change the thermometer standard, which is now M 339, rather than going in and trying to make individual changes to all of the individual standards in which a specific thermometer might be referred to. And so that's the provenance of the M 339.

[00:10:37] Brian: That's a good decision made by the contractor because it happens all the time when you have documents and even if it's not a standard, you know just when we have multiple documents that we manage, it's so much better to have the information contained in one, so that you don't have the problem with document control, right. Where you make one update here and then Kim and I actually were just dealing with that today on a different issue where we were trying to figure out where else is that recorded or documented. So, we need to make sure we catch all those things. So, good move there. But if I'm a user of the standards and I've got the 42nd edition and I am going through a standard, how might I see M 339 referred to and how can I use this standard?

[00:11:24] Casey: So, you'll see M 339 referred to in a way that's really similar to the way that you've seen M 231, which is the balance standard referred to many times over the years in our standards. So I'll use T209 as an example. T 209 is Max Specific Gravity of Asphalt Mixtures. So, in the 42nd edition, you'll see in section 5.7 there's a thermometer requirement for the mass determination and air, and it says that there's a thermometer required, and that thermometer has to meet the requirements of M 339. And that's how you can refer back to M 339. You can see you know what are the requirements of this thermometer? If I'm using a digital thermometer, does the thermocouple meet the specifications does the meter meet the requirements of the specification? And then you can determine whether or not your thermometer is actually meeting thermometer specification requirements. You also have to make sure that you choose the correct thermometer. And that's something that was updated in in a few of these standards as well.

[00:12:38] Brian: Yeah, that's what I was going to ask you about. So, I think that's the question that most users are standards get into when they have an assessment is, OK, well, which thermometer do I use? How do they find that is that in M339 or is that contained in the actual test method?  You know, like T209 for example.

[00:12:58] Casey:  Sure. So that would be contained within the test method. M 339 doesn't list all of the thermometers that every test method requires. M 339 is just a. It's just a specification. So, in order to determine what kind of thermometer you should use or purchase for testing, you would need to refer back to the test method. So, if you want to know what kind of thermometer you want for T209 for example, you have to open up T209. If you have a thermometer in hand and you're not sure whether or not it meets the requirements of T209, you can look in M339 to evaluate according to whichever section is appropriate. So T209 for example has a note about which thermometer types might be suitable for the different components within that test method. And since T209 has a couple of different components, there are different thermometers listed.

[00:13:56] Kim: So, you mentioned Casey that that was written in the note section of the standard. And is that a requirement of the standard or is that not a requirement of the standard?

[00:14:07] Casey: So, notes in AASHTO standards are non-mandatory, which does leave a little bit of wiggle room and might cause a little bit of confusion for the user. But what this does is this list, in the note section, suitable types of thermometers, and it lists out specific thermometer types, not the actual makes and models because that's proprietary information. But it list out the specific types of thermometers that are acceptable for use in this test method. [Kim: OK] and that's how it's listed in the other test methods that had these changes as well.

[00:14:39] Kim: All right, so it gives users of the standard kind of options of like these types of ones are acceptable and not that they have to use that specific one or is that not right?

[00:14:50] Casey: So, in the mandatory section of the test method, it lists out certain characteristics that the thermometer needs to have. So, for example, I'm still looking at T209. It lists that the thermometer for use has to have a range of at least 20 to 45 degrees C and an accuracy of plus or minus 25 degrees C. And that's a mandatory required characteristic of the thermometer in the notes section below, it says. Here are some types of thermometers that meet these requirements.

[00:15:22] Kim: Gotcha. Alright. That makes sense. Thank you.

[00:15:24] Brian: Yeah. And I believe if they look at the spec, the M339, it gets, it gets into more detail like if it said. If I give a thermistor for example. I, if I remember correctly, it actually goes on to explain what a thermistor is in the spec, right? So that if they see that wording, they can then get more information that help them make the purchase. Of the correct equipment is that. Is that correct?  

[00:15:51] Casey: You're right. If you look up what a thermistor thermometer is, there is a description of what you know, what is involved in a thermistor. So, if you see it in a test method and you're like, I don't know what the heck that is, I just want to buy a thermometer. You can go to M 339 and it will list out you know the components like does it have arms and legs or whatever thermometers components would be.

[00:16:13] Brian: Well, that would be a really interesting addition to M339 if it had arms and legs. So, you'll definitely want to check that out and see if that is the case. Now, what about other than thermometers? The thermometer part seems pretty straightforward, right? Other than the arms and legs part. But when you get into other temperature-related apparatus like an oven or a bath a lot of times in the standards, those either have a built-in temperature readout or some kind of relay with a set point and a display. How are those captured? Does it get into ovens and baths as well?

[00:16:56] Casey: So yeah, some of the other revisions do involve things like drying ovens and water baths. You know, things that aren't thermometers but do require you to take their temperature. And so, like the other apparatus, there are certain requirements. Sorry, they're not requirements. There are certain information that's included in notes underneath the required information. And so, the user might read the test method and say, well, gosh, I have five or six or ten drying ovens, do I need to buy a separate thermometer. For each of these ovens that meets the standard. The answer is no, and there's a caveat for that. If the circumstances in your lab require you to have a different thermometer for each oven, you know every lab is different. Everyone's got different resources and different needs. Then yeah, you'll have to evaluate what the needs are and what thermometers are appropriate. But in general, if you're running one test and you've got two ovens you shouldn't need.  Two separate permanently installed thermometers in those ovens. Again, there's going to be caveats and certain things that are required of certain tests, but generally speaking that's not really the intention.

[00:18:08] Brian: Yeah. And I will say sometimes people take it for granted that if there's a piece of apparatus listed, that somebody's just going to go online and buy it or go somewhere and just buy whatever it says. But in our industry, you find a lot of people love to make homemade stuff. So, it would not be out of the realm of possibility for someone to build their own oven, and then and then that information becomes very useful to somebody like that. But if they're buying one off the shelf. It probably comes with a built-in thermometer, so it knows what the dial actually will deliver when they set it to a certain temperature, right? [Casey: Yeah, one hopes.] Uh, yeah, yeah, one would hope.

[00:18:52] Brian: But yeah, I think that's gone be really helpful to people because I know I will let you know listeners that I have been working on a ballot on a similar standard to T 209 and I ran into some of those same issues with how the wording was and what I was used to seeing and what I'm now. I had to make some changes to the standard, and I tried to incorporate everything that was laid out with these recommendations from the contractor, and I tried to weave them together as best I could, but I have no idea how that's going to turn out because I don't know what the outcome of the ballot is yet. So that will be interesting. And Casey, you've been through this with any changes with standards for a long time, right? So, can you kind of take us through where you see this going? So, this is the first time everybody's going to see this new standard and these changes that are affiliated with that standard. What do you think is going to happen next?

[00:19:53] Casey: As you can tell and you know, I rattled off some statistics at the beginning of this podcast. There have been a lot of changes and more changes than are typical in a in a typical year of materials testing standards development. If anyone has ever been involved in, you know, a really big change or a lot of small changes at once, you'll know from experience that we’re probably not going to hit it out of the park 100%. As with anything that gets changed, you know there's always going to be some pushback. There's going to be people who are early adopters of changes. They're going to people who are right in the middle, maybe see how things go, wait a month or two, and then there's going to be folks that we have to drag along and that's not unique to materials testing standards’ thermometer changes. That's kind of just how all changes go. And so, we all recognize that we all recognize that this was a huge lift, that there are some things that maybe we didn't get completely right and the great thing about this committee and about the way that these standards are developed and maintained is that they're living standards, they get reviewed. We accept and welcome suggestions for revisions from industry, from private labs, from re:source. So, if you're out there listening and you're like you know, oh, I've got. I really want to let Casey know how I feel about these thermometer changes. I'm going to say, well, you should e-mail Brian and Brian will forward me those emails. Umm well, first, he's going to compile them all, and then he's going to forward them to me that in that right Brian.

[00:21:32] Brian: I would love nothing. I would love nothing more than that. But if you do, please e-mail them to podcast@aashtoresource.org. So I can keep them all together because no one ever uses that e-mail and I'll be easily able to organize them.

[00:21:45] Casey: So, these standards, they're living documents. You know, we're not going to. Put out all these changes and then, you know, wipe our hands off and say, OK, we're all done. Let's move on to the next thing. Everyone in COMP, especially the people who were in charge of creating the ballots and. You know are in charge of these standards. They want to make sure that they're. In as good of a shape and as usable and user-friendly as they can be and you know, sometimes that takes one or two or three tries and. If we know what those changes are. Umm. And we know. Where to start with recommendations then you know, maybe next year in 2023 edition, we'll have, you know, even better versions of the standards.

[00:22:28] Brian: Yeah, I agree that is just part of the process, right? I mean that's standards development you, you think you get it right, you make some changes, people start using it, they give you feedback and then you keep improving over the years. So once people get it in their hands and they start looking at the equipment that they have and considering whether or not you know, let's say they've been in conformance all this time and there doesn't really seem to be an intentional change, maybe there was not an intentional change. So, it might be worth asking the question. If you run into that situation and if somebody has technical feedback on one of the standards in ash, so who should they contact?

[00:23:08] Casey: Well, they can get in touch with me. I typically forward those requests to the chair and the Vice-chair. Sometimes the questions can just be answered outright by AASHTO staff and so we try to keep our volunteer members from having to answer too many emails, but they can always send them to me. My e-mail address is csoneira@aashto.org. But they can always send those to me and or you know, or Brian and Maria are the folks at re:source and we'd be happy to do our best to get those answers for you.

[00:23:40] Brian: If people do have questions, they can feel free to ask anybody at AASHTO re:source or Casey. Like I said, if you're reading the standard and you say, OK, I've always been in conformance, but now it seems like I have to do this the way I'm reading it. It seems like I have to make a drastic change. Please check with us before you make that drastic change because chances are, either the way you are reading it is not what was intended or if there was. If there didn't tend to be a drastic change, we can at least confirm that before you make a big expenditure.

[00:24:13] Kim: So, I have a two-part question. First part is for Casey.  Casey, when does the 42nd edition of those standards come out?

[00:24:22] Casey: So that's a great question, Kim. The 42nd edition of the Material Standards is slated to be published electronically at the end of July. Our print standards, so the books, those are actually not slated to come out until September and that is due to a paper supply shortage if you can believe it

[00:24:44] Kim: And Brian, when is the AASHTO Accreditation Program and AASHTO re:source assessors going to be enforcing any of the changes that are coming in the standards in general, not just the thermometer standard that we've been talking about, but in all of the standards, when do we start enforcing the requirements?

[00:25:04] Brian: I'm going to give a very unsatisfying answer to that one, and it is, I don't know. So, one thing I just learned is that there will be a different print edition release than the digital edition, which I am very grateful to Casey for letting us know that because I would think that once the digital one would come out, we would start reviewing those changes and making updates. But we don't want to do that before everybody has a chance to read and understand these changes. So I think we'll probably have to go through those changes a little bit after the print edition comes out and see what changes we want to make.

[00:25:43] Kim: All right, so our customers and laboratories that use the services of AASHTO re:source don't need to kind of freak out or anything about all of these changes as soon as they are released digitally in July, they will have some time to get their procedures updated and their apparatus updated to meet conformance with the standards before we start assessing and accrediting based on those correct?

[00:26:07] Brian: That that's right. And it is. And I wouldn't say it's unprecedented to have this many changes, but it's certainly unusual having this many changes and it is going to take a long time. You know, if you're a testing firm that has a small scope of activities, you may think, OK, well, that's not such a big deal. That might be 5 to 10 standards, but we're looking at hundreds of standards that have been incorporated into the AASHTO Accreditation Program and AASHTO re:source’s Assessment Program. So, when we make the updates based on the changes to the standards, we don't. Only have to do that Casey alluded to some possible guidance documents. If that's necessary, we'd have to formulate those. We have to train our staff. If there are things that we need to notify customers about, we need to do that. So that can all take quite a bit of time. So, I'd be hesitant to put a date in there at this point until we really see what's going on.

[00:27:01] Casey: Yeah. And I just wanted to point out that there are other changes in the standards that don't have anything to do with thermometers. So, if you are a testing lab and you don't know have tests that you. Perform that don't have thermometers. You still want to check to make sure that those revisions are reviewed internally. And adjusted appropriately to make sure that you are in conformance. So even though there were quite a lot of thermometer-related revisions made in the 42nd edition.  Don't ignore the other changes because those are still important ones.

[00:27:38] Kim: This brings up something I think we talked about in a previous episode about raising your standards of how to keep track of all these changes. So, do you either of you have any best practices laboratories can follow or suggestions or things that you've seen work about how laboratories can keep up to date on the standards and what's changed, or update their policies and procedures in accordance to the new changes of the standards.

[00:28:04] Brian: Yeah. One thing you might want to do is when you get your new version of the standards, there's always an index. That you can look at and review so. In AASHTO, if you have the digital version of the standards, there's a table of contents. And the table of contents will have the dates of issue on all those standards. So, you can look at it there. There's also a list of technical changes which that might be even more handy. So, there's actually a document that AASHTO publications puts together. And it will list everything that was updated in the current release, and they won't necessarily have all of the changes summarize. Sometimes they do. Well, actually they do a I take that back, they do a pretty good job of listing the changes in summary. So, I'm looking at one from last year for M201 which is a the curing room specification for a concrete and cement, and masonry. They even get into details saying, you know, revise as follows. Section 324. Added definition of water tank Section 5, extensively revised and expanded section on temperature measuring devices so they do give a pretty good summary of that. I'd also mentioned if you look at the standards themselves, AASHTO uses, whereas some standards will have like a red line strikeout version, and like in ASTM for example, AASHTO uses a line on the side of the page. So, you can see which sections we're updated and that can be pretty handy. Especially, you know, like Casey was saying, you know, we're talking a lot about these thermometer changes, but there's other things that change, too. So, if you're looking in the standards you use and you see a line next to a paragraph in the body of the procedure, for example, that's, that should give you a clue that that's something you want to review. And that's something you want to see. If it's a significant change and then retrain your staff on that process. If it has changed.

[00:30:05] Casey: And then Brian, I would just add one more tool to that toolbox for reviewing any standards that have been revised is that we actually listed in the title, or I guess on the title page of each standard. And you'll notice that there's a section right under the AASHTO designation. It's right in between that designation and the technical subcommittee listing. And it says whether or not the standard had technical revisions or and or editorial revisions to it.

[00:36:36] Kim: That is really helpful information. So, thank you both for that. And I do want to remind our listeners that AASHTO Accredited Laboratories are required to have the most current version of the standards and have that legally purchased as well. Just thought I'd throw that little caveat in there.

[00:30:51] Brian: Thanks, Kim. I'm glad I'm not the heavy on this episode. Thanks for pointing that one out. So, so, Casey, anything else you want to talk about with this current version of the standards coming out?

[00:31:03] Casey: The 42nd edition was a really heavy lift by our volunteers. You know, I went over those statistics with all of the changes that were made and all the things that were balloted. But I don't know if you're listeners are aware, but all of the changes that get made also are reviewed and made pretty looking and copy-edited by a team of staff. It's actually a pretty small team of AASHTO’s staff. Who? I mean, they go line by line, image by image and they really knock it out of the park when it comes to making sure that our standards are, you know, as good as the as they can be. And so, I just really want to give a plug to our publications department who does all of that really hard work. I mentioned earlier in the podcast that there's a little bit of a delay on the print standards and you know, with all the delay in materials just worldwide, you know, not even related to the specific thing. Our publications team anticipated that and they actually. Got their part of it done early. And so not only were these unprecedented numbers of ballots and revised standards that they dealt with but they. Got their revisions and their copy editing and formatting done early. To make sure that we could provide, you know, standards. Books to our customers in a timely manner. Now, of course, unforeseen delays with paper supply and ended up kind of nullifying that advanced work. But I really just did want to point out how hard working the volunteers are as well as our publications team who's responsible for the. Our materials books.

[00:32:47] Kim: And also wanted to throw in a plug for the COMP meeting the annual meeting for the committee that does all these is happening July 31st through August 4th in Miami, FL and that is. 2022 if you happen to listen to this for some reason, later in 2023 for some reason, but yeah, so if you want to meet some of the volunteers or you want to be some become part of the volunteers or a friend of AASHTO or something like that, you can find more information on the meeting and on COMP and the website its materials.transportation.org.

[00:33:30] Casey: Yep. If you visit that website. There will be a link front and Center for you to register for the meeting or to just find out more information. And like I mentioned we you know we welcome participation from academia and industry producers, private testing labs, and so. Participating in person and meetings is welcome and encouraged, and so you can find out more information in the link that's pretty readily available at materials.transportation.org.

[00:34:02] Brian: Yeah, thanks for mentioning that. And we did talk about that in the last episode with you, how there are friends of the committee or subcommittee. So, if you want to be a friend, you can get in touch with Casey or if you just want to be an acquaintance and show up at the meeting and hear about what goes on, we'd be happy to meet you and have you see how COMP works. So that will be in Miami in August. And we will be there. So, Casey, thanks again for your time today, and please check out transportation.org to learn more about COMP and if you have questions you can get in touch with Casey Soneira at csoneira@aashto.org. I'm sure you there with your pencil writing that down right now so you can learn more about all of the wonderful things that COMP does. Thanks a lot for your time, Casey.

[00:34:59} Casey: Thanks, Brian. Thanks, Kim. It's great chatting with you today.

[Theme music fades in.] 

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