Guest Posted October 29, 2004 Posted October 29, 2004 Reminds me of another story. I was working in a leisure centre re-fitting a fitness\massage suite(!) when it came around to taking down the emergency lights. So, around the other side of the wall to the mains cupboard I disappear and tell the apprentice to shoput when the mains goes off at the emergency. After turning off all the likely MCBs I still hadn't got a response so I went through them again, only this time I went through the unlikely ones too, (bearing in mind the board was 30 years old and most circuits had been altered quite a bit over the years so the labelling wasn't to be trusted). After I'd switched them all off and not heard anything I went around to find the power to the emergency off, only the emergency was still on, surprisingly. This complex arrangement of 'LED for power, tube for continuous light' had not been understood by the apprentice. Anyway, at about this time I hear the centre manager shouting me. I pop my head out from around the door and she asks why the pool is dark! Once I turn all the MCBs back on the pool is still dark as it takes the lights about 20-30 minutes to strike once they've been switched off. I decided to lock myself in the mains cupboard at this point and only came out after they had finished evacuating the pool due to the darkness. Moral of the story, if you want anything doing properly, no matter how simple, do it yourself!
Guest Posted October 30, 2004 Posted October 30, 2004 Reminds me of uncounted times i have been reconnectiong pir's after apprentices in the middle of the night.....
neilb Posted November 11, 2004 Posted November 11, 2004 Mate of mine told me a story about when he was using a rotary saw to pull up some floorboards. He had the blade set to low and proceeded to chop thru a gas pipe and a nail which was holding it down. He kinda jumped out of his skin when a 3 foot flame shot out of the floor boards. Luckily he survived unharmed and ran as fast as his little legs could carry him to the gas valve. (dont know if it was a true story but i laughed for ages anyway) During my early days as an electrician i was asked to go and connect some mains tails to a manweb 100A isolator. Little did i know that the isolator was faulty and stuck on when i touched the live with my uninsulated screwdriver. Think i was shaking for about an hour after that. That was the day i decided a good set of electricians tools would be handy. Another story about my mate. He was rewiring an old house and after isolating the mains ordered his lacky to go start ripping out some wires. He came back half an hour later shaking saying he had an electric shock. My mate called him everything under the sun and marched him over to the offending wires. He said "you couldnt have had a shock because i turned the electric off, watch ill proove it". with that he licked the wire and danced around the room for a bit. Later it came to light that the detached house used to be 2 semi's and the other mains unit was still in use. DUMBASS!!
neilb Posted November 11, 2004 Posted November 11, 2004 More stories but about my former boss this time. My ex boss was a real nut and couldnt give a flying f**k about his own workmanship. He went into a new build to find the plasterers had board all the cables up in the ceilings. Now personally i would have poked around with a screwdriver to try and fish out the wires, but NO, my boss goes to his van and brings back the biggest lump hammer i have ever seen. He started to create cannonball sized holes in the ceilings of every room in the house untill he found all the wires. Then he charged the plasterering firm for the extra work he had to carry out. The building company made them replaster all the ceilings and wouldnt pay them because it was their fault. Lets just say we never found a single wire up in the ceiling again after that. Another one, One day my boss had to go to a house after recieving a complaint that the girls that lived there were recieving electric shocks when they touched the walls whilst in bed. In his official report to the building company (a very large and well known one) he put "due to sexual activities between 2 rug munchers and the combination of silk sheets, I feel that the cause of the problem is related to static electricity. The remidy for this problem would be to either change the sheets or to add an earth bond to the bed" Apparently the office staffed laughed all day when they read that one.
neilb Posted November 11, 2004 Posted November 11, 2004 Ok sorry for spamming the forum with these stories but i have one final one i would like to share. THis is a true story that i witnessed with my own eyes. My boss had a call that a house we wired recently had a socket that was buzzing every time the lady close a draw in her bedroom cabinet. We went to the house to take a look, where he moved the drawers and checked the socket. No problems found so far. So he put the drawers back and started to open and close them to see if he could see what she was complaining about, low and behold the buzzing started. He opened the drawer fully and said "Ahh theres your problem love" with with that he pulled out the ladies dildo and showed her how the opening and closing of the drawer was turning it on and causing the buzzing. She turned bright red and i remember i did too. (being the young naive apprentice.)
Brian c Posted November 11, 2004 Posted November 11, 2004 Ok sorry for spamming the forum with these stories but i have one final one i would like to share. THis is a true story that i witnessed with my own eyes. 31010[/snapback] Don't apologise, keep 'em coming! Very entertaining. If you don't know......ask.
Brian c Posted November 11, 2004 Posted November 11, 2004 He went into a new build to find the plasterers had board all the cables up in the ceilings. Now personally i would have poked around with a screwdriver to try and fish out the wires, but NO, my boss goes to his van and brings back the biggest lump hammer i have ever seen. He started to create cannonball sized holes in the ceilings of every room in the house untill he found all the wires. Then he charged the plasterering firm for the extra work he had to carry out. The building company made them replaster all the ceilings and wouldnt pay them because it was their fault. Lets just say we never found a single wire up in the ceiling again after that. 31008[/snapback] You say that like it's a bad thing??! If you don't know......ask.
Brian c Posted November 11, 2004 Posted November 11, 2004 Can't fault your old boss. The plasterers should know better, they do now!! It really winds me up when other tradesmen cover/cut cables. If you don't know......ask.
Guest Posted November 11, 2004 Posted November 11, 2004 You say that like it's a bad thing??! 31020[/snapback] I was going to say something like that, when I was wiring new builds and the plasterers did something like that there wouldn't be much left of the plaster in the general vicinity of where the cables should have been.
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