Today's wasted call out

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My other half did a classic a couple of weeks ago. We were going on holiday for a week and as we were leaving I said something about turning the playstation off. "Oh don't worry, I turned off all the little switches on the fuseboard". Luckily we were only 2 minutes from home... :slap  
That'll be your last holiday for a while, the next time you leave you mightn't be allowed back in. :(

 
Reminded me of a customer last week , totally threw me for a while .

I replaced two PIR  T/H floodlights ...one on the back of the house , one on garage at the bottom of the garden . 

House flood has an overrideswitch wired in . 

So he says " When we switch this light on , the one on the garage goes on & off"    

I start looking into it , house flood is wired from the ring.

The garage has an SWA supply to board in garage , via a spur from the same ring.

When I try the switch it just overrides the house flood ,  nothing happens down at the garage , finally I give up , can't see any logic to it .

I tell the bloke I don't see a problem , " Oh well never mind "   And he switches off the garage spur and locks the door. 

When I ask he says it saves electric as its not running down to the garage .!  Does it all the time , so garage flood is doing its power up segment every time .!!!

 
People have some F odd ideas.....some bordering on the insane

my mates neighbour parks his car in garage evey night, revs the nads off it, turns engine off, runs to back of car and shoves an oily rag in the exhaust. In the morning he lets car roll backwards out of garage ( it is on a slight incline), removes rag, starts up,engine.

when asked why his answer was 'thats the way my Dad used to do it, NEVER fails to start'

I suppose there is no arguing with the logic

 
Friend of mine who ran a garage years ago told me a good one. Ford Escort was in for its third new clutch in eighteen months (but first one at my friends place). Car owner was complaining about the ridiculous design of Escorts that have rubbish clutches. When the clutch was removed, sure enough it was totally worn out. Another new one was fitted but my mate didn't want a repeat of what had apparently being going on. When the owner came to collect the car my mate asked a few questions about how and what the car was used for but nothing out of the ordinary. No tow bar fitted either. Puzzled, my mate handed over the keys and watched the owner climb in, start the engine and select second gear to take off. 

"Excuse me, why are you taking off in second?" asks my mate.

"That's what you do, first is only for use on really steep hills" came the reply.

The owner had been taught to drive by his father and that's how "he always drove his truck"

 
My wife was taught to drive by her father. Never used the hand brake on hills (north Derbyshire has a few) she just rode the clutch. After changing the clutch on the first car I put a wooden ruler in the glove box, it stopped her riding the clutch. (Use your imagination).

I never changed a clutch on any of our cars after that. Pity I couldn’t say the same for the father in law, I spent more time under his car than I did ours.

 
my mates neighbour parks his car in garage evey night, revs the nads off it, turns engine off, runs to back of car and shoves an oily rag in the exhaust. In the morning he lets car roll backwards out of garage ( it is on a slight incline), removes rag, starts up,engine.
If your mate hears his neighbour shouting and swearing one morning it's probably because he's lost his rag.

 
My wife was taught to drive by her father. Never used the hand brake on hills (north Derbyshire has a few) she just rode the clutch. After changing the clutch on the first car I put a wooden ruler in the glove box, it stopped her riding the clutch. (Use your imagination).

I never changed a clutch on any of our cars after that. Pity I couldn’t say the same for the father in law, I spent more time under his car than I did ours.
Sorry that's WAY over my head. care to explain?

 
My wife was taught to drive by her father. Never used the hand brake on hills (north Derbyshire has a few) she just rode the clutch. After changing the clutch on the first car I put a wooden ruler in the glove box, it stopped her riding the clutch. (Use your imagination).

I never changed a clutch on any of our cars after that. Pity I couldn’t say the same for the father in law, I spent more time under his car than I did ours.
My driving instructor, (not a real instructor, an ex polis driver trainer, and long time friend if my father, that had taught my mother and older brother to drive) 

I had my first lesson, apparently I sat with my hand on the gearstick too much,

2nd lesson, I've never seen so much blood come from anyone knuckles before,!!!!!

3rd lesson, and I passed my test, :)

Try doing that to a kid now and you'd be locked up,!!!!

Respect, don't question someone that knows what he is doing, 

How many lessons on average do kids need these days ? 

 
When I learned to drive, it was still legal for newly qualified drivers to take you out as your co-driver.

Now one of my mates would take me out and bring a 12" steel rule, if I did something wrong I got that, now that did hurt.

Not many lessons from the instructor, I can't remember how many, but I then took my test & passed.

 
My wife was taught to drive by her father. Never used the hand brake on hills (north Derbyshire has a few) she just rode the clutch. After changing the clutch on the first car I put a wooden ruler in the glove box, it stopped her riding the clutch. (Use your imagination).

I never changed a clutch on any of our cars after that. Pity I couldn’t say the same for the father in law, I spent more time under his car than I did ours.
Do you still have the wooden ruler? I'm sure a bit more training wouldn't go amiss. In fact, I'm off to by one myself :)

 
Back to wasted call outs.

A few years ago, rental property "no hot water."

Having established it was an all electric property I embarked on a 70 mile round journey, armed with two different length immersion heaters, spanner and hose etc to change them, only to find the tank was full of nice hot water.

The "fault" was NO water at all coming out of one of the hot taps. the rest were fine.

Another wasted bill to the landlord who actually needed a plumber. If only the fault had been described properly. 

That's another question to ask next time.

 
I spend about 20% of my working life "fixing" machines by releasing the emergency stop button, and hitting reset on the hmi. 

 
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