eLeCtRiC sHoCk!!!!

[Dave_]

Well.

Im very new to this forum. (7th post..)

Been on the books for 6 years, qualified 2007, 2391-10 passed 2009 (june exam - 2nd attempt! Doh!) Achieved a merit grade in 2391-20 Design, Erection & Verification in june 2010.... quite chuffed that i have got both parts... but with six years experience i am greener than the New Forest... I have so much to learn.... i have a very deep respect for time served electricians - after all, my knowledge is from them......

I guess your wandering what the *** is this guy babbling on about? well.......

After seeing the thread regarding ' tell us about your faults' i started thinking.....

and im curious to know what mistakes we ourselves, competent sparks have made during our prosperous careers.....? The reason i list my qualifications is to prove there is something between my ears (alongside the fluff, lewd thoughts and odd electrical impulse ;-)

I mean, we are all human. from what i have seen there a lot of 'have a go' DIY peeps that shouldnt be let loose with a bus pass let alone a screwdriver, possibly some bad sparks etc.... but come on guys what have you done? 'momma? am i bad??'

Ill never forget when i was on site (after a few weeks on the tools) and my new friend derek told me: were human, we make mistakes. one time in your career you will make a stupid mistake like cross the polarity on a socket outlet. I listened. did it a week later. (my only chance, *** i cant do it again!)

I have read some cracking stuff on here, JURASSIC SPARKS - GREAT STUFF!! But these are other mens mistakes.....

The Best i know about was when a BT engineer broke a fibre link in a very critical data centre and a very well known bank lost all its ATM's for one hour on a saturday morning to the tune of around ten million pounds. oh bugger.

I cant cap that.... doubt you guys can either ;-)

My silliest mistake was just that. silly. not thinking. I used to work in a posh girls school - a maintenance job basically. I was in the sports centre repairing some light fittings.... In the gents changing rooms (staff luckily) changing a 6ft tube in a VP fitting. I removed the old lamp and then when i put the new lamp in i was at the top of the steps, stood on top literally (8 tread) at full stretch, WITH MY PINKIES ON EITHER ENDS OF THE CATHODES, fitting energised.....

i wont tell you what happened next.... they says its just history... but i'm still here.... i gained 'experience' from that.....

well come on lads, spill the beans.........!

Im new - if this is something that is generally not spoken about then just delete this post, give me a nudge and ill gain more 'experience'

Dave

 

[Dave_]

come on lads, you cant all be perfect!

dont be shy, its only for a laugh......

please... im bored at work... ha ha (not on the tools at mo, living in Barcelona, working in a call centre making customer service calls for Honda)

 

[SirKit Breaker]

I have had more electric shocks then i care to remember. But my claim to fame is that i went all through 2010 without getting 1.
When it comes to cock ups and dropping ********, i am at the top of the tree. I could fill a book, do i learn from it, no not really, still cock it up and still dropping ******** 30 years on. Its called being human.

Cheers..........Howard

 

[telectrix]

remind me never to buy a honda. LOL.

 

[telectrix]

I have had more electric shocks then i care to remember. But my claim to fame is that i went all through 2010 without getting 1.
When it comes to cock ups and dropping ********, i am at the top of the tree. I could fill a book, do i learn from it, no not really, still cock it up and still dropping ******** 30 years on. Its called being human.

Cheers..........Howard

and i thought it was only me.

 

[SMB]

Dave, i think it just might be possible that your chances of employment have just deminished in regard of telectrix.

electric shocks do happen, but very rarely.

If you are dealing with fools then its a possibility.

Just lock it.

 

[BillyTheSparks]

When I was in the first few weeks of training, me and the boss were called to a very big house with a large garden. In the garden there was a wood store, shed, come summer house type thingy. This had a PIR on it controling a separate 150w Flood light, the PIR had B*****d up. So the boss told me that he would go and turn the circuit off, and told me to count to 30 by this time he would have got to the MCB and turned it off.

Yes you can guess what happend........27....28....29....30!
I got quite a nice 'belt' off it, jumped of the ladder sreemed like a little girl!!!!!

So i went to see why the boss haddn't done what he said and there he was on the phone as it had rung whilst he was walking past. Obviously that was more important, when he saw my face he looked at me, and realising what had just happened p****d himself laughing!!!

This was 9yrs ago now and I still dont let him forget it when this subject is brought up in the pub.

Another one was, again in the first few weeks, I had to change a socket outlet in another large house which was being refurbished so had lots of people milling about.
So i turned off the MCB (didn't lock it off) went up to the lounge to change said socket. As i took the face off the wires needed straighting up and changing position. So i grabbed the L and N and pulled them, the only thing was the painters radio had 'gone off' so the n*b turned the MCB back on.

And again i got a bloody packet, i moved across the floor so quickly i didn't know i had done it. And again a scream like a pansy!!

I went absolutely mad at him shouting that "there are electricians in the house, so wouldn't it be a good idea to ask them first before turning anything on???"

I know that it wasn't his fault now, and i should have locked it off. But i have definitely learnt from both of these shocks.

There are a few more but i cant remember them at the moment, I'll post them when i do.

 

[SMB]

Hey, I really think to shout about this sort of stuff shows failure.

If I ever receive another electric shock it will because ive been a fool.

Im not a fool.

 

[telectrix]

Hey, I really think to shout about this sort of stuff shows failure.

If I ever receive another electric shock it will because ive been a fool.

Im not a fool.

maybe not, but some day, no matter how careful you are.................

 

[i=p/u]

me first insulation resistance test at college , got a buzz , beaming red i was, thats all so far,

 

[i=p/u]

sould like a fool

 

[nickblake]

My biggest cock up was wiring a 36 way TPN distboard full of RCBO's Oone of those where you stand back and admire the work , and when testing couldnt get a single R1R2 reading ,i had wired every RCBO up the wrong way round so L and N were reversed , bang head against wall , i spotted the mistake whilst doing the dead tests , so all was good , and the moral of the story is ALWAYS TEST EVERY JOB YOU DO WHETHER ITS A FULL REWIRE OR JUST CHANGING A SOCKET FRONT AS ITS SO EASY TO MAKE A MISTAKE

SMB no matter how good and carefull you are people always make mistakes

 

[BillyTheSparks]

[QUOTE
If I ever receive another electric shock it will because ive been a fool.

Im not a fool.[/QUOTE]

Another electric shock. So does this mean that you have been a fool in the past?
But your not now

 

[SMB]

Hey, ofcourse ive made mistakes.

Sorry if I came accross the wrong way. The only way I would get an electric shock now though is if I was working with idiots. Thats honest.

I wish you well.

 

[SMB]

sould like a fool

excuse me?

Should I get the dictionary out?

 

[Lucas]

Never had a buzz that was pure stupidity but I've had my fair share.

I've done some right stupid thing's in the past though. I wired up some socket's and only after I went back to second fix it I realised I had wired them up in 3core After a few minuite's of cursing and sulking I rewired them and it was all sorted.

My Boss was working with someone once who went across both phases (L2 and L3) with his screwdriver and blew a 400A main fuse! Melted his screwdriver and some of the office's were owned by the Gaurdian newspaper and he had to pay compensation.

 

[simpson93]

worst thing ive done was probably the 1st time i was coreing alone didnt know exactly how the drill worked it sumehow went on autopilot and started drilling without me pressing anything the drill julted i let go and the drill was fyling around stuck in the hole.......so me being very clever wacked my hand in and turned it off bruising up my hand a lil bit.... needless to say it put me off coreing for a while.

 

[pauljpickering8]

First week my company was pulling Cat5e's in, my boss showed me how to label up the cables correctly...Right he said go and set 16 boxes up, later...right weve pulled them in now so go and label them off like i showed you and cut them off...labelled them all and cut them off on the wrong side so had all the boxes labelled up 1-16 but none of the 16 cables had numbers on. Still laugh about it now.

 

[Dave_]

our apprentice (now qualified, not sure how) meggered himself during his AM2 in front of the examiner what a tool.... they still passed him though and the examiner laughed... i would have failed him.... i used to tell him that the voltage drop in a circuit increases when the cables is run vertically.....he didnt question it....

 

[Concept]

i used to tell him that the voltage drop in a circuit increases when the cables is run vertically.....he didnt question it....

Haha legend!

I too have made some pretty stupid mistakes in the past usually in a rush and overlooking something.

when I was an apprentice very early on I wired a massive 3 phase dis board up un suppervised only to be told at the end of the day that I couldnt bring 415v into any room at the same time which meant a hell of alot of rewiring...doh

first day on another job I forgot to take a link out after dead testing a board but for some reason dont ask me why I put the link to the top of the isolator on the same side as the meter tails went to put the main fuse in and blew myself up... literally

more recently a couple of months ago was doing a job at my mums she has a B&B and the previous owners had a 20a blue plug fitted outside to power a caravan, she wanted it changing to a normal outside socket so in a rush I turned off the whole fusebox went to cut the wire and blew my snips to bits, turned out there was a second smaller consumer unit hidden behinf
d a shelf above the meter in the cellar which fed this cable... oops oh and didnt blow the fuse wire either.