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Old 10th Aug 2022, 12:42 pm   #81
Denis G4DWC
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Location: Brackley Northamptonshire, UK.
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Default Re: I’m an idiot!

Many years ago when we moved home just to the south of Leeds I wanted some sort of VHF broadcast aerial. It was an interesting house with the Master Bedroom and En-Suite Bathroom downstairs. Right that'll do for a Visitors Bedroom and my Shack for a while.

The Bedroom had been badly fitted with some home made built in wardrobes by the previous owner which would be a good space to store a whole load of paint tins and other stuff until we got sorted. The plan was to put a dipole inside the wardrobe and drill though the wall directly adjacent to the Receiver and wardrobe in the adjoining room. Simples!! Feeder would only be a few feet long.

Trying to drill through the wall was a problem as the side of the wardrobe wasn't properly attached to the wall and each time I pushed on the drill the side of the wardrobe flexed so I couldn't drill through it. I needed something to stop the side of the wardrobe from flexing. A light-bulb moment occurred to me. I just needed a bit of wood to lever against one of the tins in the wardrobe and a small 4 year old Daughter to hold the lever in place. She was told NOT to let go of the bit of wood.

All was going well until I drilled through the side of the wardrobe then a swooshing sound and liquid squirted out of the hole accompanied by a little voice shouting Dad, Dad.... Ignoring these cries, I jumped up, raced to the kitchen swept everything out of the under sink cupboard to turn the water off then raced up stairs two at a time to turn all the water off from the tanks still with anguished cries from the little one down below. When I came down there was the little one still holding the lever, her pretty dress and tiny specs, now frosted, with the contents of a tin of Spray varnish. I had to strip her off and clean her and her clothes with White spirit. With hindsight I knew there were no heating or other pipes in that part of the house but I just didn't stop to think at the time. We often laugh about it now and she's still fine and in mid 40s..
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Old 10th Aug 2022, 10:43 pm   #82
joebog1
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Default Re: I’m an idiot!

I am still "at it ".
Yesterday while building a new preamp tagstrip, I couldnt work out why there was no earth point on the tagstrip, when I KNEW I had laid out the wiring underneath exactly as the picture showed. EXCEPT!!! I didnt. I counted lugs from the left on the lefthand side of the picture, and right on the righthand side of the picture. It took me TWO hours to work out the picture has 20 lugs and my tagstrip has 19.

Joe
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Old 10th Aug 2022, 11:21 pm   #83
John123
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Default Re: I’m an idiot!

I can recall forgetting to plug the scan coils back in after working on a Panasonic TV chassis and blowing up the line stage! On closer inspection the cable was simply sat in front of the connector, giving the outward appearance of being plugged in! Felt like a right

Thankfully even ten years ago, all fusible resistors and genuine line-output transistor were readily available (original Matsushita as marked 'safety critical' on schematic). Fun times!
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Old 15th Aug 2022, 11:22 am   #84
Tim
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Default Re: I’m an idiot!

Quote:
I am still "at it ".
Yesterday while building a new preamp tagstrip, I couldnt work out why there was no earth point on the tagstrip, when I KNEW I had laid out the wiring underneath exactly as the picture showed. EXCEPT!!! I didnt. I counted lugs from the left on the lefthand side of the picture, and right on the righthand side of the picture. It took me TWO hours to work out the picture has 20 lugs and my tagstrip has 19.
Done that! Or at least something very similar with a multi-way connector.
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Old 15th Aug 2022, 3:01 pm   #85
G6Tanuki
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Default Re: I’m an idiot!

I once fitted a two-way radio to the wrong car. It wasn't even a car owned by any of my clients!

It was August - new-registration-letter time. They'd just replaced some of their area-salesforce fleet. I'd arranged to come in over the weekend, and remove the radios from their old cars; the dealer was due to deliver the new cars on Monday so I turned up to do the installs. Shouldn't take long.

The new cars arrived, were unloaded from the transporter, and I set to work. Unnoticed by me, a representative from one of my client's suppliers turned up and parked next to the new cars... his car was also new, the same make/model as my clients' new cars... and he left it unlocked while he went in for a meeting.

He was rather surprised when he returned to find me screwing the control-box of a Pye Westminster under the dashboard.
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