Mistakes and Screw-ups

[iclark]

IIRC ???

I cannot remember if I first saw this here or on another forum:
http://www.acronymfinder.com/

very handy. to my surprise, it even had one that a friend used to put on buttons that she sold:
IITYWYGMAK
we pronounced it itty-wig-mac
in some circles, it was a fun button to wear.

Ivan

[a1gutterman]

I cannot remember if I first saw this here or on another forum:
http://www.acronymfinder.com/

very handy. to my surprise, it even had one that a friend used to put on buttons that she sold:
IITYWYGMAK
we pronounced it itty-wig-mac
in some circles, it was a fun button to wear.

Ivan

It also gives you the option of only telling those that you wood want to kiss.

[iclark]

back in the spirit of the thread:

not making sawdust but mistakes none the less:

~35 years ago, one of my co-workers ordered a metal "water tank" (for quenching, probably, but I don't recall for sure). the tank came in all full of cracks and leaked like a sieve. he tried to reject it. the purchasing agent would not allow him to reject it because he had not speced that it hold water.

~30 years ago, I was setting up to measure some material properties in a horizontal furnace tube at 1000*C. we purged the tube with some hydrogen-nitrogen forming gas and I used some teflon tubing to run the vent to the room's primary exhaust duct. at one point I turned up the purge gas flow rate and left the lab to get something. while I was out of the room someone came by and turned off the room's exhaust system. when I got back, the teflon was melting and vaporizing with no exhaust. I got the exhaust back on quickly and turned off the furnace, but I do not recommend teflon fumes to anyone.

also about ~30 years ago, we needed to slide a furnace vertically. we had some round steel rods that we could mount vertically. I came up with the bright idea of using a couple of brass bars to slide on the rods. in order to make sure the holes lined up, I first drilled the holes through a single 1"x2" bar from the scrap bin and then cut the bar in half length ways. unfortunately, the brass bar I used had not been annealed. as I cut it in half on the bandsaw, the 2 sides of the cut curled away from each other. I had 2 1"x1" bars ~12" long with a half inch curve. I was mad enough that I got a big hammer and straightened them and then reamed the holes. it worked, but it irritated me for years whenever it didn't slide smoothly.

~25 years ago, one of our grad students needed a water cooling jacket for an experiment so he took a sketch to the shop. he requested 2 parallel flat copper plates with a 1" hole in the centers and 2 concentric tubes silver soldered to those plates one 1" ID and one 4" ID and with feed and drain tubes on opposite sides. what he got was 2 rectangular parallel plates with the 1" holes and 2 parallel 1" tubes welded to the plates on each side of the hole. each tube then had a single pipe welded at right angles to it. his adviser kept it as a desk ornament until he retired. few people ever believed that it wasn't a joke.

I should stop before I get to the embarrassing stuff.

Ivan

[iclark]

It also gives you the option of only telling those that you wood want to kiss.

one sometimes had to be very diplomatic in elevators when asked what it meant. timing is everything.

the fun part was when one had received a kiss and they then asked again for the definition. everyone has occasional blond moments.

Ivan

[a1gutterman]

...the fun part was when one had received a kiss and they then asked again for the definition. everyone has occasional blond moments.

Ivan

Reminds me of a certain Abbott and Costello skit...

[dlbristol]

I was making a mission style rocker patterned from an old family chair. After assembling the side rails, and posts, I carefully laid out the arms, turned them over to expose the mortises, put on the glue, placed the side assembly on the arms inserted the vertical rails, clamped up, checked for square and left the shop full of satisfaction. I returned the next morning to admire my work. I turned the assembly right side up and &*^%$#((&*^:eek: The arms are on inside out! I guess that after laying them out, When I turned them over, they must have looked " backwards" to me, So I "corrected the error" and you know the rest. Good advice from this forum, allowed me to undo the glue job and after a bit of clean up, reassemble in a correct manner.
I did consider "an in process design change" but I finally decided that even if I had to cut the tenons, that would be easier than redoing the arms. As a former teacher and coach, I have high hopes for myself. I often told kids that the most successful people are often the ones who make the most mistakes. If that is true, I am going to be "gooooooood"!