First one wasn’t really on a job site, it was helping my sister move. Carrying an insanely heavy cabinet down a muddy slope; my brother-in-law
makes us stop — so he can dust off the bottom.
Second; two guys show at a small job where we were building a bunch of 3-storey garden apts.They swore they were top notch, pick of the barrel, jim-dandy,etc. great carpenters. So I’m up,walking the top-plait, sheeting the roof with a couple of other guys. When we here the heart-rending sound of a tool under torture. You know the sound, just like a baby in pain. We look down to see the first guy got his saw bound by trying to cut a sheet if plywood down the middle between two sawhorses. Bad enough? Not quite. Guy #2 puts his hand in the middle to release the bind. Blood, screams, panic,,,,
Yeah, it was a quiet lunch… …until somebody told a joke. Musta been good, got us bak to work, can’t remember.
Replies
One of the few commercial jobs I've done over the years....back when I was an employee.
Dividing a large stroefront into two. Block wall had been constructed down the middle. Drywall delivered on Tuesday. We lean stack against wall as per electricians request, so as to leave floor open so they can roll around on a baker installing overhead lighting.
We pull off job to allow electricians free roam for entirety of Wednesday.
9:30 Wed. morning I get a call from electrician. "When are you guys going to come move the sheetrock?"
"Huh?"
"We can't access wall.....sheetrock is in our way."
Long story short, I get there about an hour and a half later to find four electricians sitting around waiting for sheetrock to be moved. Union regs don't allow them to touch the stuff.
Four guys sitting.....one of which is the boss......for an hour and a half.
That, my freind, is hands down, the stupidest thing I have ever seen.
J. D. Reynolds
Home Improvements
That, in a nutshell, is why unions have gotten the wrap they've earned over the years.
what are you saying about the union????????????????????
Read message #2
Yeah, what idiot didn't understand that it was a union job and the sheetrock should have been moved cuase that's they way things are?
With my mouth I will give great thanks to the Lord; I will praise Him in the midst of the throng. For He stands at the right hand of the needy, to save them from those who would condemn them to death.
- Psalms 109:30-31
yeah i gotta jump on this band wagon too, there is sometimes a reason for the way they do things, like when they have certain "conditions" that they work under, and frown on breaking those "conditions".
sometimes it is not obvious why they have those conditions, but then things happen and you come to understand that if the conditions hadn't been broken you wouldn't have such a mess on your hands.
a classic example is union rules involving the use of power tools, we wouldn't be reading posts about stupid things involving improper tool use if the users of the tools had been properly trained. i myself learned how to use a skillsaw as a union apprentice in the residential tracts of southern california, my teachers were the likes of the larry haun's and the will halliday's, and i learned to cut with the guard permanently pinned up, not relying on the guard for safety but rather the technique.
how many of these posts in here wouldn't exist if it weren't for improper safety training? and JDRHI wants electricians who haven't been trained in lifting techniques, or had any practice working together to safely move sheetrock to take it upon themselves to move this material. who would have been sued if someone had gotten hurt? what would have happened if they stacked too much in the wrong place and structure damage occured, or what if they just ruined the material itself by not caring or wanting to do someone elses work, work that they as contract electricians were not getting paid for.
i have to admit that the sparkies may have been able to muddle through move the stuff without hurting themselves or anything else, but it wasn't their normal job, and if something happened that they didn't anticipate then they would be in trouble. i wouldn't have moved it either, not untill i got a signature absolving me of responsibility.
the union has its bad points just like anything else, and if they get too powerful and people abuse that power it gives all the unions a bad rep, but there are lots of good people who are everyday union members that are better craftsmen because of the training, education, and working conditions of the union. the difference between ignorance and stupidity is that ignorant is just uneducated, stupid does not possess the ability to learn. those skillsaw accidents described in earlier posts are acts of ignorance not stupidity. if those guys had apprenticed with me it wouldn't have happened, they would know the right way to do it before they were cut loose with the tool.
First; my wife is a partner in a law firm and let me tell you she can be a very mean whatever.SecondUnions gave us the five day work week if wanted.Unions gave us all better wages; I know this from working in areas that unions are strong and areas they are not. Big difference. Unions addressed many health and safety issues.Unions are the one organization that has stood up for the common worker against the greedy bastards that would use us up, steal our labor and toss us out as yesterday's garbageI have never been a union member, but I have read a bit of history. Unions did for the workers in the 20th century what guilds did for the serfs in the 12th through 17th centuries.Yes, unions can be a major pain to work with. And, yes there is a ton of nepotism, cronyism, corruption et al. That is the nature of human organizations. But, I can confidently say that if not for unions we would all be working harder, for less and absolutely no regard for our health or safety.Forgot to say; got out of the lying cesspool of the office. Went back to work with my hands. Trying to keep the business small. Do good work. Much happier
<<But, I can confidently say that if not for unions we would all be working harder, for less and absolutely no regard for our health or safety.>>
Thanks for your post Muggs,
I was about to start one in the same vein but you've said it better than I probably would have and I was a union member for about ten years.
Tradesmen respecting each other's union rules and contractural agreements is part of working union.
What kills unions isn't rules about who moves whose materials and when, it's nepotism and other small minded politics, on the local level. You can't run an idealistic national union with small time crooks, elected by timid local tradesmen who aren't willing to take on the status quo. That's why unions have lost much of their strength, a sad fact which has weakened our way of life even as America's economy had grown and our rich get richer.
When big business runs the economy, big unions are necessary to protect the rights and earning power of those who serve those enterprises.
As Muggs points out, the prevailing wages and benefits in many parts of the country has been determined by union contracts. Everyone working non-union for wages in those areas is earning more without having to fight for it or negotiate for it. So those people are as much dependent on the unions as are its members. If you disagree, go visit a place like southern Georgia, where there are no unions. Try to find a decent wage there.
Edited 5/10/2007 10:25 pm ET by Hudson Valley Carpenter
if someone had gotten hurt? what would have happened if they stacked too much in the wrong place and structure damage occured, or what if they just ruined the material itself by not caring or wanting to do someone elses work, work that they as contract electricians were not getting paid for.
And yet, one man was able to rectify the situation without incuring any of the above.
Amazing.
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
LOL... you're like a superhero or something. Where do I sign up for this class on moving drywall from one side of the room to the other? Sounds very stimulating.View Image
Oh....it takes years and years of training. And only the best and brightest need apply.
Rocket science I tell ya.
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
When I was a planner my boss told me he once took a class in how to fold maps!
I've told this on on BT before. But hell, I've been around here so long I've told about every story I know at least twice.(-:My favorite "dumb thing" was done by a neighbor. He thought he'd save a bunch of money when he built his house. When he did his drain tile under the basement slab, he used the cheap black corrugated pipe. And he drained it to daylight.Since the pipe was already under the slab, why not save money by running the floor drains into the same pipe?When the exterior drain to daylight got plugged up, the ground water came up through the drain tile. Once it was full it simply came up through the floor drains and started filling up the basement.
Sometimes the message has to be blunt so you will see the point.
you left that out in the original post i was responding to, how about if the situation were as i described in my post? can you see my point that a subcontractor wouldn't want the responsibility for damaging the material at least as a reason to not move it, and what about not getting paid to do that work.
i said in my post as well that the sparkies could have done it, but the reasons they chose not to do it are valid. if the foreman of the electricians on site told the electricians to lay the rock down as you say you did, and one guy got stuff in his eye from the dust being kicked up and had to go to the doc to get the speck of wood removed who would pay the bill?
the "conditions" are there for a reason, and when something goes wrong you understand why they are there, and why you should obey them. i don't understand why the liabilities alone would be reason enough not to touch it, even if it were simple. and i don't particularly like being insinuated as stupid for discussing the point or asking questions.
Edited 5/11/2007 10:11 am ET by segundo
sequndo....if you, me and anyone else reading along went through our days only doing the things very specifically defined as our job description, and never touched or moved anything unrelated to the task at hand, nothing would ever get done.
Every time we walk onto a jobsite, there is the opportunity to screw something up for somebody else....or injure ourselves.....or damage some material....or anything else you can possibly fathom as going wrong. And yet....the vast majority of the time, none of the above occurs.
We're not talking about moving a 500 lb. slab of granite with a pricetag in the thousands of dollars. We're talking a stack of sheetrock.....between four guys.
If they managed to damage every single sheet, it wouldn't have amounted to half the cost of six man hours at union wages.
And I never insinuated that you were stupid. I said justifying their actions was.
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
About three weeks ago the NY Times ran an article about the increase injury to DIY’ers who use pneumatic nail guns. As we all know you can pick up a compressor with trim nailer for less than $80 at the big box stores.OK, the dumbest thing I ever saw on a job site. Last week a home owner called me up to look at the exterior of their home. They had extensive water damage during recent heavy rain here in New York. When I arrived at the home I saw the HO up on a ladder fixing trim around a second story window. He was wearing his tool belt with the nail gun hanging dead center below his belt buckle pointing directly at the “family jewels.” I was laughing so hard tears were rolling down my face. When I finally composed myself I walked over to the compressor and disconnected the hose and suggested he come down off the ladder. Jay
I think the electricians never should have been able to tell you where to put the sheet rock. I always like rock piled in the middle of the room.
I think when they asked you to lean it against the wall you should have told them that wasn't possible.
If they can't move it they have no say in how or where it's put.
Besides, you need somewhere to sit and eat your lunch.
I was hanging doors on a commercial job with a helper and I told him to put the hinges on a set of double doors while I went to adjust the closer on another door. When I returned, I discovered that he had put the hinges on backwards. I figured it was an easy mistake to make because the hinge pockets are mortised all the way through on commercial doors. I told him to take them off and turn them around and went to adjust another closer. I returned as he was reinstalling the last hinge. To my horror I found that he had taken them off and put them right back on the same way. I explained to him what I meant by turning the hinges around and left again. I soon returned and, sure enough, he had put them on backwards again. I ended up doing it myself. This particular guy worked for the company about 18 months and this episode was par for the course. How did he last that long? His dad was a superintendent. He would have lasted longer if he hadn't knocked the tailgate off the owner's one week old Chevy 4X4 king cab, but that's another story.
It wasn't a "union job".
The electricians were union members.....but that's about it.
Took me all of five seconds to grab the stack with one hand and drop it to the floor.
But you go right ahead and justify their stupidity.
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
JDRHI,
You're not a union electrician, are you? In light of that, how can some lowly person such as yourself possibly tell them how to do their work?
Back to the re-education camp for you! ;)
By the way, one of my best friends worked as a mechanic in a refinery for a number of years after he graduated high school. He has dozens of stories about the stupid ways unions killed productivity.
In all honesty, I wasn't busting on unions, regardless of how many knee-jerk reactions my comment garnered.
Four guys sitting around for an hour and a half, waiting for someone else to move a stack of sheetrock is the stupidest thing I've ever seen.
Well.....it was....until I started seeing folks trying to justify it on an internet message board.
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
Ok, let's take the union aspect out of the job. Suppose it had been 4 plumbers or illegal alien painters or such. Suppose they tried to flop the rock on the floor like you did, and there was a scrap 2x4 layiong there and it busted all the rock. Now what's your answer? One sheet ... I agree with you. But more than that ... ? They could justifiably be ridiculed for not calling the afternoon before to alert you so there wasn't any downtime."Put your creed in your deed." Emerson
"When asked if you can do something, tell'em "Why certainly I can", then get busy and find a way to do it." T. Roosevelt
You're thinking WAY too hard about this and looking for things that might, possibly, could, maybe, perhaps, go wrong.
I'll bet dollars to donuts that the vast majority of folks.....union and otherwise.....do things every day that doesn't fall within their "job description" without hesitation, because it will move the job along.
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
Thanks guys, this is fun. How come when I ask a serious question I only get 5 responses?Gotta get back to work.....
Maybe we should change the name of the thread to union stories. I'm sure we all can come up with union tales where common sense was lacking, but it is true that unions have provided a voice for many workers to stand up to unfair management practices.
Personally, I tend to not be a union guy largely because of some experiences when I was a kid working in a grocery store (I had no choice . . . had to be in the meatpackers union) and later as a member of the Musician's union, but on the other hand, my father, who was a trucker during the time when they worked ungodly hours under terrible conditions, could say no wrong concerning the Teamsters when his outfit was finally unionized.
I have very little use for unions, but I have to disagree with your comment. First, there should have been better communication. The electricains should have explained their needs better. Second, there really is no reason for electricians to move a stack of rock, just a drywallers should not have to move a stack of conduit or romex. Moving one piece out of your way is one thing, but not a whole stack."Put your creed in your deed." Emerson
"When asked if you can do something, tell'em "Why certainly I can", then get busy and find a way to do it." T. Roosevelt
Come on man. You need to get a job done, you do what you have to.
As I said to Bob.....it took seconds for me to flip the stack into a pile on the floor.
The rock was placed exactly where they suggested. "Anywhere but in the middle of the room."
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
I actually have to disagree with a lot of the union way when it comes to the ridgidness of their rules. I imagine most of their rules are there because of abuses perpatrated in the past and other good reasons. And sure, maybe it would have been better if the drywall could have been delived after they were done, but I don't think I would ever get anything done if I always waited for the "right" person to come around and move something, or clean something up. I'm certainly not going to wait around for an hour and a half for someone else to do it.Peace,Caseyhttp://www.streets.org
I've seen a 60' werner 3 piece ladder upright fully extended in the back of a one ton dodge to get the extra 3'
I imagine most of their rules are there because of abuses perpatrated in the past and other good reasons.
A lot of their rules were generated to "create" more jobs for their brothers. The thinking was that if carpenters, rockers, and electricians (just three random examples) were prevented from doing each others' work, then the person paying for the work would have to hire three people, not just one. Thus, instead of having just one person employed, the union way employs three.
The "logic" is flawed, I know, but that type of thinking has been around a long time.
In Germany, for example, trade unions pushed for a shortening of the 40-hour week down to 36. (This information is about 15 years old, so things have probably changed even more since then). The logic was that if the companies hiring trade workers were forced to reduce their workweek by 10% (40 to 36), then they'd have to hire 10% more people to keep their output the same.
It didn't work, of course. Industry just found ways to improve efficiency with more automation, more investment in tooling, etc. In the long run, I think those companies ended up exporting a lot of German jobs, too.
I'm all for the union objectives of ensuring a safe workplace, and trying to use collective bargaining to get a fair deal for the workers. But those once-noble objectives have given way to a lot of plain nuttiness in modern times. What the union leadership doesn't seem to realize (or care) is that if they push the companies too far, and make the resultant price of goods too high, the company will not be able to compete and will have to either export the jobs or fold. And I don't see how a bankrupt company is supposed to help the tradesman.
In an adjacent room there was some finish trim going on. From the next room I heard "tap, tap, TAP...CRAP!"
Over and over.
A few sighs.
I walk in to see what's going on.
A new guy who is hand nailing trim is trying to start and drive finish nails by holding a nailset in between the hammer and the nail.
I mean, he's not driving the nail almost home with the hammer and finishing it with the set, he's trying to drive the nail from the get go by using the nailset.
It was his first time hanging trim and he was told by the job to "set the nails with a nail set". And by golly that's just what he was trying to do.
muggs56,
Well I have quite a list .
But the one that always springs to the top while I was a super on a job.
I kept hearing a skil saw being truned on and off quite rapidly.
Finally I hollared at the guy,: "Either fix the switch or the cord or get another saw out"
Quiet for a moment then the sound starts again so I walk around the corner to see:
Young carp kneeling on the ground trying to put a point on a 2" stub of a pencil by using the skil saw held between his knees and the guard tied back . He was holding the pencil in one hand and triggering the switch with the other.
When I blew up about how frigging stupid that was he tried to tell me that he knew what he was doing, leave him alone.
I fired him before he finished his sentence, last I heard he was packing sheetrock for a living.
Tool abuse oh yes, but my story isn't as bloody. I was working in Houston TX and we had to get some metal racks ready and that meant drilling a bunch of 3/8" holes in steel angle iron. One of the guys helping was a recent graduate from Teas A&M, an "Aggie", and several of the other guys from UT were razzing him at every turn ('cause that's what they do down there).
He volunteers to drill the holes and after fifteen minutes I stroll over to check and see how he's doing. He is still working on the first hole, sweat drenched, and cursing like a sailor. The drill is whirring, smoke is coming off the bit and he's squirting oil on the hole like crazy. A couple of the UT guys come over and one of them mentions to the other that his job would be a lot easier if he'd switch the drill motor out of reverse! You have to be from Texas to understand the total humiliation.
It took a good month for him to live that one down.
I was standing in a small lumberyard out west when a HO came in with a circ saw and complained that it wouldn't cut, even after they had just sharpened the blade for him.Another contractor took a look at the saw and told him, "I can fix that saw fo rten bucks, but I'll have to take it home with me tonight and bring it back tomorrow."The HO DIY agreedThe blade was in backwards
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
I used mine 2 days ago to cut polycarbonate roofing, which, with the blade in backwards, goes great!
Then today, on my first cut in wood I was like, "What the hell!?"
Still in backwards--but at least I knew it I guess...
Know why aggies wear cowboy boots?
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-Those little knots are just too confusing.
did you hear that when Barry Switzer left the university of Oklahoma to coach the Dallas cowboys that he simultaneously raised the intelligence level of both states!
at least he beat Oklahoma State BOOMER SOONER
so my neubie parter is trying to cut sohe ply wood and he needs to sut int in the middle, he asks how to do it so i tell him to do a plunge cut. he plunges the saw in... but with the back of the blade first. kickback and a sore wrist. had him stop for the day.
I was installing doors and windows in a log cabin in Maine years ago and the roofers showed up to work.
After they set up there ladders they took 2 cases of beer up before the shingles or anything else. Im glad I was finishing up that day and was glad to be outta there. Oh another job my friend (ill call him Steve )+(because thats his name ) was doing for a lady where he was trimming out a bedroom and building a closet . well he nailed through a heat pipe behind the wall and when he realized what he did he pulled out the nail, thats when the water really poured out and downstairs in living room with hard wood floor couch , luckely the stereo and Tv didnt get wet well he called me and another friend in a panic and we went over and fixed the leak and helped dry it up . well if that wasent enough things were ok for a day or two until he did it again yes can you beleave it he nailed in to the same pipe and water all over the place again that was pritty stupid . but we still helped him not really for his sake the second time we just felt sorry for the lady that hired him and had to help him so it would help her.
he hasent worked for her again. woof woof
Carpentry and remodeling
Vic Vardamis
Bangor Me
He's not the first one to do that. Jerry Jones and Jimmy Johnson come to mind first.
Stupidest thing you ever saw on a job?
usually the project manager
I don't Know what I am doing
But
I am VERY good at it!!
Good one! How come izzat? Sad but true sometimes.
Hey!Iwas one of those for awhile. I used to tell people my job was to guess, lie and steal. 'Was pretty good at it, made the company lots of money, found out my boss had been lying to me. Walked away leaving them to deal with a complicated mult-million $ job. They went under; no regrets.
One of many that comes to mind..
framing a town house
premade a bunch of California corners(2 studs nailed like an L)
handed one to my helper and said "put this in and I 'll get the guys to stand it up".
come back with the guys and he has the long leg of the L sticing ot of the wall.
so i tell him it is wrong and to fix itwhile me and the rest of the crew hump some plywood
come back and he has it sticking out but away from the end
wrong it has to be flush
so he puts it with the nailer facing out.
4th times the charm.
I didn't know that there were so many ways to orient a two stud corner!!!
I don't Know what I am doing
But
I am VERY good at it!!
California corners, huh?We just called 'em cheap #### corners, You don't save much in labor and the material cost is negligible. WHY?
Because you can insulate a two stud corner like MisterT is describing. We usually use triples for corners, but occasionally an energy conscious builder or homeowner will ask us to use a two stud (or California) corner so they can properly insulate it.
More than one way to skin a cat bro..... free your mind and the rest will follow.View Image
thanks,
i'll think on it...
I like those cali corners because it's all solid. No blocks that a nail may miss. That and the perpindicular orientation of the grain is stronger.
think about it - double studs or a T - not only that but a cali corner provides more sheetrock backing
i was a union carpenter for 16 years and dont recall many dumb things, Im very proud of my work and always worked hard, while its true theres bad apples everywhere you will not get called to work if your a slacker, One time i beeched about my job and my dad told me hey your making a great wage with bennies and own your own home on that union job
That corner can allow better insulation
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
Working as a carpenter on an Alaska island, The guy working on the cannery started welding with no face shield, I told him to stop he told me to buzz off he knew what he was doing, I went to look for his boss when i got back they took him off blind, I think he recovered,,.... another contractor hired a guy to build a fence, I stopped by looking for him and asked why he had 16 foot posts sticking up in the air, He was supposed to cut the posts in half, It never dawned on him why he was one half short on posts and why the fence was 13 feet in the air????
This idiot managed to find rebar cutoff ends that were no longer than 12". Each piece of rebar was connected by tie wires in the footing and none were even lapped.
Two things come to mind, I had only been a carpenter for maybe 4 years and was working in a brownstone in Brooklyn shimming kitchen cabinets. Another carpenter was on the job same age as me but full of bragging and bravado and BS going on about how he was a union carpenter making x # of bucks per hour, blah blah blah, throwing terms & jargon around like he was God's gift to the trades. He was hanging a bunch of 6 panel doors in existing jambs, which I'll grant you is not all that easy. A few days later the HO was there mad as hell because all the hinges had been mortised, holes cut for knob sets etc, but all the doors were hung upside down. These were expensive solid poplar doors too mad in a local shop. I would have said something before but his work was in the upper 2 floors and I was in the garden apt. and I didn't see them untill the HO called me up to look. Mr. high and mighty ate crow the rest of the day-job.
Another time in Brooklyn, a painter, another young cocky buck, was working 4 stories up painting the jambs and casings on the outside of all the back windows...from the inside. He would stand on the window ledge and lean out only holding himself from falling by one hand around the sash of the open window. I told him to get the hell inside and that he was a fool. He just laughed and said "nevuh happen.." Few weeks later....you guessed it, this guy was in the hospital having shattered both ankles, popped one knee, broken arm and shattered elbow. He had a bad head injury too.
I know there are many many more, and better ones but I'm too tired and just can't think.
My wife used to work in Manhattan as a store designer. They were remodeling a store, Union carpenters had left cut-offs and other debris (including a hammer and other tools) on floor. (Union jobsite cleaners not shown up yet?) Union carpet layers arrive and proceed to lay wall-to-wall directly OVER the debris and tools. I understand it's not their job to clean up other's mess, but they said their union doesn't allow them to TOUCH a hammer. I guess they also don't let them use a phone to call and explain why they can't lay the carpet today. This is just passive-aggressive BS. Ended up having to pay for union carpet layers to remove the carpet, carpenters to remove their tools, carpet layers to re-lay the carpet.Wife also said when union workers were around, she had to hide her hammer (that she used for hanging displays, etc.), as the union guys would walk off the job if they saw a non-union person onsite using a hammer.
And I thought Paris Hilton was a prima dona!!!
When I was a transportation planner in Muskegon (working for a regional planning commission), I put a counter in with a pneumatic rubber hose stretched across the road in a park. Later that day a guy from the county told me I should go out and remove the counter because they were going to be working on that road. I went out there and they had already paved the road--right over the hose! I said, "Okay, we have a permanent counting station now!" (Removing the hose would have entailed pulling two nails.)
Speaking of stupid things, today while I was painting the patched drywall around a French door we put in yesterday, the guy I work for was out putting down composite decking (recycled plastic and wood fibers into "boards" complete with fake grain). I finished painting and walked out to see if I could help and I noticed big scratches across four of the deck boards (two were gouged and two had just deep scratches)!
I said, "Wow, that doesn't look good!" The guy says, "Yeah, I put the step together and shot a nail that stuck out the bottom and didn't see it till I slid it into place." I talked to him for quite a while before I finally convinced him to take the two gouged boards out and cut them for the steps (using only the good part of the board for the step and another short section beside the steps and then throwing the scratched remainder away) and since he didn't want to go buy any new boards, I convinced him to use the two that weren't as badly scratched in a corner where they wouldn't be seen, instead of right in front of the French doors. He's the boss--I sub for him.
I've been a member of several different unions only one of them a trade union. There's good & bad. I'm just not a union type, it's mostly a certainly type of mentality. But the BS they pull sometimes has led to their demise. In some cases they have really shot themselves in the foot.
Not knowing all the details of the carpet layer story, we can make up all kinds of scenarios and excuses.
It's conceivable that they wanted the floors cleaned up, and some self important supervisor or foreman at the other end of the phone said, "stop making excuses, and get that carpet down NOW, you bunch of slackers!"
In which case most of us would say, "fine, if you won't listen, we'll just do what you say", and did exactly as told.
I've met bosses who say, "don't think, just do what I tell you to." They're usually the ones who don't understand the horrible workers they always have. I had one guy say, "how come everybody takes what I say literally?". Hmm. Maybe because, if they don't, you scream and yell and throw things at them?
I've met bosses who say, "don't think, just do what I tell you to." They're usually the ones who don't understand the horrible workers they always have. I had one guy say, "how come everybody takes what I say literally?". Hmm. Maybe because, if they don't, you scream and yell and throw things at them?
Did we work for the same guy? I had this exact same experience. Guy would ream you for not doing exactly as told, then if it didn't work out, he'd say You guys are taking me too literally!
In a similar vein - one time I called my project manager (I was the site sup't.) to say that the dirt he ordered was too much - the slab was going to end up being too high. He told me to stop questioning him because he knows WTF he's doing. Later, he comes out to the site after the slab is poured. His reaction - the slab is too high. I said I told you that - you told me to shut up and do as told. His response - This is still your fault - you were here and could see how high it was, I was just responding to a phone call with no way of knowing the actual situation.
The dumbest thing I ever saw on a jobsite? I think it was the pot-smoking framers installing pre-fab roof panels ( black paper and shakes on a 2' x 8' plywood panel) They would run them wild into the valley, then come back and cut the angle with their skill saw - right through the valley metal and all. Leaked like a sieve the first time it rained. No way to fix it - they ended up tearing off the roofs and re-roofing.
Of course - who's dumber: the carps who did this travesty, or the jobsite super, that I reported it to, and who responded "these guys are journeymen, and I'm not a babysitter" - and didn't even bother to look at the situation. Then he comes to me after the first rain, and asks me (a first period apprentice at the time) can you fix it?"I needed a drink, I needed a lot of life insurance, I needed a vacation, I needed a home in the country. What I had was a coat, a hat and a gun."
Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe
Did you say carpet layer?
Reinvent, I'm mad at you....
That was sick!
It was wrong!
It was just plain twisted!
But the real reason I'm mad at you is because my Stomach hurts really bad from laughing so hard." If I were a carpenter"
LOL.... that was just twisted..... but pretty dang funny.View Image
That guy looks exactly like the one who installed carpet in my last house. Fortunately I didn't own any pets. Peace,Caseyhttp://www.streets.org
I just came accross this on metacafe. I thought you might enjoy it. A great example of the question on this thread. :-)http://www.metacafe.com/watch/444443/construction_accident_compilation/ott
Edited 5/12/2007 4:10 pm ET by ottcarpentry
31 years ago I was stripping formply off the underside of a first floor slab. All came off easy, cept for one sheet. After several unsuccessful attempts to pry it from underneath, I went to the upper floor and started banging on the 2' exposed overhanging end of the sheet with a 2X4, a 4X4, and becoming more and more frustrated, started kicking at it with my foot.
I was jumping up and down on the end of the sheet when it came loose and honest to god it floated me 12' to the ground. I was still standing when it landed in a huge cloud of dust and there 10' away, staring in disbelief, spitting dust, was Sherman, the oldest carpenter on the jobsite.
"In 40 years," he said to me, "That has got to be the STUPIDEST thing I've ever seen!"
Congratulations! You are the first to admit your own mistake.I know I have dozens, but here's one; Wife and I buy shelving from Ikea, install, stand back to take a look. While I'm patting us on the back for things being "plumb,level, square", in line across the doorway, etc; my wife gets a look on her face and asks; "what's that sound?".Go to basement. Water pouring down. Shut off water. Take down shelves. Cut out old plaster. Find that I had managed to place 2 d/w screws deadcenter through a 1/2" feedline to the upstairs bath.I couldn't do that if you handed me $1000.Fixed it.
Taining to use a circular saw? You have got to be kidding me. Your father was supposed to show you how to use it by the time you were 12. Power tools come with certain Darwinian properties.
Carpeting over tools and debris, that shows a lack of self respect and zero pride in workmanship.
Unions are colusionary, extortionist organzation that tolerate and promote mediocrity.
Given the greed and indifference of those with money and power; what is your solution?
I take it yur talkin' about more than a few upper union bosses...Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming<!----><!----><!---->
WOW!!! What a Ride!Forget the primal scream, just ROAR!!!
Come on. How can you bad mouth an organization that promotes using senority instead of skill or merit?
I hauled auto parts to big three plants before I started doing construction. Some of the things that go on in those plants is simply ridiculous.
Unions are colusionary, extortionist organzation that tolerate and promote mediocrity.
But they've elected some great US Presidents! (Kidding.)
union teach ya to use DW screws in applications other than drywall???add that to yur pulled a boner list....Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming<!----><!----><!---->
WOW!!! What a Ride!Forget the primal scream, just ROAR!!!
that'll teach ya to use drywalll screws for shelving!;)
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hanging shelves with drywall screws?! you are in trouble now, and posting that fact in this forum may be the biggest mistake ever! wait till piffin finds out yer gonna get it!
What's the problem with dw screws? I was taught that a few old-school carpenters. They tend to be stronger than wood screws. The heads definetley hold up better and they are much cheaper.
oh,man you better duck. i would change my screen name. you have open a can of worms that no man has survived. drywall screws also known as "piffin screws" have taken down many a men. good luck larryhand me the chainsaw, i need to trim the casing just a hair.
You are being facetious, right?Everything you just said is totally wrong.drywall screws are made for hanging drywall onmly. The metal is cheap and brittle and heads will snap off at the shoulder when used in wood which is far harder than the paper and gypsum. when remodeling and removing cabinets that were hung with DW screws I find a quarter to a third of them have been broken off.I also recall a safety meeting for the State WC compliance training where one of the disaster photos shown was from some yahoo using drywall screws where structural screws were needed. The screws snapping off landed 2-3 people in th ehospital.Not only is the metal weak, the shank is smaller so there is less displacement in the wood. Pullout resistance is a function of the amot of wood displaced.Most better screws also have a coating that prevents or delays rusting too To be fair - some guys call any screw with a bugle head and phillips drive a SR screw even when it is a structural screw. Maybe you have been using real screws, but if you are reaching into the SR hangers bags to screw anything other than sheet rock, you are screwing up!
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To be fair - some guys call any screw with a bugle head and phillips drive a SR screw even when it is a structural screw. Maybe you have been using real screws, but if you are reaching into the SR hangers bags to screw anything other than sheet rock, you are screwing up!
I dont want to rehash all this BS about the screws but, I wonder if there really are 2 1/2" or 3" sheet rock screws? I've been told that there really isnt a true sheetrock screw that long, and that came right from one of the screw manufacturers. If your hanging cabs with anything less in length then you probably got more to worry about then wheather or not the screws are intended for SR or cabinets.
I think that a lot of people call any black screw a sheet rock screw, sorta like Klenex, Skill saw, Sawzall.........
I've been in old houses that had the site built cabinets from the early part of the last century nailed right to the wall and they were in no danger of comming off.
I dont want to re-debate this whole thing here, never did any good the first time so no sense in doing it again!
Doug
I've bought up to 4 inch sheetrock screws before.
Same thin shank and blackened steel with heads that will bust off pretty easy.
But now that we're on the subject...nah, I'll start a new thread.tagline- The secretary of the Province of New Netherland, writing in Dutch, in 1650, for the information of those who wished to take up land there, states more particularly that "those in New Netherland, and especially in New England, who have no means to build farmhouses at first according to their wishes, dig a square pit in the ground, cellar fashion, six or seven feet deep, as long and as broad as they think proper, case the earth inside with wood all round the wall, and line the wood with the bark of trees or something else to prevent the caving in of the earth; floor this cellar with plank, and wainscot it overhead for a ceiling, raise a roof of spars clear up, and cover the spars with bark or green sods, so that they can live dry and warm in these houses with their entire families for two, three, and four years -Thoreau's Walden
And maybe the one manufacturer that I talked to didnt make them that long, dont know?
I dont see any in 4" length but I guess I dont look for them either. I dont want to hang rock and I sure as hell dont want to hang any where I need a 4" screw!
Doug
I'd used them in a 100yearold house to pin drywall over 2inch dow bluefoam insulation board right into the wall studs without using strapping.
Been 8 or 9 years now and not a pullout or crack anywhere to be seen.
be a wisecrack or unseen
tagline- The secretary of the Province of New Netherland, writing in Dutch, in 1650, for the information of those who wished to take up land there, states more particularly that "those in New Netherland, and especially in New England, who have no means to build farmhouses at first according to their wishes, dig a square pit in the ground, cellar fashion, six or seven feet deep, as long and as broad as they think proper, case the earth inside with wood all round the wall, and line the wood with the bark of trees or something else to prevent the caving in of the earth; floor this cellar with plank, and wainscot it overhead for a ceiling, raise a roof of spars clear up, and cover the spars with bark or green sods, so that they can live dry and warm in these houses with their entire families for two, three, and four years -Thoreau's Walden
Edited 5/13/2007 10:00 pm ET by rez
I styill have a handfull of 3" and 4" SR screws around someplace. We used them once upon a time for SR over 2" foam. Now I run strapping over the foam and then the SR hangers can hit wood easy
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I don't know you, but I have to call you on BS. Why are you inventing these calls to manufacturers? Not making it up? Okay, name them.Any fool can walk into Lowe's or HD and grab a box of 3" drywall screws.
Lots of different companies make them. Type it into a search engine and see for yourself.
I'll have to go back and look what the company was, it happened about 6 or 7 years ago. There was no "invention" on my part. I never said there were "them", only implied that there was one.
I was curious wheather or not real sheetrock screws actually came in the longer lenghts. I knew that black screws were made that long but wondered if they were sheet rock screws or just black screws that were thought to be sheet rock screws.
I know that you can walk into Lowes and buy 3" or 4" black screws, I just wondered, and that was all it was on my part because I didnt think there would be any need for that length in sheetrock screws, not being in the business of hanging rock I didnt personally see a need for them in those lenghts, as a few guys pointed out, there is so I was wrong on that point.
If I recall, and its possible that its not 100% but I suspected that the longer screws were all the same, none dry wall type. I found the no. to the company that was on the box and called wondering about my suspicions, I got some answer that maybe I was reading something into but the guy told me that they didnt make/produce/package (not real sure anymore) sheetrock screws of the longer lengths. If they didnt for what ever reason maybe I read something into it based on my preconcieved ideas but for me at least, I was convinced that sheet rock screws where not really sheet rock screws when they got past the 2" -2 1/2" lenght.
Maybe in my earlier post I posted with more athority then I really had on the subject but I dont make a habit of coming on here and spreading the BS around. I thought I even stood corrected when rez or Piffin said that they had used true sheetrock screws of the lenghts that I mentioned.
Wheather or not I can even come up with anything close to the company that I called I have posted that I was wrong regarding sheetrock screws of lenghts past the 2 - 2 1/2" length. Two people that I regard as not into BSing said so and that was good enough for me.
Doug
I am very interested in the sr screw issue. I started using them because the heads of wood screws I was using stripped out so easy with a screw gun, and was advised to use them by some old-timers that do great work.Piffin, since you appear to be the god of screws around here; please enlighten me on the subject of screws. Where do you buy good reasonably priced screws in large quantities?
What do you buy for what?
GRK Reiser screws with Torx heads. Go to them and you will never go back to anything else. The torx head and corresponding bit will not cam out like a phillips will. The bugle head has cutting edges on the back of the shoulder to neatly taper itself into a countersink and the tio is self drilling.Their metal is so strong that the 3/16" laghead is equivalent to a typical 5/16" glavanized lag screw.They have normal plated, and stainless steel too, trimheadscrews, star hangers, and a new one, the caliburn, that is twice as good as Tapcons for concrete.http://www.grkfasteners.com/
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Holy sheet mon...those screws of yurs got balls! May I refer youse guys to this testimonial.
Shannon Skovlund, a sales representative for BPI Inc of South Dakota writes:
One day I pulled into Ethan Co-Op Lumber Association in Ethan South Dakota to visit Brian and show him GRK’s Caliburn™ Concrete screws. Brian asked "Are they any good?" to which I replied "Of course, they are GRK!" Brian said "Let's Find Out..," so we went into the alley of the lumberyard, drilled a hole into the concrete, put a washer on a 3 1/2" Caliburn™ XL and fed it through two lengths of a log chain. We then hooked the log chain on the end of the fork of a 10,000 lb fork lift. Pulling on the chain the fork lift had a 2 1/2 - 3" deflection. We lowered the fork and slid the chain towards the center of the fork. Pulling again it appeared the chain was ready to snap. It didn't and the screw pulled out. The threads were completely intact, telling us it was the concrete that gave way!
Ok, they look great, a bit pricey. Twice as good as tapcons, how? Where do you buy them in quantity at the best price. Thanks.We will fight them, sir, until hell freezes over. And then sir, we will fight them on the ice.
I buy them from my local lumberyard.They seem pricey at first, but the savings in labour by comparison makes them cheap. No broken shanks to retrieve and replace. No camout stripped heads. Fewer bit replacements. Self drilling too.every one of my guys got to love them the first time they used them and fewer lost, drpped, broken cammed out screws means more production and less waste for me.Maybe I should take a job as a sales rep with the company!;)
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Muggs
I think, and I'm guilty of doing it myself, that a lot of people consider all black screws sheetrock screws.
I work for a company that uses black screws for just about everything - we use sizes from 1" up to 4 1/2" but they are not sheetrock screws, look like it at a glance but are not.
The GRK screws that Piffin posted the link to are great screws but they are pricy, especially if your buying 15 - 20 25lb boxes of them a year.
From my tool supplier I buy the GRK's in the longer lengths because if you have to drive a 5" screw the caming out of a phillips screw is a real pain, Although swithching to a impact driver does take care of most of the caming.
Doug
you are right that there are other screws than SR screws that are black. I have some nice square drive trmhead srews that I use sometimes that can pull themselves right through a wall! They or the GRK are what I use for a lot of extension jams on windows.
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I have some nice square drive trmhead srews that I use sometimes
Thats funny, I just unloaded my screw trey of all the black trim heads today - gave them to this young kid on the job, he needed some trim screws so I set him up! Since I found the GRK's I dont think that I used the blacks more then a few times.
THis is the one place that I will always use the GRK's, I love those trim heads.
Doug
Maybe not the stupidest thing I've ever seen, but surely the meanest piece of advice I can remember was in an article on kitchen cabinet installs in FHB.
To eliminate squeaky countertops, they suggested laying down a bead of adhesive caulk before screwing them down. I think of it every time I change warn out laminate tops. It's hard enough to find all the screws, I can't imagine what I'd do if they were caulked too.
Piffin,
talked to a few more carpenters today. While the screws you mention do look good. It was suggested that you are a shill for the company. Suspicious that you only recommend one brand. Not true; right?
You could talk to him directly if you're gonna diss him._______________________________________________________________
"The artist is not a person endowed with free will who seeks his own ends, but one who allows art to realize its purposes through him. As a human being he may have moods and a will and personal aims, but as an artist he is "man" in a higher sense - he is "collective man," a vehicle and moulder of the unconscious psychic life of mankind." - Carl Jung
Sorry,
Bad joke...
OK by me._______________________________________________________________
"The artist is not a person endowed with free will who seeks his own ends, but one who allows art to realize its purposes through him. As a human being he may have moods and a will and personal aims, but as an artist he is "man" in a higher sense - he is "collective man," a vehicle and moulder of the unconscious psychic life of mankind." - Carl Jung
Muggs
You addressed that post to Piffin but you hit the respond button on my post.
I doubt that Piffin is shilling for any company but I'll let him tell you that personally.
I often recomend a certain cabinet door company that I personlly think is the best out there, my opinion but I dont recomend any others and I'm not shilling for them, I just believe in them - probably the same for Piffin.
Now there is know way that anyone would confuse Piffin for me, everyone knows that I'm the much better looking of the two of us! If he doesnt admit it then I believe he's a shill!
Doug
I doubt that Piffin is shilling for any company You did not hear about Piffen. His daddy started a company back in 1931 no I,m sorry 1934. he invented the drywall screw. It was called the Piffen screw. made for hanging cabinets. Even named his boy after it, right after the dog. Piffen is really Piffen II. Piffen one was the dog. When his dad left. Piffen 2 got a large subside from the company. That how come he can live in Maine. There not any job in Maine, so he lives off the company profits. Really Piffen One got the company but something about opposing thumbs kept him out of it, that and peeing on the carpet.well anyway, the piffen screw company is one of the last company that dosent make their product in Tawiann. But I think there really made in Canada, you know being so close to Maine. Anyway Mr Piffen, that would be daddy ,was an immigrant from scotland. Piffen 2, not the dog says it was Ireland, but he ashame of his past, His dad real name is Piffen O'Calacuttey. But nobody could spell that in 1922. That why he made the trip to the ol country last year, to stay in good graces with the O'Calacutteys. And something about a moonless night and the Barney stone. But hey that his life, less we know the better. Somebody with all that money can be as freaky as they want.Oh did you see the new Piffen screw commercial on CNN this morning. it was supporting the troops, had airplanes flying over. I bet that cost a bundle. Brought a tear to my eye. catchy jingle though. been singing it all day. " Piffen screws, Piffen screws, when you need a handle, piffen screws" Its a little bluey though.But anyway, Piffen is not who you think he is, He hides behind the beard to keep the public away. Howard Hughes did it too.
Edited 5/15/2007 6:58 am by brownbagg
LMAO;)You forgot the part of family history where my mother, the dear Mrs O'Calacutty moved to Florida to retire, she brought so much money into the state ( to avoid the excessive Maine income tax) that they named a city after her!
Her adress is now in O'cala
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Thank you for clearing up a slew of misconceptions.
Stupidest thing - I'm with BB, it'd be me. Particularly the moment right after I stepped off the end of some scaffold when priming our greatroom celing. I was less stupid once I hit the ground.
http://jhausch.blogspot.comAdventures in Home BuildingAn online journal covering the preparation and construction of our new home.
Oh, crud--I tried to post to you and everything went crazy! Wouldn't post, cleared what I said and won't let me out!! Help I'm a prisoner of Prospero!
What I said was: LMAO at your great story! And every bit is true. The dog got the job becasue he had the secret screw alloy recipe and he could say his own name (had sort of a raspy bark).
The stupidest thing I have witnessed? Well three come to mind.1. We are building a video store (video smith) and need to levelastic the concrete floor. The Forman in his infinite wisdom poured the excess down the toilet. stuff cures real good under water.2. Same job. Almost done and we need S hooks, wire rope, eye hooks etc to hold the edge of a long shelf that would have 4 large colour monitors on it to show off the latest movies. The Forman gets the hardware and we install it with reservations. He says it will be fine. A few days latter the monitors show up and are immediately put up on the shelf to get them out of harms way. A little while latter CRASH! The S hooks he got were to small and pulled open.3. Doing a remodel on a house that was getting a small addition (say 12 X 15) We had a foundation wall poured for this and our lead carpenter was getting ready to frame it. He requested some sill seal but was tolled it did not need it. He argued the point a few times but finally relented and started framing the addition.
Fast forward a few days. The Archy comes by for a visit and demands that there be sill seal under the sill plates. So down comes the nearly completed addition.
And guess who said the foundation did'nt need the sill seal. You guessed it, the same bone head foremen.
just curious.Was this foreman related to the owners?
Sounds like three strikes and he's out to me!
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In fact he was married to the owners sister I belive. He knew nothin about construction but was put in charge. He also insisted we use the crevice attachment on the shop vac because it would have stronger suction. Also clogged up every 10 seconds.
Wow! But it's Blarney stone. My last name is O'Day and my mother's was Kelly. Don't mess with the Irish. Great sense of humor, love to tell stories(just ask my wife), but we also love a good fight. Ah, the hell w' it man; lets get a drink...
If you are planned on spell checking for BB, you'd best quit your day job and buckle up.
Besides...."Barney stone" was funnier!
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
Edited 5/15/2007 9:53 am ET by JDRHI
I got visions of a dancing purple rock.
Fight fire with water.
This comes close
Is there someone up there? He!! no, and I'm not even afraid of heights.“The richest genius, like the most fertile soil, when uncultivated, shoots up into the rankest weeds..” – Hume
I've wondered what they did when they got to the bottom third of that smokestack and it was filled up with the pieces from above it?
I guess the pieces would just fall OUTSIDE of the full stack and bounce all over the place.
Quantum materiae materietur marmota monax si marmota monax materiam possit materiari?
LOL.
"Barney is a purple stone, from our imagination...."
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
Barney is bad enough without being stoned...
Fight fire with water.
Ok, here's one I did. Bought some melamine Tied it down quite well on the roof of my station wagon(divorce - hard times). get halfway down a suburban road, top speed 35mph; stuff starts to shred - cut by the ropes. Reminded me of the time I was driving down the h'way and the truck in front of me was carrying big chunks of compressed old cars. One chunk decided to escape, leaped off the truck and started bouncing down the road. Scared the hell out of me; hard to figure which way it was going to bounce.
Murphys Law:
It will bounce in whichever direction you swerve.
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
I was on I-70 coming down east past georgetown, CO from the eisenhouer tunnel and passing a mobile home being towed on five axles. if you havene't been there, it is about tenmiles of steep grade downhill with a canyon right next to the highway.Just as I get abreast of the thing, one wheel decided it had had enough and parted company with the rest of the setup. It rolled along, passed the rig towing in my lane right in front of me as I slow down. eventually it veered right back in the slow lane in front of the towing rig, gradually cut on across untill it hit the gaurd rail when all that kinetic energy took it on a bounce maybe sixty or seventy feet in the air and on down into that canyon. I never did see where it landed.
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Your story remined me of a couple things--first, you should have just sold the ruined melemine to some pet food maker or for chicken feed!
About stuff bouncing down the highway--when I was a transportation planner, one of the many stupid things I had to do was do traffic counts. We didn't have no stinkin cones or anything, they felt that our fluorescent orange vests would repell cars I guess. So I'm trying to nail the counter hose and it's stretched across a five lane highway and cars are all going fifty and not moving over one inch to let me near the edge to pound the nail in. So I get frustrated and throw the three pound hammer to the ground and it bounces up and goes down the road, bouncing eight feet or so into the air on the first bounce and I'm seeing headlines in the paper "Planner causes major pile up on S. Getty Avenue". I was real happy when that hammer settled down and came to a rest about 40 yards down the road without having gone through any windshields, etc.!
(When I was a kid, I had a good arm and for kicks threw a rock as high as I could in the street I lived on. It was a residential street, not very heavily traveled and i looked to make sure no cars were coming before I threw it. But the rock had a hang time even better than Michael Jordan's and by the time it was coming down a car had turned off another road and turned onto ours. I watched helplessly as the car ran over the spot where the rock hit the pavement and it bounced up under the car. Of course it was my next door neighbor driving the car! She waggled her finger at me (how did she know it was me that threw it?!).)
Have not seen the show "Black Donnelley's" but have heard and love this quote (paraphrasing):
"All of those stereotypes about the Irish being a bunch of brawling alcoholics makes me so mad that I want to get drunk and hit someone"
BB
Funny story Johnny, very funny.
Doug
You'll just have to get your picture up in your profile so others can judge whether you are the better looking...But I don't mind cedeing that title to you since I am certainly the smarter one
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You'll just have to get your picture up in your profile so others can judge whether you are the better looking...
Thats not going to happen, I'm not taking the chance of going 0 for 2!
Doug
--"Piffin,
talked to a few more carpenters today. While the screws you mention do look good. It was suggested that you are a shill for the company. Suspicious that you only recommend one brand. Not true; right?"Muggs,Piffin just uses what works.3 of 4 lumberyards here stock GRK. One yard dropped GRK because they found a less expensive torx knockoff...so many carpenters complained that they switched back to GRK.If you give them a spin, you will see for yourself.They self-tap better than any other brand, hardly ever break. I really like the GRK color-coded bits, I can grab the right bit for the screw everytime...nice.
Ok guys, You've convinced me; I'm giving them a try. Thanks for the info.
Sorry for bad jokes. Like any jobsite; takes a bit to acclimate to the local humor. I'd give you a smiley face, but I hate emoticons.
Stupidest things...
Almost had a great one today (so I guess it doesn't count because it nevered happened, common sense kicked in)
I was outside playing ball with my kids. Looked down the street and a guy was working on his transportation, apparently he couldn't get it started. He was going to hook it up to a friend's car with a tow rope. It wasn't a long rope, he would have been about 5' from the back bumper.
The stupid part...it was a motorcycle. Old yamaha from the late 80's - POS.
I had my camera phone in hand ready to snap a photo of this guy getting dragged down the street. I was so disappointed. “The richest genius, like the most fertile soil, when uncultivated, shoots up into the rankest weeds..” – Hume
"I was outside playing ball with my kids. Looked down the street and a guy was working on his transportation, apparently he couldn't get it started. He was going to hook it up to a friend's car with a tow rope. It wasn't a long rope, he would have been about 5' from the back bumper.
The stupid part...it was a motorcycle. Old yamaha from the late 80's - POS.
I had my camera phone in hand ready to snap a photo of this guy getting dragged down the street. I was so disappointed. "
I did that once when I was a teenager, with hilarious results....I couldn't get my motorcycle running, so I rolled it down the hill on our street to bump start it. It didn't, so there I was at the bottom of the hill with a dead bike. I then got the smart idea to have my dad tow me back up the hill with his car; I tied the rope to his trailer hitch, then wrapped it once around the handlebar and held on to the end, figuring that if anything happened I could simply let go of the rope and it would come loose. Well, that didn't work - I skidded a little bit on some gravel so I let go of the rope, but it got caught somehow and I went down. Fortunately for the bike, I ended up on the bottom so it didn't get a scratch, but I ended up with a real nice road rash all across my back.
After we finally got the bike up the hill and went back in the house, my mother was real impressed with our ingenuity. :-)
mothers are easy to impress that way;)
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I guess your computer is running again? That thread seems to have disappeared
Yes, thanks.They moved it to the Tavern.
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The tavern? Oh no, I don't go there anymore! Did anyone suggest you buy a MAC to fix it?
No problem on the joke. One of my life principles is that anybody with no sense of humour is a man who canot be trusted. I've seen that over and over again.
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Piffin,
You are a man of my own heart. You obviously know things I could learn. Pleased to meet you.
Wait a second, did you say 3or 4 lumberyards? Where I live I have to go way out of my way to find two. There's a great little hardware store or two; but, mostly I'm stuck with home depot or lowe's. Liked it better when I could go to a lumberyard that also had a sawmill and for the things they didn't have I could hit a good hardware store. And at both I could actually talk to someone who knew what they were selling. Age sucks, but the alternative is worse.
no not true and not suspicious either. Remember you asked me what I use, not for a list of what are good screws.Had you asked tha latter, I would have mentioned the Griprites, Simpson, and McFeeley's
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I owe you an apology, Doug: I just re-read your post, and where you said, "the one manufacturer that I talked to didn't make them", I had mis-read it as "the longer screws must be made by one company" that you hadn't talked to (implying you'd talked to a bunch of them).BTW guys - if it's black, 95% of the time it is a drywall screw. Structural screws are expensive, hence pretty rare to begin with on a jobsite. They're even more rare in bugle-head (other than the new headlocks, I can't think of one). And even more rare in black. On the other hand, people using DW screws for non-DW applications is rampant.If it walks like a duck...
We get our screw from Bear Supply out of the Chicago area, they are black but they are not DW screws, not sure what they are called but I dont think in all the time I've used them (about 6-7 years) I've ever broke one at the head. I know they are costly, not as much as the GRK's that Piffin likes to use but pricey none the less.
On the other hand, people using DW screws for non-DW applications is rampant.
I think thats probably more true then most realize!
I worked a a shop down in Texas that the owner went right over to Lowes/Home Deopt and bought the cheapest screws that he could find, usually drywall screws, and they broke constantly, cheap azzed stuff. I really dont know how we were able to hold anything together - And you could not convince him that there was a difference.
Doug
Gee Doug, sure am glad you cleared that up. snork*
Now on the subject of cheap screws. I bought a box of GripRite exterior screws at the local Lowes labelled as for use with ACQ with a grey coating but I wouldn't trust it with ACQ, IMHO you understand.
Anyhow, I started using them for sheathing osb on sheds and am amazed at the quality of the screw at such a cheap price. I say cheap because a local chain here runs specials on occasion where you can get a lb. box for $1.99 as opposed to their normal $5.79 or the Lowes price of $6.87 for the same thing.
Anyhow again, now I've been using the gold colored extended length bosch tips with the little anticam ribs on the tip and recently bought a pack of the cheaper normal Lowes Taskforce brand and they aren't much different.
In that those freaking cheap screws keep busting the tips off both brands when driving with an impact.
One would expect to either have the crosshair insert on the screw stripmangle or snap the head off but no, they would rather eat up my buckfifty screwtips fer cryin' out loud.
Another anyhow, at 2bucks a pound on sale those screws are a good buy worth stocking up on.
be and the fact that I busted so many screwtips on this last shed that that is one of the stupidest things I ever saw on a job.tagline-...for two, three, and four years, it being understood that partitions are run through those cellars which are adapted to the size of the family. The wealthy and principal men in New England, in the beginning of the colonies, commenced their first dwelling-houses in this fashion for two reasons: firstly, in order not to waste time in building, and not to want food the next season; -Thoreau's Walden
Who buys screws by the pound?
I don't know, why do they sell them by the lb.?tagline-...for two, three, and four years, it being understood that partitions are run through those cellars which are adapted to the size of the family. The wealthy and principal men in New England, in the beginning of the colonies, commenced their first dwelling-houses in this fashion for two reasons: firstly, in order not to waste time in building, and not to want food the next season; -Thoreau's Walden
Sorry, I meant; I buy them in 25 or 50lb lots. You are correct in stating they are listed as price per lb. What I was trying to say is, since the quantity affects price so much,: simply stating price per lb. can be almost meaningless.
I guess I buy by the pound. I get the full 25# box so actually buy by the 25#
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First, the "anger the natives" comment.
I've said it before and I'll say it again.
"If you're hanging pre-made cabinets that came from a national cabinet manufacturer (kraftmaid for example), I see nothing wrong with using drywall screws. If there is any sort of overloaded weight in those cabintets the particle board and hot glue is gonna tear loose long before those drywall screws ever snap off."
Now if you're using custom built cabinets that are made of actual wood, that's a different story altogether.
Personally, I've always used those grabber brand "gold" #8 screws along with brass cup washers for hanging cabinets (depending upon the color of the cabinets). Never had any problems there.
Now, back to the actuall origional subject...
Many years ago, we had accidently left an angle brace nailed to one of the walls. The sheetrockers had 3 choices... knock the brace off themselves, (2 nails) Call the contractor and have them send someone from the framing crew to knock it off, (kinda whiny, but not an unreasonable request). or sheetrock around it, just to prove a point. guess which one they did? This was a new drywall company that we were letting do one house on a trial basis. I wonder what happened to those guys when their boss found out why we weren't interested in using him for any more jobs?" If I were a carpenter"
Those groptite screws are pretty darn good for the price.
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rez
I cant use the Bosch tips in my impact, they break all the time. I use a brand that I get at White Cap and in my impact I dont think I break one any more then maybe once a month. I have to see what brand they are.
Other then stainless steel is there any other screw that you can use in the new ACQ wood?
I know thats not what your post was completly about but those Bosch tips got me thinking!
Doug
Like someone posted, the Grip-Rite screws that come in colors (sounds like a song by the Stones) say they're for ACQ. There are some other colored screws, usually green or cedar colored that are also supposed to work. I've seen both at Lowe's. I guess we'll know in a couple years whether they really do work!
brownbagg, that story just cracks me up.
Someone on here not too long ago started talking about the ACQ corrosion and stated something to the effect that ACQ without the moisture lessens or removes the deterioration of the fastener, I don't know.
It sounds plausible that in a dry environment the chemical reaction of whatever chemical salts in the acq would be minimized to the point that a coated screw might prevent the transference, but the reality of it is still an unknown. Maybe it will just put off the inevitable.
Danno mentioned the cedar colored screws from a bigbox and I recall that is what the homeowner got for me to use on a small deck project last year.
Now this deck is wide open and the lumber keeps a high moisture content.
This homeowner somehow got on a badboy list with the city inspectors and are always giving him all sortsof grief for this, that and whatever.
The little stoop was close enough to the ground that the homeowner wanted to forego a rail and it was nada with the inspectors so back I went to add a rail something like 6 months later.
I had to remove several of the decking boards for access and when I did I discovered great deteriorationof those cedar colored screws. I mean to the point where I was lucky they were still coming out and some of them were so bad I started marvelling and kept the worst ones as I wanted to snap some photos.
The greater number of screws removed had open rust areas on the threads and shoulder and some were almost eaten all the way thru.
I told him they would all have to be replaced with stainless next time I show up there. I'm thinking if that same scenario were repeated inside a vented dry enclosure the corrosion would have been much less if at all. But that is mere speculation on my part. That stoop wood was continually moist.
So no, in a wet environment I'm thinking nothing but stainless is going to cut it.
be maybe it's time to think timberframe techniques with wooden pegs or hire brownbagg to pour some concretetagline-...for two, three, and four years, it being understood that partitions are run through those cellars which are adapted to the size of the family. The wealthy and principal men in New England, in the beginning of the colonies, commenced their first dwelling-houses in this fashion for two reasons: firstly, in order not to waste time in building, and not to want food the next season; -Thoreau's Walden
so don't use ACQ and save ya the head and wallet aches to start with..Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming<!----><!----><!---->
WOW!!! What a Ride!Forget the primal scream, just ROAR!!!
DW screws are brittle and snap heads with ease. Then your shelves come crashing down. You should have hired a union shelf hanger....Frank DuVal
There's a reason they're "definitely cheaper". They're made to hold up sheetrock, which is pretty light.
I'm pro-union, because I agree we need them as a balance for the corporations. But I think that you're doing the union cause more harm than good by trying to justify those electricians.
Stupidest thing you ever saw on a job?me
Was that you I saw up on the two extension ladders tied together to make a ladder tall enough to reach the 3rd story gable?
Hey!Wait a minute!You trying to take my job man?
"Stupidest thing you ever saw on a job?"Brownbagg.;o)Oh wait. That might have been a mirror...
Fight fire with water.
Two guys predrilling holes in a lift of metal for a hay barn. They were on a 5/12 pitch 24' up to the gutters. Looked inocent enough till I saw the bottle of oil . They figured, the oil would speed up the drillin.
It was quite a show watching them screw the metal off.
Well I have some to add:
A remodel/new construction. Electrician does final rough and also phone wires and cable, all's well and shortly after electrician leaves, next day I can't get a hold of homeowner. Return, cable guy is working on phone lines, can't get them to work says HO. Finally after a couple of weeks, I am able to reach homeowners on their home number to schedule a a final inspection. They tell me that no one could figure out the phone problem until they had their alarm guy come over to set up the alarms. Seems the electrician had reconnected the phone lines to the alarm wires in the wall! The guy was a real pain throughout the job, so I wasn't too surprised. HO didn't bill for fixing the problem, although I offered to accept an invoice as I would have taken it back to electrician.
Framed a house/garage for a self described DIY'er GC, they refused to work with us during the planning stage, or let the subs communicate and each sub just pushed through their own needs, damn anyone else. Ones I remember: garage walls were too short for proper header over garage doors, missing footing for last lally, HO couldn't understand why we had no interest in putting a footing in for free because her 'super foundation guy' wouldn't come out to do it. When we were ready to frame first floor walls she announced, "I've changed my mind on the windows, but I don' know yet, go ahead and build and I'll let you know." Couldn't understand why we just couldn't build the walls and then 'change the openings later', nor why I was visibly frustrated at the delay.
HO who had to change position of a main conduit from the service pole to his panel (we put in an iron support beam across where it once went through the joists). We asked when his electrician was going to come in to replace and reroute that conduit as it was dangling dangerously and needed to move prior to rest of project. "Oh, I'm gonna do that this weekend, gotta get a junction box and I'll just splice it over here...." (pointing at the beam).
Whole condo remodel: A tile guy set up with his wet saw to cut tile for a bathroom -- in a completely finished and painted room! "Too cold outside." Not if you want your job it isn't, he was informed. Customer visited and was concerned about the poor guy cutting outside in January; the saw and tray was dripping with icicles and of course, you don't wear gloves when using a saw. "It makes him move faster." I said and went back to working still with the vivid picture in my mind of tile mud splattered all over the walls in that room.
Dumbest things I've done have more to do with paperwork and dealing with customers than anything in the field (that is in comparison of resultant suffering).
I once saw an electrician venting a bathfan through a vented soffit. But that wasn't the dumb part. The dumb part is that he was trying to do it from the roof of the 2 story colonial. He was laying face down on the roof with his waist at the drip line. His helper was sitting on the roof and holding the guy's ankles while he bent at the waist to get up under the soffit with a 4" holesaw in a holehawg. That development was all 8/12 roofs, IIRC.
How come it is just painters and roofers that normally are assumed to be low IQ? I gotta add electricians now after that one! 'course maybe they have enough static electricity stored up to keep them stuck to th eroof when that hawg binds and tries to flip them both!Forgive me all you electricians out there. I just happen to be pissed at one today. Where I built a hidden door and safeint o behind bookshelves this winter, I called and called and called for the HO chosen sparkie to get the light fixture and trims installed while I was there.After I am goine three months later, he showed up to do it. I had a secreet hidden latch for the door, and knowing that he, the housekeeper, or a painter might need to get in and need instructions how to operate the latch, I left a block of wood there saying,
"Hidden latch.
Call Paul..."With both of my phone numbersThe azzhole ignored that, wrote "Call 1-800-Mr wonderful" on the block and forced the latch, ruining it.I have a call into his pager that he is ignoring, so he will just have to apologize to the owners for that extra service charge from me. I'll enter it as "Replace latch destroyed by electrician - $80.00"stupid azz *(&#^#!
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I was finishing a basement cieling with strapping and them card board cieling tiles. I was stapling the tiles, with a bostitch narrow crown.
I dr5opped it right on it's nose and broke off the saftey doo-dad. Pulled trigger, no go. So, in my infinite wisdom, I took one leg of a staple and poked it in there and got the remaining part to retract so it might work.
Thinking I better see if I Really fixed it, I pulled the trigger, and shot a 1 3/8th staple through my finger.
Yup, I really fixed it.
Parolee # 40835
First, while putting back furniture into a reno i'd done, I asked the movers how a desk was assembled (to save time, it was a wierd desk) I was told, abruptly and rudely,"I can't tell you, but I could do it faster than you!) This from a mover! I had the last laugh when he installed glass door bookcases upside down (and had screwed them into the wall!)
Second,, driving by a H.O. doing his own reno,, drywall up on sawhorses, and cutting with a circular saw! MAN, that was a cloud of dust!
Stupidest thing on a jobsite:
I designed a theatre for a school in Brooklyn back in the '80's and the exterior walls were brick/cast stone belt course/split-face CMU. The split-face was from a very reliable company, E.P. Henry of NJ. However, an operator at the plant had neglected to wash out the mixture tank before starting the new color (ours), and about 25% of the split face had two different colors swirled together in an extremely unattractive mixture.
The union masons in Brooklyn simply built all the defective CMU into the exterior wall - "we aren't paid to look at them" was one comment that I heard.
All the block had to be replaced at E.P. Henry's expense.
Jeff
Condo management company hired 6 workers to chip off an ice dam that formed along the entire edge of a 4 story high roof. They decided to rope themselves together for safety. Only problem was they were all on the same slope of the roof. If one went they all went. Stupidest thing I ever saw!
That would be high on my list.
Ok, here's another one. Didn't see it myself, but when I was doing steel buildings there was a story. Guy is measuring a roof w/a tape walking backwards; falls off edge.BTW, did you know that quonset huts came about when the army needed good fast, cheap shelter; they went to silo builders and figured out that if you cut it in half, lay it down, it might work?
OK- here's ONE of mine. We had a three-story Victorian with a 12/12 roof. I routinely walked the roof unprotected when needed for repairs, etc. As I was planning one of these jobs that would require a roof walk, my wife pleaded with me to tie myself off. I begrudgingly agreed (not sure why I'm so stubborn about stuff like this!).Went to third floor, tied the rope around my waist, tied other end around the center section of the two-window dormer. Went out a dormer window, did my roof work, climbed back in the window. I untied the rope from around my waist, tossed the end out the window (easier than lugging the rope back town the stairs). Before untying the other end, I looked down- there was 15 feet or so of rope lying on the ground.If I had fallen, I would have hit the ground, but there would have been a handy rope to haul my lifeless body back up to the third floor.I got more if you have the stomach.Bill
I did the same thing once--my friend had tied the rope to the chimney (which probably would have just broken off if I had fallen without slack) and had me tie the other end around my waist. Took chances I wouldn't have normally taken because I felt so secure. End of day, got on the ladder and untied the rope and threw the end and it hit the ground before it ran out of slack.
Did you forget to tie off the rope, or did your wife sneak up there and untie it herself?
Early 70's. Up on a roof and I spotted a gal walking down the sidewalk looking fine. She looked up and spotted this tall, skinny hardhat looking equally fine. Our eyes were locked! The tall, skinny hardhat then stepped through a skylight. I was cut and scraped up but otherwise unhurt. My partner on the job couldn't stop laughing for half an hour.
Very similar experience.....in my teens....working for the Village as a summer job. Cleaning out the catch basins around town using what was basically a ten foot post hole digger, dropped down through the manhole covers.
Turn to watch young hottie riding by on a bicycle. She saw me looking and slowed down to allow a better view. Being such a cool young dude, I couldn't have her thinking that I was watching her.
Started to step back towards manhole before taking my eyes off of her. Next thing I know, my feet are dangling and I'm "chicken winged" to keep myself from falling all the way in.
Yep. One cool young dude.
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
...and they say blondes are stupid....speaking of blondes, I can remember one that took my breathe away. I couldn't speak to save my life!
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How'd you know I was blonde. (Was being the operative word.)
J. D. ReynoldsHome Improvements
Thanks for sharing that. I thought I was the only one to have done anything like that. I grew up with my roofer-tinner father always telling me "never walk backwards on a roof, you'll fall off." He never warned me about skylights or open manholes. ;-)
Third Dumbest: The kid they sent out to be a rear chainman on a survey crew I was running. We were trying to close a run between two monuments. The distance was supposed to 971-feet and some hundredths. We would chain out with a hundred foot long chain, so it took ten chains to get there, and we kept missing by about four feet.
Third time we did it, I had the kid who was on the instrument lead chain and I ran the instrument. I look down at where this kid was holding the dumby end of the chain, and instead of holding his plumb bob on the zero, he was holding it on the end of the little metal loop, which is about .4 feet from where the zero is. There was the four feet of error.
He was a legacy hire (one of the owners nephews), so I couldn't get rid of him. I finally gave him the job of waiting next to a monument until I flashed the headlights of the truck at him and then he was supposed to go hold a rod on the monument, until I flashed the lights twice. It kept him out of the way, and my production went up. After about three weeks, somebody told him why I had him standing out on a point, and he got mad and quit. Which is proof of how dumb he was, he was getting a full pay check for sitting in a lawn chair 7.5 hours out of the day.
Second dumbest: A new superintendent, whose first decision was where to set up his job trailer and it's temp power pole. He got the trailer set, and the electrician asked him where to put the temp pole. He walked over about twenty feet from the trailer, drew a big "x" on the ground, and the electrician started drilling. Four-feet down they hit the water main. And, since he had put his trailer on top of the valve can, the whole site was flooded before they could get it shut down.
And the absolute dumbest: The "inspector" they sent out to inspect a sidewalk and driveway pour, who had absolutely no field experience. She made us add water to the mud so it "poured smoother". The slump went from just under 3-in to 6-in, and every bit of the concrete was cracked by the end of the week.
I,m sorrytrue story. metal roof, chaulk line and tennis shoe. ever heard a ground man scream.
Didn't you scream before you got to the ground?
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I left finger marks in the roof metal
I don't remember why we were frameing nearby, but back in the late 70's a new prison was being built in Bucks Co. Pa.
I saw a block wall going up that must have been at least 14 courses high and 100' long. I knew we always had to put kickers in our basements ( 2x6 braces) so backfill could commence before we had the floor on. So I knew a little about block walls.
Well, there was nothing braceing these walls, and being summer, we get some serious weather, with straight line winds and such...in my mind I thought, geez, that sucker could just blow over without braces. I wondered who would have to eat it if it fell.
Sure enough, the next morning, there was a pile of block laying flat..the head cheese said to us carps. " Hey, fellas, we need a shid load of busted up 2x6" UNDER that pile, the ins. Co is on the way, and we need some braces under there, or no $ to rebuild it".
No joke.Parolee # 40835
Yeah, 'cause he was fired.
Sorry!
Shoulda been;He was fired before he hit the ground.
Oh god, please (!!!) I beg you, let's not start talking about inspectors or architects for that matter.
Ok, another for you. Working as an electrician apprentice; we walked in to a new house. Looked up and said what the f@#$! Two sections of the bottom of the roof trusses had been cut out. Found out; the apprentice hvac guy found them in his way, so he removed them for his convenience in moving the duct-work up.
I knew a man intense around 14 months ago or so whether in body or out I cannot tell as he had to hit the roof hard seeing only two days before the rains were to come.
He'd got all coffeed up and took on stripping one side of a low pitched roof and valley to lay sheathing down atop the old 1x lumber, lay the gracie then the archys.
He worked as a man possessed and finished up at night by floodlight right before the arrival of the rains.
Tho' the layers of old rolled roofing were vanquished beneath the onslaught of his intensity he had overstepped his mark and following the morning after the finish he began nursing the month long pain in his elbow with a velcro wrap and a sling.
That was a stupid thing to see on a job.
be I told the fool he needed to lay off the coffee.
View Image
...not to want food the next season; secondly, in order not to discourage poor laboring people whom they brought over in numbers from Fatherland. In the course of three or four years, when the country became adapted to agriculture, they built themselves handsome houses, spending on them several thousands."
-Thoreau's Walden
Edited 5/15/2007 9:02 pm ET by rez
Not so much stupid as funny.
I hired this kid for a summer real good kid just not too smart. While setting the ridge about 16' up on staging, the spacer block in the gable was being stubborn. So I yell to new guy to get the sazall. He brings me a skill saw, I says I want the SAZALL. He RUNS downstairs + I hear the other guys start yelling? Next thing I know he comes RUNNING up the stairs w/ 5 skill saws. I SCREAM I want the F-ing sazall.
He SCREAMS this is all the saws man.
What could I do? I figure it's my fault for hiring him!
Funny thing is He worked for me for 3 more summers b-4 he moved + was the hardest worker I had Go figure!!
NAIL IT !!!
I agree with brownbagg. Generally, it's me.I was watching a guy removing his picket fence. There was still the concrete poured around what remained of the deteriorated post at ground level. The guy had swung his pick into the post cavity, embedding the pick into the wood. He then hooked it up to the truck and tried to yank it out. I can't really fault him for that, I might've tried the same thing. However, the truck ripped the pick from the post and sent it flying across the street and into the neighbors driveway. Given that this is a residential street with a car parked opposite of the post, not 15' from where the pick landed, I thought he might try some other way, like I suggested.Nope. Tried it a few more times. Still amazed the neighbors car escaped without any harm.Pick never worked, he wound up driving some concrete stakes deep in and using the truck.
Another one I didn't see in progress, but got to enjoy the product. Crew was playing general for a kitchen remodel, and we did the demo. I don't remember why, but I was sent into the attic above the kitchen to look around. As I'm walking along the bottom chord of the trusses, I hear Mrs. HO ask if the ceiling is supposed to be bouncing/ boxing like that. Boss asks if I'm sure I'm on the chords...yep. Few minutes later, another warning--it's getting worse.I discovered the problem under the insulation. Looked like sparky had completely removed a section of the bottom chord to install a can. Not notched, surprisingly, because the cuts made a lovely semi-circle. I'm lucky I don't weigh too much.