Crazy machine shop rules and owners, lets hear about it.

[jlrii]

Fruit Fly Phobia?

 

[9100]

Seeing lots of reasons that a fella would wander away and not bother to go back. Rules made that appear arbitrary, as in the case of the window mentioned earlier, amount to being two problems. First is that the employer that made the rule, didn't bother to explain it and it's reason, the second part was that the venting should have been clear of the building to keep the fumes from recycling anyway.
Trev

Explaining the situation here seems to be even more trouble than explaining it was then. The spray room was not intended for production. Every so often we would make some test equipment or special item and needed to give it a good dust free coat of paint. Venting out the back wall was no problem. The quantities of these contacts suddenly went from an occasional one to serious quantities. Here are pictures of the contacts. For a size reference, the silver contact areas are 1.5" X .625".

contacts

When the upsurge started, I was hot tin dipping the terminal tabs on a plumber's stove. The glass bead blaster was a makeshift installation and I was silver brazing the contacts by clamping them on with carbon blocks held on by tongs and heating them with an acetylene rosebud. We managed to move a 20 hp compressor to the basement, connect it to a 200 gallon tank with a refrigerated dryer, build tin plating and wash tanks and a brazing fixture as well as teaching several new employees their jobs while meeting the deliveries. We weren't adding half million dollar ducts.

I don't have any stockholders or backers. I was still paying for the building and the improvements were paid for from revenue.

The problem was that people didn't smell fumes as they would with paint and the rusting was in slow motion, not immediately obvious, so they didn't take me seriously. Besides, what is so damned hard about leaving a door closed?

Bill

 

[El Mustachio]

No citrus fruits on-site!

I was installing some swiss machines on a production line and that was number 1 in the site rules we were sent. No one on-site knew why, but they all remember that the floor manager "went mental" when someone ate an orange at lunchtime.

Also, in the lunch room, there were no chairs and no waste bins - you had to stand and take any uneaten food, wrappers, etc, home with you.

I'm curious... did they handle a lot of zinc or chrome plated parts there or do a lot of low RMS finishes? Citric Acid + sweat = corrosive fingerprints. Really shows up quick on finer surfaces or on zinc. Just a thought.

 

[JoeE.]

The shop I worked in had a huge addition put on the existing building. Both were just big metal building. The old part did not have a very high ceiling. Here, it' hot and steamy in the summer.. so it was extra hot and steamy in that old part of the building.. and lots of heat generating equipment to help keep the temp up.

Everybody had their own fan... they were everywhere and you took it with you as you moved around to different areas of the shop. You'd melt without it.

When the addition was done.. they installed 3 or 4 highpowered exhaust fans along the roof peak to, theoretically, cause a draft and help keep us comfortable...and to allow them to eliminate personal fans!

There were 10 or 20 louvers along the exterior walls at floor level.... all along both the east and west walls. When the exhaust fans were turned on, motors would open the louvers to "let the air in"...

Well, that didn't work worth a shit. The building was probably 300 foot long and 150 foot wide... NO WAY IN HELL the air drawn in from those louvers was going to do one whit of good cooling anyone off.

As soon as it started getting warm.... we started sweating... and one by one the fans came out. Management was right on them... making us unplug them. Pretty soon, even they had to admit defeat.. them exhaust fans didn't do squat....

They were good for sucking welding smoke out, but did nothing for comfort...

The railroad I work at now... they went around and removed all chairs with rollers from our depot offices (about 10)... they are afraid someone is going to get hurt.. you know, lean back in your chair and tip it over. No one ever had ever tipped over backwards in one, but that didn't make any difference to them. "Someone MIGHT"...So, they all went out in the dumpster. But, not the chairs in management offices, just the working mens' offices... Management still has roll around chairs. I guess we are too stupid to be trusted with roll around chairs.

Couple of years ago... they removed all the stools from the "crew room".. where the trainmen sat at an elevated counter to access the computer terminals to get their paperwork. The man in charge at the time thought that he could speed the men out to their trains if they had to stand up and do their work, so he tossed the stools out. Instead of setting around wasting time, now we stand around wasting time.

 

[doug8cat]

Split Tenths,
Thank your higher power, be grateful your significant other can pack/cook a good lunch.
Other wise you be thinking "Oh shoot Tuna again!!!".

I love her with all my heart, however her culinary skills are LACKING.

But I an't no peach either!

 

[NAST555]

I think the fluorescent light power issue was the old style that had starters. I don't believe this applies to rapid start bulbs.

Yup that is correct. And the starters give in after switching on and off all the time.

 

[Toolroomguy]

And a US President can marvel at the French language for not even OWNING a word into which to translate the American 'rendezvous'.

Typical Gallic trick, that!

Bill

I thought President Bush said there was no French word for entrepreneur.

 

[NateA2]

Shop I worked at in the early-mid 2000's allowed you to drink on the floor while running machines after 5pm. Also, after noon on saturday.

I actually saw one employee squirt dye cleaner (denatured alcohol) into his coffee and drink it.

I dont drink anymore, so this shop was way weird for me as everyone there but me was a serious drunk.......

One guy asked me if he was there on friday...his name was Thor.

 

[Dave W]

The one that got me, tho... you *have* to take a full 45 minute lunch. It starts *exactly* at 11:40 AM, and ends exactly at 12:25 PM. Your work area must be clean before you leave. Breaks were the same way.

Hey! I worked there!

Same shop had a rule, no oil-dry. They had some kind of fancy "coating" on the concrete floor and didn't want it damaged. We were supposed to use shop rags to wipe up oil and coolant on the floor. Then you had a bunch of guys walking *very carefully* on the slick floors...

Also, the toolroom guys had absolute priority over any production equipment. So you'd go to break and come back with all your tools and stops on the turret lathe buggered about, or quill stops fiddled, and swarf all over the place. Of course, setting everything back up came out of the operator's timesheet, not the toolroom's timesheet.

Let's see... the toolroom guys worked in the same shop area, but they always complained they were too hot. So they'd open both bay doors and 20F wind would howl through the building while the heaters ran full-bore and we tried to run equipment with frozen fingers. The toolroom guys were probably too hot because they insisted on wearing their insulated hunting suits. But they got what they wanted, every time...

What else... oh, yeah. The drill jigs that had the bushings in the wrong spots, so every part they made had to be signed off as a variance by the QC supervisor. For *years*. Rather than fixing the jigs or changing the print. Then I got yelled at for using the Bridgeport and making the parts per print... and using the Bridgeport was actually faster than the jig, which was like some kind of fixturing Rubik's Cube.

Oh, and by the time I left, no compressed air. They claimed it was damaging the machinery. We were supposed to use shop rags for everything. Which didn't work too well, and their "week's worth" of rags lasted about two days. So you'd lift a part out of the antique Hardinge CHNC, shake it a few times to get as much oil as you could off, and set it on the bench, so oil would run off onto the slick no-oil-dry-allowed floor...

 

[Big B]

As the old saying goes: "The beatings will continue until morale improves".

Big B

The shop I worked in had a huge addition put on the existing building. Both were just big metal building. The old part did not have a very high ceiling. Here, it' hot and steamy in the summer.. so it was extra hot and steamy in that old part of the building.. and lots of heat generating equipment to help keep the temp up.

Everybody had their own fan... they were everywhere and you took it with you as you moved around to different areas of the shop. You'd melt without it.

When the addition was done.. they installed 3 or 4 highpowered exhaust fans along the roof peak to, theoretically, cause a draft and help keep us comfortable...and to allow them to eliminate personal fans!

There were 10 or 20 louvers along the exterior walls at floor level.... all along both the east and west walls. When the exhaust fans were turned on, motors would open the louvers to "let the air in"...

Well, that didn't work worth a shit. The building was probably 300 foot long and 150 foot wide... NO WAY IN HELL the air drawn in from those louvers was going to do one whit of good cooling anyone off.

As soon as it started getting warm.... we started sweating... and one by one the fans came out. Management was right on them... making us unplug them. Pretty soon, even they had to admit defeat.. them exhaust fans didn't do squat....

They were good for sucking welding smoke out, but did nothing for comfort...

The railroad I work at now... they went around and removed all chairs with rollers from our depot offices (about 10)... they are afraid someone is going to get hurt.. you know, lean back in your chair and tip it over. So, they all went out in the dumpster.

Couple of years ago... they removed all the stools from the "crew room".. where the trainmen sat at an elevated counter to access the computer terminals to get their paperwork. The man in charge at the time thought that he could speed the men out to their trains if they had to stand up and do their work, so he tossed the stools out. Instead of setting around wasting time, now we stand around wasting time.

 

[Dave W]

Turns out there were federal standards for employee accommodations the shipyard hasd been violating for 30 years

About... 1981, I was in a large machine shop in Cincinnati. Big wood-frame building, three stories tall, maybe 16-foot ceilings. The wooden framing members were enormous; what Machinery's Handbook refers to as "fireproof." The building dated back to 1900 or so.

Anyway, I walked into the bathroom on the second floor. It was enormous; larger than my house. All antique tile. One wall was the old 5-foot-tall floor urinals. Two of the big round things that look like a cross between giant laundry tubs and sinks; I never found out what those were called. A shoeshine stand! One wall with individual sinks. And down the middle of the room, raised up maybe three feet on a platform, a row of maybe two dozen naked toilets, facing the mirrors over the sinks.

It was bizarre. Walk up the steps, drop your pants, and look down on the world.

 

[Big B]

Maybe that is where the term "throne" came from.

Big B

About... 1981, I was in a large machine shop in Cincinnati. <snip> And down the middle of the room, raised up maybe three feet on a platform, a row of maybe two dozen naked toilets, facing the mirrors over the sinks.

It was bizarre. Walk up the steps, drop your pants, and look down on the world.

 

[JoeE.]

slight thread drift, sorry...

The old railroad shop here in town... there is a "change house" where the men would go change out of their greasy overalls and boots... so momma didn't shoot them for getting it all over the house when they got home.

Lockers, sinks and toilet. Early 1900's building.

They had the oddest toilets I ever saw. When you sat on the seat, the bottom of the seat, back towards the hinge, would depress a plunger which, when released as you stood up after doing your business, would cause the toilet to flush.. somehow. No hands required.

I have looked on the net trying to find a pic of something like this, but have come up empty handed.

I texted a guy who is working at that shop and asked if he could go take a picture of the toilet.. they are very ingenious. There was a row of 10 or so toilets....

Excuse the thread drift...

 

[Trunk Monkey]

I had a boss that would yell at any one he saw with their hands in their pockets.

Ha, guessing he had a prior military back ground .You won't see a service member with their hands in their pockets in most circumstances. It's crazy how those rules will stick with you. In Wichita KS a lot of aircraft workers referred to "Boeing gloves" if someone had their hands in their pockets. In the Army/Guard we call the same thing "Air Force" gloves.

 

[Larry Dickman]

Ha, guessing he had a prior military back ground .You won't see a service member with their hands in their pockets in most circumstances. It's crazy how those rules will stick with you. In Wichita KS a lot of aircraft workers referred to "Boeing gloves" if someone had their hands in their pockets. In the Army/Guard we call the same thing "Air Force" gloves.

You know the old saying- Man with hand in pocket not crazy, just feeling nuts!

 

[jumpinjimmy447]

The new company that bought us is much much more concerned with accidents, {and thats a good thing } but !!! I do machine work all the time , I cannot have a fixed bladed knife in the plant {level 5} , I tell them you trust me with a drawer full of sharp mills and other tools but not with a uitility knife ? hell I have to surface grind knives here.
I cannot use sand paper on the lathe unless its absolutly needed and then I have to have a written release from my supervisor explaining why I need to use it and he must observe me doing the work, I dont know about you guys but hitting tenths on a manual machine from China with out polishing them in is a bit tough for me.
If I need to open a pannel with 480 VAC in it I have to suit up in protective gear with a large helmit and flash protector , rubber gloves under lether gloves just to reset an over load on a motor . and thats just a start.

 

[Atomkinder]

I don't know if it's crazy, but it definitely seems silly: at the place I work now, you can have a knife on your person, but you cannot use the knife for anything. You must use a safety-retract knife (those types that spring back when there is no pressure... that suck... a lot). Apparently this is because people were managing to cut themselves with the normal utility knives... which I think is more of a Darwin Award "we don't need you anymore" sort of situation, but hey, I don't make the rules!

Also, they don't like cardboard because it's a fire hazard with the welders in the same building.

 

[rwbaldwin]

I'm curious... did they handle a lot of zinc or chrome plated parts there or do a lot of low RMS finishes? Citric Acid + sweat = corrosive fingerprints. Really shows up quick on finer surfaces or on zinc. Just a thought.

I did think that might be a reason, but no. They mainly work with aluminium and delrin.

Workers who have asked why, just get asked if the they understand the rule or not, 'because that's all that matters'.

 

[iMillJoe]

...You won't see a service member with their hands in their pockets in most circumstances. It's crazy how those rules will stick with you. In Wichita KS a lot of aircraft workers referred to "Boeing gloves" if someone had their hands in their pockets. In the Army/Guard we call the same thing "Air Force" gloves.

When I was in the Air Guard, certain maintenance tasks required you to have one hand in your pocket. The theory was that if a screwdriver (or what have you) slipped and went into a nearby power wire, you might get luck and survive if the current didn't cross your heart, like it might if your other hand was grounded on the air frame.

 

[Bobw]

When I was in High School, I had a job slopping food in a nursing home kitchen... I always wore white jeans. The boss
did not like that, so he wrote up a new "dress code" and made us all sign it...

The pants in the new dress code were be "heavy, white and cotton".

Day after I signed the new policy, I showed up wearing my white jeans as usual. And I get called into the office.

That's when he told me I couldn't wear jeans.... BUT!!! The new policy you just had us sign yesterday, said
"white" my jeans are white.
"cotton" 100%
"heavy" can't get much heavier than denim...

He argued that Jeans weren't "pants". And we went round and round, and I won...
Jeans are a type of pants... Its in the dictionary.

And just to rub salt in the wound the new dress code did
not specify color for shoes, just that they couldn't be open toed or sandles and had to have a rubber sole... So I tie dyed a pair of Converse
All Stars and wore those for the next 6 months.

He was a pretty good boss, and didn't hold my teenage attitude against me... He was probably afraid I would show up wearing nothing but
long john's and combat boots.
I also was a fairly good worker, and wasn't an asshole, so that probably helped.

We also had to wear a hair net or a baseball cap, and the cap couldn't be backwards.. Especially if you were outside of the kitchen.