What can't you throw away?

[SiriusHardware]

Originally Posted by Ed_Dinning

Known as "Guvvie jobs" on Tyneside

Ed, fellow Tynesider here but I never realised until this moment that 'Guvvy' was probably short for 'Government' - the implication being that you were working on something a bit hush-hush that you couldn't discuss, I suppose - thereby (hopefully) dissuading people from asking more about it.

[Biggles]

Never really thought much about it before, why they were called guvvy jobs. But everybody knew what you meant.
Alan.

[Ed_Dinning]

I thought it had been particular to Reyrolle, who had done allsorts of special and emergency work for the government during the war, even getting ships moored on the Tyne below the Hebburn plant so work could be carried out.

Thus a "don't ask and get a move on" request.

Ed

[avocollector]

My first multimeter - a Hwangsha electrical works (or similar) with a whole 1k per volt DC sensitivity. Back in 1964 my Dad bought it for me by mistake when I asked him to get me a 1 ma meter. Anyway I've kept it all these years even after a good friend borrowed it to try and fix his motorbike and managed to blow several of the shunts on it. I replaced the blown wound shunt resistors with carbon track ones. Best black communist Bakelite front with steel box and cardboard liner. Crazy - should have tossed it years ago but it brings back memories of all the projects I built and things I fixed with it!

[stevehertz]

Wouldn't mind seeing a photo of that one out of interest!

[Farzooks]

Originally Posted by vidjoman

They were quite strict about private work and 'borrowing' stock but a friend wanted some conduit to run the length of his garden to run a cable to provide power for his shed. After being told he couldn't take the scrap conduit as it might cause a precedent and others might do the same he used to come to work each day with a ladies bicycle, no crossbar, and leave with a gents bike with a length of conduit as the crossbar. Only took about 3 weeks and he had enough conduit for his needs.

Two tales, one real, one possibly apocryphal...

A bloke I worked with decided he wanted a gravel path around his house, so over the course of a couple of years took a half carrier bag of gravel home with him every day on the train. The gravel was taken from a huge pile around the back of the works, kept for repairing the roads in the plant.

When the workers in a well-known car plant went home, there was the usual crush at the gate, as everybody tried to get out at the one time. One day, a bloke collapsed in the midst of it and concerned colleagues tried to help. The security men came over to see what was what and render assistance as needed. Turned out he had suspended a car battery around his neck with a bit of wire and that had cut off some vital bloodflow to his head, hence the black-out.
A closer examination of his workplace and the stock figures revealed he'd probably been taking batteries home with him for years, one a day. They tended to be 'lost' in the natural wastage.
In the same town, I often came across garages and sheds with brand-new parts for old models of the cars the plant made, some of them 30 and 40 years old. Just nicked for the sake of it, I think.

[mark_in_manc]

My uncle ran the transport garage in a meat factory. He mentioned operatives stealing ham, sausages etc in their underwear... I wonder what the score is regarding worker pilfering vs management incompetence, and their effect on the demise of British industry

And what can't I throw away? Anything, anything at all. I'm a bit young for that attitude, but my parents were young during the war and had kids in later life. Perhaps that's where it came from.

[emeritus]

Legend had it that, in the days when Plesseys used to make TVs, one enterprising "home office" production line worker managed to get a TV CRT out hidden in a bouquet of flowers.

Back to the thread topic, just found the box of carbon resistors that dad salvaged from the old radios and TVs that our neighbour used to break up for the scrap metal in the 1950's. Most with short-ish leads, but they don't take up much space and bring back happy memories. I can't think that they are of much use to anyone really, unlike the salvaged valves that must have been binned in a house move in the late 1960's.

[electronicskip]

I could never bear to throw away my original 1970s Trafalgar LED watch, even though its long expired.
It was the envy of all my school mates who used to gather round and watch me press the magic button to show the time flash up!!
All well and good , but the battery only lasted a few weeks before it needed changing as I recall .

[stevehertz]

Yeah, the singer in the band I was in had one. Novel as it was, it wasn't anywhere near as useful as a normal watch that you just had to glance at to see the time; no need to employ your other hand to press a button. Anyway, vocalists will be er.. vocalists.

[PsychMan]

I can't throw out anything electronic, I'll take parts out, PCBs etc and save for later scavenging. It's amazing what bits come in handy.

The other week I needed a 12V relay and found one on an old PCB from a washing machine we disposed of 6 months ago. Sometimes I might need a particular resistor value and will find one on a scrap board I kept.

My gas cooker became beyond economic repair last week so I kept the ignition box.

At the very least, even if something is full of horrible SMB stuff, there will be a mains lead, switch, or perhaps a fuse holder...

[dseymo1]

I'm the same, and have crates of scrap PCBs etc. When I need a specific component, however, there rarely seems to be anything suitable, no matter how hard I look!

[AC/HL]

I suspect we all do to a degree. The problem often is that the same common fault exists on the other one.

[Wendymott]

I have a Lamp/Bulb..... from a childs projector from the mid 50's..... I got this as an xmas present..... the bulb was an MES 3V...... but with a frosted glass...... I have kept it and it still works.....

[trickie_dickie]

A few days ago, I had to fit a new 13amp double socket in place of a blank plate for a new chest freezer. Whilst wiring it up (the power was off) I noticed the Earth connection screw was missing. Too late to take it back, I thought, where did I put that old burned out switch off our Immersion Heater? Found it in a kitchen drawer, removed a terminal screw and it fitted the new socket. Job done. NEVER HAVE BEEN ABLE TO GET RID OF ANYTHING. Got that from my Dad.
Still got the burned out switch. Might need another screw.

[Richard_FM]

My parents have a few jars of nuts & bolts from things they have taken apart.

A lot came from a washing machine which needed to be stripped down before it could be taken to the tip.

I wouldn't be surprised if they still had some old mains plugs around, my Dad used to recycle them if anything didn't need one any more.

[Refugee]

I can remember doing a homer extending the hoses on the washing machine.
I managed to find coupling bits for the inlets.
For the drain I had spotted some compressed air hose in the obsolete part store at work. I cut off what I needed and it worked well.
A few weeks later the test department wanted to use the hose again so the fun started.
The test guy was just standing about 10 feet short of where it needed to reach to shouting out repeatedly that it used to reach.
I just had to keep my mouth shut as we might have got banned from having bits from the obsolete part store without booking them out.

[julie_m]

If questioned, I would have said I had noticed that the air hose was worn near to the connector and it looked as though it could burst the next time anybody tried to use it; so I got a new connector and remade the end for safety's sake and I probably cut about half a metre off the eno

[Refugee]

I was not seen carting 10 feet of hose away so I just kept quiet
The washing machine is long gone but I still have the bit of hose in memory of that day of winging we had way back in the 1980s.

[G6Tanuki]

I keep strange things: for example-

Car brake-bleed nipples and pipe-junctions/unions. The old Imperial ones have a 3/8-inch 24TPI thread that's the same as the one used on mobile CB and amateur-band aerials. Braze in a length of old copper brake-pipe to the nipple/union and you can easily make up a whole range of antennary things (short whips, loading-coils, capacity-hats etc) for experimentation.

Washing-machine bits: I have here the base [angle-iron frame, 4 castors] from a 1980s washer into which I've fitted a base of MDF [well, several thicknesses of MDF] and it makes a great little 'dolly' for moving heavy stuff [engines/gearboxes/stacks-of-wheels] around on. It's strong enough to support a Ford V6 so a couple of AR88s is not going to be an issue.

Finally, earlier in the year I discovered that my 2-man tent, which I'd stored in the shed, had fallen victim to nibbly rodents [squirrels? rats? mice] and now lacked the essential characteristic of a tent - that of being waterproof. I put it to one side and after a few months decided I was going to put it in the wheelie-bin but then I looked at the sectional fibreglass tent-poles and had an idea. Took the bungee-cord out the centre and replaced it with a length of 1.5mm plastic-coated power wire [the 'singles' used in conduit]. Result: a portable 17-foot vertical whip antenna that collapses down to about 2 1/2 feet for transport. Works just fine on 20Metres. The tent-pegs and guy-ropes attached half way up prevent it all from waving about too much in the wind.

I also have a 'scrap' chainsaw-engine and old 12V car alternator that are linked by washing-machine pulleys and belt: it makes a brilliant 65-amp 'jump starter' unit!