What did you fall for or do as an apprentice?

[RSOldie]

Bruce Springsteen Well time slips away And leaves you with nothing mister but boring stories of glory days ?

[andy thornton]

When i started in 1981 had been there 6 months and christmas time was going pub time at dinner,only 16 1/2 at the time was,nt that bothered with going for a drink but was told of course your coming to the pub,Remember thinking thats nice they want me to be included only at 1.30pm to be given a list of people to clock back in so they could stay in the pub longer,remember thinking if i got cought it would be apprenticeship over-and that bloody clock made a hell of a noise.Still there 36 years later but pub is closed down.Happy days

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Former RS Edition owner

[irelmo]

<p style=”text-align: left;”>I was sent from the basement of a 5 storey house to see the carpenter  on the top floor to get a length of fallopian tubing!</p>
What’s worse is I knew I was being tricked but still asked!

[Sennaboy]

First job sent to the paint store to get a large can of tarten paint when I got there the guy said no problem but what clan do you want penny dropped then

oh the benifits of youth

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[71-bda]

ooh lunchtime drink !! at 17 I had no fondness for beer at all, one Friday one of the apprentices who had just got a car suggested we go to the Rose and Crown in Isleworth as they had a stripper on Fridays. Happy days I thought, so we go in, I ordered a bottle of Budweiser or something similar as knew a full pint would do me in later at work, the rest of the ‘men’ apprentices all ordered chunky pints. So on comes this old doris and starts getting her kit off, while strolling amongst the drinkers in the busy pub, she comes up to me and takes my nearly full bottle and immediately proceeds to rub it in the heavily forested lady front garden and then inserts it where it was never intended to go, the crowd are loving it, and of course she hands it back to me and everyones jeering “drink it, drink it”  well…. did i fook ? NOOOO !!

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No nothing.

No Mods. No rockers. Just a chunky knob, thats now been replaced by an RS knob innit.

No tackiness.

Std as Ford intended, but with a space saver wheel and jack and nuts and wheel brace. oh.. and flaps, a man has got to have flaps.

Innit?

 

[oldbloke]

Worked at plant hire firm, now some of them rough big burly blokes sat in a very small canteen 8×12, one of the fitters came to me ( welder ) took my acetylene torch filled a bin bag full of gas tied the end with a piece of newspaper in it went to canteen opened the door after lighting chucked it in pulled door shut and held the handle, well listening to the panic and them  trying to get out the windows  KABOOOOM

[yorkirs]

Cheers guys and gals

Looks like we all had similar experiences, 99% of this stuff today and you would be emptying your locker and updating your CV when you got home.

One other I recall, was when we all made a 3ft long toolbox on wheels from scratch using sheet mild steel, took about 5 days of marking out, cutting, bending and spot welding.

On completion someone filled one of the toolboxes with water / sawdust and then put it in the industrial ice plant, as it froze solid most of the spot welds failed resulting in a wood chip lolly pop with all the hand tools in it.

Revenge was sweet as the perpetrators padlock was “re-engineered” the rivets were filed off the base plate , the plates were removed then reordered and new rivets added, end result was owner could not get in as the key did not fit, had to borrowed a hacksaw and cut lock off.

As the tools now unlocked they were then shared out Around the group.

 

 

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May the Ford be with you

 

 

[oldbloke]

One of the guys always had a boiled egg in his butty box, occasionally we swopped it for a raw one, always funny watching him crack it open

[oldbloke]

Of course the old one was to send the trainee mechanic to the stores for a box of blue sparks and a bag of compression

[bibo]

While at our training school I drew the short straw for demonstrating the PPE required for a grid transformer oil change, overalls, paper overalls over the top, helmet, googles, respirator, full arm latex gloves… one of my class mates thought while dressed like the Stigs kinky brother I should go down into the office and request for a batch of spirit level bubbles from the supply manager, she had no idea what i was talking about, called the care taker for advice as he had his hand in everyone’s pie, her face was priceless when she realized the whole office including my class mates and tutor where laughing at her naivety, didn’t even question why i was dressed ready for nuclear fallout ???

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