Then and now.....

Then
And so we FINALLY got our hands on SI Engines. The first engines they trusted us with were Landrover 2.25 Litre petrol engines. Our instructors: Parrott and Malone led us into the running engines lab. Here were arrayed row on row of Engines, all set up so they could be run. We were each assigned one, now all of a sudden, we weren't in such a hurry to be mechanics. What MOST of us wanted to do was head back to the classroom and study some more, to make sure that we knew all the ins and outs. What we were actually going to do was firstly confirm that our engines actually started. Once we were sure they started and ran ok we were to report to messrs Parrott and Malone. Finally the last engine was checked and found to be serviceable. Now the real work started. We were sent from the room and our 2 instructors made their sneaky way round the engines. They had a box full of 'faulty' bits. Condensors that didn't, Points that wouldn't, Fuel Unions that leaked, Rotor Arms that shorted and HT Leads that didn't conduct electricity. These and many other sneakily modified bits were fitted by them to our pristine engines with the result that when we got back none of them would start. At this point all the banter that was present in class mysteriously disappeared. All that was left was a room full of mystified looking young men glancing from their disabled engines to their textbooks and back again.
After what seemed hours but was in fact seconds we all looked towards the instructors who now didn't seem quite so friendly and approachable..........they looked evil, and they were both unmistakeably looking EXTREMELY smug. "Your engines have been disabled, the faults have all been gone over in class, each engine has only 1 fault. It should be a doddle for you to fix them, all you have to do is bring us the faulty item and collect a serviceable one" ......oh well, here goes.
It was only as we started working our way through that we found that actually it WAS a doddle!. All we had to do was work logically through without jumping from one component to another and in no time at all we'd find the fault. All of a sudden we stopped looking like rabbits caught in a headlight and started to look like mechanics.....it was at this point that Parrott and Malone wheeled in the big guns. "ok get out, now its MULTIPLE faults" This worried us not a jot after all, if you can find one fault finding more than one is just as easy.....
I walked up to Mr Malone with a rotor arm I had found to be faulty. "Are you sure its that?" he asked. Desperately trying (and failing) not to sound smug I said "Yep". "OK then, lets take the faulty bit over to this WORKING engine and test it" he said. Puzzled and slightly worried I followed him. My worry increased as he told me that he was going to replace the rotor arm on this working engine with the one I had given him. It increased further as he told me to hold the uninsulated ends of the plug leads while he cranked the engine over. I suddenly realised 2 things, firstly that Mr Malone was a sadist, and second that I wasn't TOTALLY sure that the bit I had tested was REALLY faulty. I was about to make my excuses and leave (as they say in the papers) when he cranked the engine over. I didn't get a shock. What I DID get was Mr Malone saying "Next time test it PROPERLY and don't take short cuts, then you might be less nervous when we test it again!"
Those of you reading this and thinking how barbaric and risky Malones methods were are right.......but they led to no deaths and some very quick learning! Mr Malone didn't beleive in 'repeat' mistakes. I don't think I'll ever forget seeing the results of one person who took a piece to him that WASN'T faulty. Suffice to say that 20,000 plus volts going through a person makes them jolt a bit :)

Then and now.....

And a regular item from now on, how I started a mechanic and what I do now. See if you can decide which I enjoy more :)

Then:
The story starts waaay back in 1983 when I joined The Army.....thats THE ARMY as in the British Army. I'd already done my selection tests and was keen to join up as a Paratrooper. Thank the lord for the extremely switched on officer who firmly steered me away from that ..... "Don't be so bloody stupid!" and after several minutes of me mopeing around and deciding my life was pointless unless I could join The Parachute Regiment he prevailed upon me to join REME ( Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers)
After finishing my basic training it was time to learn all about engines and gearboxes and stuff.
I arrived at Bordon to start my training.....all 11 months of it. First thing to be learned was that we wouldn't even see an engine for weeks. First we had to learn maths, technical drawing and physics. Jeez, I thought I was training to be a sodding mechanic!!
When we FINALLY got to SI or spark ignition engines, we were issued our toolboxes and finally felt like REAL mechanics.....how wrong we were.




Now:
I make my jolly way to a car with an "electrical problem". Apparently his headlights have broken. After a pleasant 65 mile drive I arrive at the service station where he's waiting with the afflicted vehicle. It takes only a few minutes to find out that his mysterious electrical problem is in fact 2 blown bulbs. Both dip beams have failed. He assures me that due to some strange planetary configuration they both failed instantaneously and mere minutes ago, hmmm, I remain unconvinced. After replacing both bulbs with new ones from the service station he was parked in we both waited with baited breath to see if they would mysteriously blow again....well  his breath was baited, mine was anything but. strangely enough neither bulb failed as we watched and I left him making his merry way home. It amazes me how many people are convinced ( or try to convince me ) that both headlight bulbs expire simultaneously in some sort of suicide pact. Its amazing how cynical this job makes you :)