Dirty Tricks...and Dasterdly deeds.:/-)

Scott72

Anyone who would play pranks like this should not consider themselves professional! It sounds more like a group of school age kids. Gee... I wonder why homeowners look down on us.
GROW UP!
Scott

[Deleted User]

We've all got them...

I was thinking about all the dirty tricks I've had played on me by the different trades. Like the time the plumber, irritated because we cut his hot and cold pipes (because the doofus ran them right across our flue chase...)He dis-assemble our system and dropped one of those little, flexible rubber shipping inserts that they use to cover the gas valve inlet hole. Got lodged right at the zone valve. Could NOT get water to flow in the proper direction. Could get it to flow backwards, but as soon as you turned on the system circulator, perCLUNK, flow would stop. We'd already sent our best brightest talent to figure it out, to no avail. Once I pulled the zone valve apart, I could see the blue rubber in the orifice of the valve.

In retaliation, I reached up inside his water heater combustion chamber with my ChannelLoc pliers and pinched the pilot tube shut...

The HO told me he wasted 2-1/2 days on the water heater, ended up eventually REPLACING it with a new one to resolve his issue. OUCH! Ya think I didn't feel guilty??? NOT!!!

Then there was the drywall guy that tied a loose piece of Onyx, roughed in out to a garage, into a knot, and slipped it back into the wall, No flow EITHER way, even with a hand powered hydrostatic pump. Now, THAT guy never got paid back, but I got paid for finding it.

And then there was the disgruntled plumber that dropped a ball bearing into a bull headed tee serving two different buildings. Intermitten, unexplainable water availability... Seems he overheard a conversation about him, and did it in spite. He won:-)

Or the electrician that ran his conduit through a drain pipe...

What about you? Got any dasterdly deeds you'd care to share?

ME

Dave Yates (PAH)

Let's see....

A drywaller once took off our faucet supports in a kneee-wall island whirlpool application - his holes were off by about an inch - you could see the original screw holes by shining a light past the faucet stems. Punch list mentioned a "floppy" faucet?!? Boy, was it ever & tiled in on both sides with a marble cap on the wall. So..... no one wanted to accept responsibility - you've all been there, heard that too. Quick thinking saved the day! Two cans of expanding foam later that faucet was rock-solidly captured and held in place.

Found a 2x4 in a sewer line once, but no one claimed responsibility. Could a been kids screwing around at night too. At any rate, we ended up utilizing our Ridgid sewer machine with a circular cutting-tooth head to cut off small chunks until it was removable through the house trap's cleanout.

A GC once laid rat-traps in unsuspecting places as a prank & we found that out the day an electrician got his fingers whacked while reaching into a wall cavity. Rat traps are huge! My boss told the GC that if any of us got our hands, toes or whatever whacked, he was going to whack the GC & he wasn't kidding. No more pranks on that job.

We've cut electricians wires, but only after warning them that our chases for ductwork, hydronics or plumbing may not be used for running wires without first running that by us & only after they basically said tough sh*^. Cut your own holes, thank you very much. Must say though, that only ever had to be done once on one job. On those rare occasions where we're not doing the plumbing too, we'll let them know the rules up front too. Most pros work in concert to get the job done and will, more often than not, lend a hand to get each other's work done as needed. More than once, entire job-site crews have helped hoss acryllic T&S units up to a second floor (no steps yet) or lower a cast iron boiler into a darkened recess not yet a basement (again, no steps yet).

Once had a bunch of drunken masons at 7 AM threaten to kick our arses. The tossed beer bottle upon our arrival aleted us to their perch in the roof-rafters while they were building up the chimney. So, we dropped our tool boxes on the spot and invited them to join us on the ground floor. Don't know when they came down, but it was long after we'd moved to the basement(G). Masons & roofers - tough birds, but there seems to be some reason why those two trades attract odd characters. Maybe they're hydronicians gone bad?!?

Dastardly deeds? I've had some very dark thoughts/ideas where dead-beat customers are concerned. Never carried any out, but they'd be extremely costly to find and fix. Worst thing I've done there is file an IRS form showing them as having received the full retail benefit. Might as well owe the taxes! There ain't no free lunch(G).

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don_163

True that

what ever happen to calling the guy out in simply giving him
an old time butt whipping.

Oh that right too many lawyer out there for that.

Jim_47

Dang customers

Had a customer years back that would not pay me for repairs and service. Then after about 20 minutes of arguing he gave me about 70% of what he owed me. I refused then to give him a receit for the job. So I let it go.... for about a month . After having a late night meeting and helping one of my sons out it, As I recall it was about 1:30am and about 15 degrees out I slipped back to the area and walked about a block to this guys house. Locked out his main gas valve on the meter with one of those $35.00 supper hardened bullet proof locks. About 9:00am the next day I got a call from the guy for no heat. Good thing the service got that one. I finally called the guy back at about 6pm that night. He told me he had no heat. I went through the entire routine, switch at top of stairs, I asked him if he had oil in the tank. He told me he had natural gas. I asked him his name and address several times,shuffling through papers as if I was looking for his records. He told me "don't you remember me I am a good customer!" I asked him his name and adress again. Then I told him I had an opening about 5pm the next afternoon and that anything after 5pm was night rate and he would have to pay by cash only and upfront before I did any work. He told me he would call someone else. SUPPLY HOUSE GOSIP RULES. He called one of my friends in the biz. He got the call. Found the problem, called in gas company it was well into the morning hours before gas company office reps could athourize the removal of the service valve to restore gas service to this guys house. Took my buddy's tech and my buddy (2 guys) over 6 hours at night rate to get him back up and runing. My friends bill to this guy was over $900.00 The guy tried to refuse to pay my friend in front of the gas co. guy. The gas company guy told the homeowner to pay the service company and that the gas company was also going to bill him.
OK, I did not get my monies due but the customer got his due.

Chuck Shaw_4

Years ago

I did two houses for Habitat for Humanity. In the first house, it took us about 3 hours, to figure out and remove a 2 liter soda bottle from the main drain. I don't know how it got there, there were a lot of kids working on the house, maybe one of them did it and was a little nervous about saying something. The second house I did, was set on fire. I don't thing that was any type of prank. It was either someone from the neighborhood, who didn't want "those people" in their part of town, or an ex-boyfriend of the person we were building the house for. We never did find out which.

Chuck

Phil_6

The evils of gambling

We're working one sunday in a house and there's a football game on the radio. The GC is listening to the game and the A/C contractor came in and hears a play that went the wrong way. Based on his reaction he must have had a big wad on the game because all of a sudden he takes the radio and smashes it on the floor. The GC comes in a couple of minutes later and asks what happened and I tell him. He says oh yeah? check this out...So he goes up in the attic and opens up the AC equipment and finds the junction box with the most wires, takes off a wire nut, clips the wires and puts the wire nut back on to make it look good. Figures it will be the next spring till they try it out and a few hours of trouble shooting to find it....

Wayco Wayne_2

I've never done anything.

but I was told a story of an old Tin knocker named Jerry. A crusty old ex marine. He was working in the basement of a Congressmans house and needed to use the bathroom. The wife told him no. So he pooped in a drywall bucket and ducted the bucket into the return duct. The company I worked for looked and looked but couldnt find the source of the smell eminating from the ducts. People really should treat every one with more respect. WW

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rich pickering

nails

We had somebody, (suspect kids or a jealous friend of the owner, the gc is great,) throw 3 1/2" nails down a wc branch before it was capped for the test. 2 days after, the owners moved in, the toilet is plugged???? Cut a cooking ladle/strainer to fit the cleanout, cleared the line and caught the nails. The gc paid to have a camera sent down the whole system, lots more nails were found.

Steve D._2

Vengeance where vengeance is due

If another sub does something to you, consider getting even with the sub and not vandalizing the homeowner's property. A piece of raw chicken or sandwich meat in the defroster vent of a pickup truck will be a gift that keeps on giving within 24 hours and leaves the homeowner out of the squabble.

Steve

Robert O'Connor_12

I word

Oil of peppermint. This substance is about the smelliest stuff around and serves more than a few purposes. Had a wisea$$ kid (GC's cousin) felt he could park anywhere he wanted on the jobsite (530 unit seniors building) but desided on parking everyday right in front of my trailer. After I asked him nicely to move more than 5 times, he just laughed. One day we had a large delivery of concrete manholes a decided to use math as a way to teach this boy a lesson. We set the manholes down in an arrangement that appeared as if he could pull right out.....NOT! after three days of ME laughing at him and he hitching a ride into work, he got the masons rig and shoved two of them enough to get the car out (with a few minor dings). The boy felt smart and he decided to drop paint cans (7 total) down our cast iron stacks (this kid didn't know who he was dealing with) Lets just say his car will NEVER smell the same again. Three drops is all you need but this boy was stubborn. The whole bottle acidentially slipped from my fingers and somehow made its way ALL the way into his ac/heating ducts. Never had another problem.

Robert O'Connor/NJ

J Resnick

Dirty tricks

6 story apt house Bathtub with gum paper.Floor layers pooped in tub. We scooped it up and decided to mix it in with their mastic for linolieum floor. We laughed for hours watching them gag on their own dastardly deed.

jwade55_3

A friend of my dad.

Who was a VERY sucessful mason in the area, told me one time of how he ALWAYS got paid on a chimney job, he'd mud in a pane of glass about halfway up. If he didn't get paid, when they lit their first fire of the year, he'd be back get his money then drop a brick on a rope down the chimey, sweep it up, C'YA

J

STEVE PAUL_3

Dastardly deeds

Many years ago when I was working in NYC out of local 2 on high rise office buildings I was saw the results of the rottenest "DASTARDS" of all time. A Few plumbers found out that they were going to be laid off in 1 or 2 weeks because the roughing was about to be completed. They pulled 2 of the most costly pranks we ever saw. The first was to put circles of wire lath into the hubs of the cast iron joints before yarning them. The result was that when the lines were tested the water ran out just fine. But the first few flushes with toilet paper clogged the stack in short order. They ran the snake, busted the stoppage and low and behold a few days later another stoppage elsewhere. This went on for about 2- weeks. Until they located the stoppages, pulled the stacks apart and found the wire lath. BIG $$$$$$
The next Brain Fart was to put a PingPong ball into the water system, probably when the 3"-4" meter was set. The ball floated around until it found a line that was too small for it navigate. POW! the line stopped running. Shut down, drain and find the problem right? WRONG! When the line was drained the ball drained down to a lower section, when the water was turned back on, the original clogged line was fine, then the ball found another line to block. MUCHO DENERO to resolve that one! Talk about terrorists!

Jeff Lawrence_24

Company I USED to work for

One of the tin knockers got royally pi$$ed at the company and decided to 'poop'in the floor return of a large house many of us were working on. Since I was still working in the area, they sent me and a helper out to 'fix' the problem. As soon as I discovered the problem, I removed about a 5 foot section of 8" hard pipe, an elbow, and about a 3 foot section of pipe and replaced it with the same.

Amazing thing was the install manager had the nerve to ask me why I replaced the pipe instead of cleaning it. I told him it was on the back of the pick-up and he was welcome to clean it himself.

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Anthony Menafro

Carpenters

I had a carpenter who kept cutting out my lines to make it easier to frame interior walls in a 59 unit bldg. He came on the job so late to start the frame, so the GC told us to start the rough. The GC set floor plates for us to go off of and away we went. After he cut our lines for the third time, we took all of his tools and work boots that were left on the job and strapped them to the walls and ceiling of the unit that he used to store his things. No damage to anything, but funny as heck to watch him remove everything for about an hour. No more lines cut after that.

Anthony