On Tuesday 02 September 2014 21:38:09 Greg Bernard did opine And Gene did reply: > Hi Gene- > I ran across this little story and it reminded me of one of yours: > http://www.jameco.com/Jameco/workshop/MyStory/all-senses.html?sp_rid=M > jIyMzUxMzU2NjgS1&sp_mid=10890201&spMailingID=10890201&spUserID=MjIyMzUx > MzU2NjgS1&spJobID=343082989&spReportId=MzQzMDgyOTg5S0 > > Cheers, > Greg
Chuckle, been there, done that. But you can't tell these folks to get the hell out of your hair so you CAN apply basic troubleshooting. They you see, ARE the boss, and can't seem to understand that their constant meddling with your train of thought is costing them money. About a year into my tenure as the CE at WDTV, such a situation developed where an important piece of gear was down. Something to do with news, which is a tv stations biggest cash cow. So the GM and the News Director took turns, coming into the shop about about 6 or 7 minute intervals to give me a sermon on just how quickly they needed it back among the living. This went on for about 3 hours, right thru the usual lunch time, so about 2:30 I saddled up and headed out to find a couple cheeseburgers etc. I purposely sat down and took my time eating them, read the paper and ignored the pager which was going off at 3 minute intervals. About an hour & a half IIRC. When I did get back, I found the GM, purple faced, sitting on my work chair in front of the bench. At that point I pre-empted his blowup by turning around and walking back out. He followed me as I threw a leg over my GS-1000-G & made as if to leave again. That finally got his attention. The only guy who could do him any good yet today was about to drive off & go get a 6 pack & take it home. Then & only then did he actually start to listen to what I had to say. I told him in no uncertain terms that if I went back into the building, I was to be left alone to do what I do best, and that I would come and tell them when I had found the problem, and if I had the parts, when it would be working again. And that if _anyone_, even the telephone, bugged me before then, I was gone. You go back into the building, do whatever you have to do to assure that, and you come and tell me. I looked at my watch and said you've got 10 minutes before I push the starter button. He was back in 6. I went back in, settled in to find it, which turned out to be 3 parts actually because some bypass caps had opened up and the noise on the supply rails was substituting for a memory chip with an open in the top half of its totem pole style output driver. Took about an hour to walk thru the logic and find the bad bypasses, which when replaced, got the digital noises down to where the scope could tell me the memory chip was bad. The memory chip was an older NMOS technology and the only chip in the house with the same footprint was a much slower rated 6116, done in CMOS for vanishingly low power consumption. I put it in the socket, the circuit was happy, and it was back in circuit working about 10 minutes before the 5:30 news opened. Nearly 15 years later when a newer, made prettier video, replacement was bought, it was still working when we unscrewed it from the rack. But it didn't take long for that lesson to be forgotten. I had to do a refresh 3 or 4 times over the next 4 years. After that, I had a new GM, and 3 years later yet another, but that one is still there and we do understand each other. Its sorta funny, I served as a traveling firemen for Mr. Withers off & on for the next 10 years after I "retired". We were on his airplane headed for his station in the Michigan UP when the conversation drifted over to that, and I related that at one point Smitty was going to fire me. Smitty was GM #2. Russ looked me right in the eye and said he couldn't do it because he would have had to clear it with me. I asked when did I achieve that status? When you called Mel's bluff (GM #1) in front of me about 2 weeks after he had hired you. You've been honest with me which is a lot more than I can say about some who have worked for me over the last 45 years. Russ always treated me well. When he needed help in Grand Junction, I had the use of his guest house next to his big house out toward the monument and the use of his personal new F150 4wd pickup & gas card. I stayed there 3 times, for almost a year total. I air freighted a bunch of stuff home from the Sportsmans Warehouse as I was being quite well paid for that time. Sadly, Russ passed early this spring. He turned out to be a good friend for nearly 30 years. Cheers, Gene Heskett -- "There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order." -Ed Howdershelt (Author) Genes Web page <http://geneslinuxbox.net:6309/gene> US V Castleman, SCOTUS, Mar 2014 is grounds for Impeaching SCOTUS ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Slashdot TV. Video for Nerds. Stuff that matters. http://tv.slashdot.org/ _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
