its after 5pm

[1972hiboy]

And of course Im still at work because I thought I had enough time to evac a 14lb a/c system on a bus on recharge it before I go home.....well i was dead wrong. Its takes awhile to get that big system vac-ed out...30 minutes and counting.....thing no. 349 on my list of stuff that I need to remeber. Starting a a/c job at 4:30 does NOT give you enough time to finish the job.

[flyboy71]

"It's 5 O'clock somewhere"

I know the feeling. Be glad you dont have a work laptop and have to take it home everynite.

[fordman]

i have started many things and had to leave. myself. so i just pick things up and go. of course yo uprobably couldnt have shut it off . you would have to start over when you came back.

[1972hiboy]

haha, I would love to get a work laptop. Then I could acually take a vacation. I cant get out of the shop becuase I have to upload shop data and mileage. My mechanics dont know their way around the fleet managment software. God only knows what they would send to the higher ups LOL. I acually thought this particular bus had two seperate a/c's one for the front and one aux for the back half but once I had started I soon found they this one has the two tied in together so that threw my timeframe all off. I know what you mean though about taking your work home, my mother used to be a professor at a UC and she always had to grade papaers at home...tons of time.


Fordman, you are right I usually would have left and picked it up in the morning, of course this bus has to go out on route in the morning so im married to it till its done, my "spare" buses either have the motor out of it or the front half taken apart. oh well im happy to be working but I was going to roll the bump in after hours to work on it,

[sargentrs]

"It's 5 O'clock somewhere"

I know the feeling. Be glad you dont have a work laptop and have to take it home everynite.

I carpool with my wife and stepson. She works a couple of exits up the highway and he works where I do although I'm admin and he's shipping delivery driver. My hours are 7am to 3:30pm with 1/2 hr lunch. He's the same hours as me. My wife's 7am - 4pm with an hour lunch. So I can usually walk away at 3:45 because I then work from home when I get there. Sometimes I get caught on a customer emergency but not usually. He's constantly getting stuck on the road at 3pm or in shipping loading trucks till 4-5. My wife gets stuck and sometimes can't get away until 4-6. I'm usually the one inconvenienced because when I get home, I've got another hour or so work doing things that can only be done after everybody's off the manufacturing system. Oh well, at least we're saving money on gas and being green. But if the bump got 30mpg........... I'd be home every evening by 4:15, work done by 6 and kick back tube surfing for the rest of the evening.

[forrestbump]

Makes me feel guilty since my business is home based. No commute (unless you count the 20 feet from my bedroom to my shop), Bump sits all week until I want to or don't want to drive it, no boss, no start / finish times... I can even take a nap during the day if I want and let the machine answer my incoming phone calls and respond to emails when I'm available.

Guess I got it pretty good.

[sargentrs]

You do Well, that is if you're paying your bills with it. I got to work at 6:40am yesterday and left at 4:30pm. Got home, got on the computer and accessed my work computer from home. Started about 7pm and didn't get done with my usual nightly routine until 8:30. I update our manufacturing system database every night from home. If someone clocks out and leaves a database open, then I can't update them. So then I have to search around the network until I figure out who it is, kill their connection, and then I can update. We have an outdated manufacturing system from the 70's and I developed a variety of MSAccess databases that allow to query the system, print reports, do shipping paperwork, job orders, etc. In the process I made my job easier too. Problem is NOBODY else knows how to maintain the system so, in order for me to efficiently do my job, and the floor to efficiently do their jobs, I have to keep it updated nightly from the days production process. Bad news is, I'm salary so I'm not paid for the extra time. However, after being with the company and helping it grow for the last 14 years, I'm ok with that. 13 years till retirement and they better be here when I get there!

[1972hiboy]

You do Well, that is if you're paying your bills with it. I got to work at 6:40am yesterday and left at 4:30pm. Got home, got on the computer and accessed my work computer from home. Started about 7pm and didn't get done with my usual nightly routine until 8:30. I update our manufacturing system database every night from home. If someone clocks out and leaves a database open, then I can't update them. So then I have to search around the network until I figure out who it is, kill their connection, and then I can update. We have an outdated manufacturing system from the 70's and I developed a variety of MSAccess databases that allow to query the system, print reports, do shipping paperwork, job orders, etc. In the process I made my job easier too. Problem is NOBODY else knows how to maintain the system so, in order for me to efficiently do my job, and the floor to efficiently do their jobs, I have to keep it updated nightly from the days production process. Bad news is, I'm salary so I'm not paid for the extra time. However, after being with the company and helping it grow for the last 14 years, I'm ok with that. 13 years till retirement and they better be here when I get there!

Only 13 years till retirement? im jealous.....I have another 40 years before I can retire, unless I hit the lottery but I dont play so kinda rules that one out.

[sargentrs]

Don't be jealous of me dude. I'm old and got the scars to prove it. If I had started PLANNING my retirement when I was your age I would have already retired. Instead I started late so have to work a lot longer. Invest in your retirement now, you'll be glad you did later.

[1972hiboy]

Yeah I hear planning and starting early is a good thing. Ive got a retirement account I set up when i started working full time right after high school and a 401k with the company I work for now. Visions of retiring in my 50's sounds great to me. Id rather be work on my bumps.......

[BRUTUS_T_HOG]

try a 30lb system with 3 evaporators. 2 hours minimum for evacuation. then it takes about 2 hours to charge.

this happened to me last summer a tour bus called us up and we decided to chek it out. got paid time and a half and they bought us dinner. next day it all leaked out cause A. we couldn't tear into the bus to expose the lines for leak checks B. they didn't want to. they wanted it to last till they got it back to their big repair facility

[1972hiboy]

oh man, that must have been a large leak to loose 30lb in a day.. ..not to mention thats ALOT of money worth of freon to literally just watch vanishing before you eyes 2 hours of evac-ing geez that sounds hainous, sounds like you guys got the better end of the deal though, time and a half PLUS dinner

[BRUTUS_T_HOG]

yep. it was worth staying at the shop for the extra time. this was a massive bus with 2 evaporators bigger than the radiator in a bump. and then 1 more evaporator for the driver.

the condenser was even bigger and had its own fan assemblies. the compressor was a 3cylinder radial type that was literally bigger than the engine in my ranger.

i hate working on big stuff