Funniest shop pranks and stories

Shop Pranks

We used to pull off a few good ones....

We would always cover a rag with WD-40, and throw it underneath of someone welding....the spatter and slag would cause it to light up like a tinder box!

Or, if a guy was welding, we would sneak up behind him and smack the table with a big hammer....no matter how many times we did it, this one guy always jumped about 5 feet in the air...

Another good one was to smear a bit of anti-sieze underneath a guys car door handle....when he would go to get in his car after a long work day.....well, you get the idea!

An even better one would be to smear it under his passenger side door...his poor wife must have been covered in the stuff, especially the times she didnt notice it had gotten on her hand.

One of the best pranks I pulled was when a guy went on hoidays. We always had to leave a spare set of keys to our tool boxes, just incase a mechanic needed to borrow something if we wern't around. I opened up a guys box one time, lifted his drawer liners, and smeared tuna and egg flavored cat food underneath, and put the liner back...he couldnt figure out what the smell was or where the flies were coming from for days and days!

Last good one I will share (for now) was to run out at the end of the day when a guy was pulling away and spray WD-40 on his windsheild....that is the worst stuff to try and clean off....

Millwright Matt
www.millwrightstudyguide.com
Millwright test and C of Q test preperation

a few more good pranks

One of the good ones I just remembered was one we pulled on a new apprenticemechanic. He had never welded before. We took a striker, and flicked it on the end of the welding rod, and started welding. When it was his turn, we had another guy shut off the machine. The apprentice obviously didnt notice. He took the striker, flicked the end of the rod, and tried to start welding. Obviously it didn't work. We all took turns showing him how to do it, and how it worked, (as someone conveniently turned the welder on and off). Must have taken him a week to figure out what we were doing!

Another good one was to ask an apprentice to carry a bucket of blue steam down from the shop to the area or machine we were working on so we could use the torches. Everyone was in on it. We would send the apprentice to the shop to ask a mechanic for a bucket of blue steam...the mechanic would pretend to "dump" some invisible chemical into a container, all the while telling the apprentice how combustable and dangerous it was, and how carefull he had to be carrying it. We would have him get absolutely covered in PPE head to toe, and carefully carry the bucket back to the job location. Sometimes we would open the bucket, and ask him why he spilled it all, and to go get it filled back up again! This went on for about 6 months!

The last one, and if you work with any apprentices, is to make up a tool name and ask an apprentice to go look for it in the shop or in your tool box. Such as "metric adjustable" or Norcove Wrench, etc. Most of the time they are too embarassed to tell you they don't know what it is. If they do ask, Tell him what it looks like, and watch as he continually brings back the wrong tool. It is fun to yell at them! "Hey, I said a metric Adjustable, not an imperial one...go back and find the right one". You can keep this up for a LONG time!!

Those are all of the ones I can think of for know,

Millwright Matt
www.millwrightstudyguide.com
millwright test and C of Q preperation material

Psst. Matt. You might want to check the spelling of 'preparation' in your signature line.

I remember sometimes a mechanic at a gas station would hand the new gofer a styrofoam cup and tell him to go to the pump and bring him back a half cup of gas.

USMCPOP said:

I remember sometimes a mechanic at a gas station would hand the new gofer a styrofoam cup and tell him to go to the pump and bring him back a half cup of gas.

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Dangerous but funny! (Seen it when I was turning wrenches )

I worked in a shop full of practical jokers for 16 years and have had it all pulled on me. For a time, making signs and sticking them to peoples bodies or cars was all the rage.

At noon fridays, it was always a footrace to your car and get out of the parking lot and get to the bank, cash your check, and still have time to go find something to eat.

Well, this particular Friday I was leading the pack and shot out of the parking lot in my old beater car and got ahead of most everybody and got to the bank. As I came back out, everyone else was pulling in and waving and laughing, so I waved back not thinking much of it.

As I got back out to my car, I see on the front of the car a big cardboard sign that proudly proclaimed "I LIKE LITTLE BOYS". After I tore that off I started to get in the car, but decided to go check the rear of the car..... good thing. There was a bigger sign that said "Gay, and proud of it". No wonder everyone was waving and laughing!

In retaliation, I quizzed the usual suspects to find out the culprit and planned my mission. The offender was one of the office men, a purchasing agent, though quite a jokester.

Every so often, we'd have a shop wide meeting and the plant manager and the others would come out of the upstairs office, stand around the stairway and tell us the newest goings on of the company. I heard of the upcoming meeting and knew my intended victim would have to be in attendence.

I raced around and found some clean white paper, some spray adhesive, a black magic marker, and went into action.
I made this typing paper sized sign that said "AIDS VICTIM- Keep back 50 feet" and sprayed a coating of contact adhesive on the back of it and went on the offensive. All you have to do is let that sticky paper touch a surface and it is stuck. No pressure needed- that is what makes it great for this prank.

I found my victim, "Ron", walking around doing his thing and snuck up behind him as he was making his way to the stairway area for the meeting. I got right up behind him, held the paper out at arms length and let it drop down on him right below his shirt collar. Perfect landing! He never had a clue I was behind him.

So, a minute or so later there are a hundred men and women standing around the office stairway, and there is Ron right out in the middle of them- with a wide perimeter of unoccupied space around him! People giggling and smiling. Best part was he was facing the plant manager so that guy really didn't know what all the smiling faces were about. Not until it was over, Ron turns to go somewhere and the manager catches a glimpse of the sign and calls out for him to "come here for a second" whereupon he reaches up and tears that sheet of paper off Rons' back and shows it to him!

Perfect ending. No one of any consequence knew who did it and because it took him down a peg in front of his peers, not just us!

My brother and one of his colleagues got into a bumper sticker war with each other. I guess my brother started it by putting a sticker that said "I love porn" of the other guy's car. The other guy followed suit by taking it off his car and putting it on my brother's, but only after adding the word "gay" in the appropriate spot. At this point, my brother got really creative and put the bumper sticker on a piece of sheet metal that he had rigged up with springs, hinges, and magnets so he could stick it on under the car and it would be folded up and not noticeable until he started driving, then the wind would force it down for the whole world to see. Apparently the magnets weren't powerful enough though because it wasn't there the next time he checked.

Shop Pranks Revisited

While working at a tool and die company in Jacksonville Fla. in the early 70's I was introduced to shop pranks. We had a rash of prussian blue being painted on the nose pieces of unattended glasses at break time. It is amazing how that stuff gets all over you before you realize you have been had.

I think the best one that I ever pulled was putting a cracker ball (torpedo fireworks) in the plant manager's stapler. He was sitting in his glass box office at the front of the shop and went to staple a job detail onto a print when BOOM! All the guys in the machine department knew it was going to happen and had to duck behind benches and tool boxes so as to not be seen laughing. The PM jumped up and stared out the window to see if he could catch the culpret laughing. It was a hoot.

The pranks went on for a while but ended when the air hoses got involved. Too dangerous and caused the management to say enough

Ya air hose pranks was a part of tech school. That didn't last long either..... Too easy for things to get wayyyyyy out of control.

Years ago I worked in a canning plant that packed pickles. Have you ever stood next to a cliff and had the feeling that you might just impetuously jump off? Well they had a pickle slicer at this plant in the room I worked in and I had a fear that I might just stick it in the pickle slicer and see what happened. One day at lunchtime I was left all alone with the pickle slicer and I did it. But the foreman came back from lunch early and fired both of us. So much for my prank of the day.

Im sorry. . . what?

MillwrightMatt said:

The last one, and if you work with any apprentices, is to make up a tool name and ask an apprentice to go look for it in the shop or in your tool box. Such as "metric adjustable" or Norcove Wrench, etc. Most of the time they are too embarassed to tell you they don't know what it is. If they do ask, Tell him what it looks like, and watch as he continually brings back the wrong tool. It is fun to yell at them! "Hey, I said a metric Adjustable, not an imperial one...go back and find the right one".

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Just wanted to say that I bought a "metric adjustable" for shop use simply because it WAS metric. It had metric markings on the side of the jaws. They DO exist!

Old boss had a big SeaRay twin-engine boat and a girlfriend down in Florida. We got her in on the prank. Had the local Richmond, VA radio station spoofers call, pretending to be the FBI. The told him that they had confiscated the boat off the coast, with a load of drugs. The suspects couldn't speak English, but went on about "the General" (his last name was Patton). They had the registration info on the boat and all, and really played it to the hilt. Of course this was broadcast over radio on the Jeff and Jeff show (WRXL), several times over the years. His business partner called it in, but I gave him the idea, so I was covered.

gpete said:

Years ago I worked in a canning plant that packed pickles. Have you ever stood next to a cliff and had the feeling that you might just impetuously jump off? Well they had a pickle slicer at this plant in the room I worked in and I had a fear that I might just stick it in the pickle slicer and see what happened. One day at lunchtime I was left all alone with the pickle slicer and I did it. But the foreman came back from lunch early and fired both of us. So much for my prank of the day.

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PerryMill said:

Im sorry. . . what?

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Dude, that was WAY too much information. And neither funny nor a prank.

So what was the pickle slicer's name? And was she hot?

Yes, I got it the first time.


CJ

Never eating pickles again.

Makes you wonder what the kids at McDonalds do with your buns.

Kid at work has had a coffee cup for coupla months, raised it up the other day and someone noticed Mfg. had printed "dip****" on the bottom. Wonder what would happen if some one would put "need a hug" or somesuch on bottom in a "manly" shop?

"So what was the pickle slicer's name? And was she hot?

Yes, I got it the first time.
CJ "

Ditto a little vague, but funny.
Jim

i put an opossum in the bathroom at 6 in the morning when my 12 ended. the boss comes in and proceeds the use the head. a minute later comes running out pants barely on screaming. made up for his nc program that wadded a 1" boring bar and blamed me for.

We used to put some phenolphthalein into juice and offer it to new hires. Causes the urine to come out bright red. Always an interesting look on the guy's face when he comes out of the bathroom.