Quote:
Originally Posted by bustedbenz
It's not related to the Mercedes but my most famous "it seemed like a good idea at the time" moment was a few (ok, more like eight or ten) years ago when they gave me my first multimeter for Christmas, it was a pretty nice Extech 460 or 463 or something like that, it's not with me at the moment... anyway, I was just playing with it, I knew how to set it to ohms and test my tongue to see if it still had low resistance the way it did five seconds ago, that kind of thing... and I knew that I could check the voltage of a wall outlet by setting it to ac volts.
But... I asked myself.... how many AMPS does that outlet have? :-D
I didn't realize that the time that amperage was a current drain measurement and not just a static "at rest" measurement - so I dutifully plugged in a power strip (so I could reach it easier or something) and set the meter to amps, plugged the positive lead into the amp socket, and stuck it in.
Pffffffttt.... needless to say, it shorted out the power strip... the circuit breaker on the strip saved the rest of that outlet and so forth I guess... but it melted the tip of the + lead on my tester, and fried the power strip... yeah, explaining THAT one to my dad was a lot of fun  |
I did that once a while back when I didn't know better
On an automotive related note, one day a few years back I was changing the oil in the work truck, a 92 Ford F150. I warmed it up a little, drained the pan and removed the spin on filter. Oiled the new gasket and installed the new filter. Filled with oil. Started the engine, let it idle for a while, and then decided to rev it up to build some pressure. I had my brother stand outside with the hood open to watch for leaks. All of a sudden he comes running around to the driver's door yelling and screaming and flailing his hands. I immediately shut down the engine. He told me a geyser of oil came squirting out from below the engine. I checked the dipstick...totally dry.
I got under the truck, drained the new oil, and removed the filter. Gasket from the old filter stuck on the flange and I didn't take it off.
Luckily I shut down the engine before any damage was done.