valc91•1mo ago

That Tuesday where everything that could go wrong actually did go wrong

I was on a job in Gary, Indiana and my oxy-acetylene torch decided to crap out on me right when I needed to cut a stubborn 3/4 inch plate. Then my partner dropped the hot dog he was eating into the weld puddle, which honestly was the funniest part of the whole mess. Has anyone else had a day where your tools just seem to hate you?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_tessa1mo ago

Did you end up having to call a buddy to bring a backup torch out to Gary, or did you find some workaround to get through the job? I'm genuinely curious because that's the kind of situation where you either MacGyver something or pack up and lose the whole day.

mark_ward1mo ago

Honestly I have been in that exact same spot more times than I care to count. Tbh not with a torch but with a sawzall blade that snapped halfway through cutting a buried pipe in a tight crawlspace. Ended up having to crawl back out just to grab a hacksaw because I didn't pack spare blades that day. Ngl it ate up almost an hour and by the time I got back to it my back was wrecked from all the contorting. And right when I finally got the pipe cut, my phone slipped out of my pocket into the mud. That job just had it out for me.

logan5611mo ago

Man I feel your pain on that one. There's nothing worse than a torch deciding to quit mid-cut, especially on thick plate in Gary of all places. That's already a tough enough gig without equipment acting up. And your partner dropping a hot dog into the puddle? That's the kind of bad luck that makes you just have to laugh or you'll cry. I've had days where my angle grinder locked up on me, then my tape measure snapped, and I just sat on the toolbox for ten minutes staring at nothing. Sometimes it feels like the tools know when you're in a hurry and they just want to mess with you. Hope the rest of that job went okay once you got sorted out.