[Elecraft] (Elecraft) DUMB THINGS I'VE DONE

[Steve Carey]

Could have killed my Mother !!!
When I was living at home with my parents . . . my Brother (G8HSI) and I
built an outside Shack at the bottom of the garden. We run out of cash so
had no money for a suitable power cable. What's the good of a new Ham Shack
full of "Tube" gear and no AC ??? I joined up lots of scraps of old coax
cable . . . twisted joints ( no solder ) and covered them in PVC tape. About
200ft of cable. About a dozen joints. Only temporary you understand.
240Volts at top end . . . and 180 volts in the Shack (and that was
off-load!). One day about 5 years later, when I got home from work, my
Mother  said, "Oh . . you had better come outside, I've been gardening all
day and I've moved your Aerial cable"! The cable had become "en-twined"
between new growth of bushes and shrubs, so She one-by-one undid the joints,
un-tangled the wire and re-did the joints. She even re-wrapped them with PVC
tape She got from my Shack! God must have been with Her . . . the Power was
definitely on all the time and the house fuse was still in-tact. Weird. She
never got a Shock . . . I could have electrocuted  my Mother!

Thank goodness for Earth Leakage Trips and Circuit Breakers.

Steve/G4MJW