Workplace Pranks

[JackR]

Caught one of my employees on an internet Russian dating site. Used my personal G Mail to e mail him thanking him for his automated registration. Gave his name, work address and phone number asking him to be sure they were correct.
Pulled internet pics of women and e mailed him a few times with the pics and a want to meet story.
Sent an e mail that Sventlana liked him and would be in Phoenix on a specific date, and will stop by “his” address when she arrives. gave him an arrival date.
Had a few people in on this and had him paged mid morning on that day “Bob T. Visitor in the lobby”. Thought he was going to stroke out.

 

[Cranky]

Oh man, after working 26 years in a refinery and 5 at a steel mill, I learned a few pranks and the majority of them have already been mentioned. Water fights using the fire monitors in the refinery was big for awhile until we delayed the start up of a pretty large gas turbine that was a key machine in this one unit by two weeks. Someone decided to hose down the whole crew one day but didn't notice the electrical control panel doors were open and well, that stuff doesn't like being drenched. Some of us were sweating losing our jobs. Well, the water fights didn't stop entirely but we just made sure of our surroundings AND who was on the job. As an overhead crane operator in the steel mill, I used to pick up 12ton rough I beams about 20 feet up and release the mag. The guys and 1 gal in the office would get pretty shook up and would wonder what on earth just happened....and the office was 100' away from the drop zone.

Flammable brake wash will make just about anyone welding unass their hood and area. Did that one to a buddy of mine that used to always talk about what they did to each other in the office where he worked. The stuff he talked about didn't hold a candle to the stuff we did in the plant. He had his car over at my place adding some bracing to his rear suspension and roll cage and when he was in a tight area, he got the brake wash treatment and the shot was perfect. Thought I was gonna have to run for my life.

A smoke bomb in a co-workers tool box was found buy someone that was wanting to make some heads roll. At the time we had these Snap-On boxes with the roll up door and they usually had the 3 bottom drawers removed for storage of larger items etc. That bottom opening was perfect for a coffee can with oil soaked rags in it...then close the 'garage door' and walk away. Well, the head roller came by after about 30 minutes and with the box starting to smoke pretty good, he grabbed a fire extinguisher and went to open the box and put out whatever it was that was burning. He didn't count on the gush of fresh air to put out a fairly large plume of smoke and stepped back pretty quickly to get away from it and fell on his *** in the process. No one said a word and the 'investigation' died pretty fast....

 

[Slap Stick]

When I was quite young we lived at a stable. One of the employees, a woman, had a Renault Dauphine. Four of the hands picked up her car and put it in a stall. No way it could be driven out. They let her stew for a few hours before getting it out.
I had a guy who liked to hide my lunch until after lunch time. Since he was related to a few supervisors he was getting away with it. I found his lunch box and slipped a thin sheet of Styrofoam in it. He took a bite and had a funnily look. Everyone kind of giggled and he took another bite. That's whe he looked and found the foam and everyone laughed so he went and complained to the supervisor. They tried to fire me but thought again when it was pointed out they refused to do anything to him for hiding my lunches. The guy quit soon after.

At my last job guys used to wire charged capacitors on workbench chairs. I got em back. They used small caps. I wired up a 450 VDC 360 mfd cap to the chair who laughed the hardest. He didn't laugh any more and learned his lesson.

Our QC inspector was scared of spiders. She loved to reject cameras because she said it was her job to reject rather than inspect and reject what didn't pass muster. Our boss put a plastic spider under the lid of one of the cameras we built and maintained. She lifted the lid and about filled her pants.
In return, "Petey" made the rounds all over the shop and building, even to other locations. She took it well.

 

[Ron_M]

One of the duties working in the dealership shop is helping push in vehicles that cannot do it on their own. When the LH cars came out in the mid 90s a mechanic yelled "push" and a bunch of us were mustered to assist. Well of the four us, we were going at a good clip and the mechanicbwho was outside of the car steering, said to slow it down. The others thought it t would be funny to "get it going". The mechanic and I both threw up our hands and backed away. The LH went barreling into the shop and the nose went under the workbench, smacked the wall, and bounced back. The service manager was duly pissed and this car was almost new. I'm pretty sure the jokesters had to pay for that one. The mechanic and I were exonerated.

 

[Ron_M]

Another time during cold weather the huge overhead doors are constantly opening and closing. Typically we beeped to signal an incoming car. The open door allows wind inside and blows the paperwork around. Well on occasion two of us had to go in and we both beeped. I was in the second car, a minivan. After the first car entered, I proceeded but an advisor closed the door... Onto the roof of the minivan! I kept going and it f'd the roof up pretty bad. The service manager, while upset, knew it wasn't my fault and said next time that happens, stop! Sure enough, several weeks later, it happened again! I stopped. The service advisor later said to me that when it happened, the manager said "he Listened!".

 

[Ron_M]

Working at a c-p store one night after a snowstorm, I was lotboy locking the cars in the service line, removing keys, etc. The dealer principal was plowing the lot of wet slush. He was hitting the schnaps (it was the truck I used to deliver parts and I often found the empties the next day). Anyways a young couple were picking up their car and he drove by a got them and the intererior really good with slush. The were not happy. I witnessed it and rushed over to assist, profusely Apologizing and vacuumed up the slush. I felt really bad about that. They appreciated my help but vowed to never returned. Never heard another word about it.

 

[ckessel]

These are some funny stories. A couple of them almost got me tears in the eyes from laughing so hard. If anyone has that one mooch/thief fellow employee who snags their Gatorade, I have a suggestion. Get ahold of some of the powder'd stuff you have to drink the night before your Colonoscopy inspection. Mix it up and let the fool have that. As many know, it has fast and explosive results.

 

[kiwigtx]

I used to go on all sorts of repair jobs around town as an apprentice Sparky. One day we had to replace all the fluorescent tubes behind the plastic covers of the local FORD dealership. Prominent place on a huge roundabout, with hundreds of cars going past each hour ...even in the 80's. Being individual letters around 5 feet tall, it was quite a job to get the rusted screws undone, and the covers off. We decided to take a morning tea break after getting all the letters down.

Just before climbing down off the canopy roof where we were working, I quickly re-arranged the letters (and left one down), and left the rest standing up, leaning against the frames of the light fittings.

The dealership was called Panmure Motors. As we were across the other side of the roundabout, outside the lunch-bar, I said to the Tradie I was working with (Dave again) - check out the sign. He looked, and his jaw dropped.....not happy with me at all.

In big bold letters it read: MANURE MOTORS

If only I had a camera with me back then....some of the stuff we did.

 

[copper67sat]

Worked on a roofing crew when i was in college. Tools left unattended usually got a healthy dollop of tar on the handle.

One guy was habitually late getting back from lunch. One day we emptied his toolbox, nailed it to the roof then put all his tools back. He almost fell off the roof when he went to pick it up.

Now i work in an office and the pranks are generally tamer. I'm in Florida where it rains a lot in the summer. A classic prank is to enpty the paper hole punches into someone's umbrella so it rains paper dots on them when they open it. Could always tell when someone got pranked by the pile of dots just outside the door.

 

[kiwigtx]

I didn't read them all...but we just put anti seize under the tool box drawer handles..

One of the engineers at a factory I was at for a while thought it was funny to put 'bearing blue' on everyone's ear-muffs during a break time.

 

[Ron_M]

Not sure if I started it or the other guy started with me as this was 25 years ago at the c-p store. One day I found a condom tied to my beloved Satellites antenna and I was not happy. I was told it that it been used. This resulted in a bag of certain curly hairs in the guys toolbox. Pretty raunchy and gross I know. Maturity wasn't a strong point or requirement at this place! Alcohol was a contributor.

 

[1 Wild R/T]

One of the engineers at a factory I was at for a while thought it was funny to put 'bearing blue' on everyone's ear-muffs during a break time.

Prussian Blue.... Back it the Navy days we would spread that stuff on the ear piece & mouth piece of the shipboard sound powered phones... Then tell your chosen victim an officer was calling for them... We had guys walk around for hours with blue lips & a blue ear...

We had a Petty Officer that was always wound tight, always demanding guys do some BS task.. He pissed off the wrong guy & wound up getting his coffee spiked with a 714 (quaalude) every day for a week.... Mellowed him right out...

 

[padam]

I almost can't believe we used to do this, but 30 years ago times were different, and we were younger with strong teeth.

Worked in a machine shop.
Cut a piece of .015 to .020 shim stock and slip it into a guys sandwich.
I had a guy who took two bites at one before he figured it out.
Called it a shim stock sandwich.

 

[Ron_M]

I moonlighted nights at a local jobber. A coworker hated the manager. This manager was assigned the store so he often left his personal effects on the counter and for this story, a coffee cup which I was told by several people, he never washed. y'all know where this going!
Yup, three times a week! Coffee was pretty tangy! True story!

 

[Ron_M]

Machine shop antics? Lol. Chuck keys in spindles, dum dum on straws launched by air blowers. Good times. Shop careers rule!

 

[padam]

Machine shop antics? Lol. Chuck keys in spindles, dum dum on straws launched by air blowers. Good times. Shop careers rule!

Had some pretty serious air gun wars.

 

[ZR9B]

Now that I think of it....month or so ago I used epoxy to glue a quarter to the floor in front of the pop machine.

 

[Mackman]

My wife is one of the sweetest, friend-to-all women you could ever meet. But for 35 years she tortured her office co-workers with practical jokes, and they never suspected it was her. She still laughs about it, ten years after retirement.

 

[JackR]

Not a prank but had a guy who often tried making a helicopter out of a Bridgeport mill.

Machine shop antics? Lol. Chuck keys in spindles, dum dum on straws launched by air blowers. Good times. Shop careers rule!

you needed a box end wrench on top of the machine to change a tool in the spindle.

 

[kiwigtx]

Not so much as a prank....more like sustained stray gun-fire....paint-ball gun antics one afternoon a couple of years ago got out of hand....some beer was involved....our most hated colleague had the codes to the security camera footage, and managed to create a mask so that he couldn't be seen sitting in that chair doing private stuff all day when he should have been working.
I just noticed the Camera sign.