Hobo Code · 3:10am Mar 4th, 2023
Some time ago I said I was gonna do a blog post on Rule Four of the Hobo Ethical Code.
And now's the time!
There's also gonna be an addendum to a previous blog post at the end, so stay tuned for that!
[soft_break]
Now you may remember the Pirate Code (arr) which are really more of guidelines . . . so it is with the Hobo Ethical Code. There isn't a Hobo King who's gonna order his guards to arrest you if you break the hobo code. [There is a hobo king, elected each year in Britt, IA, but he doesn't get guards or enforcement powers as far as I know.]
That having been said, the Code was established at the Hobo National Convention in 1889. That might not have been in Britt; Wikipedia says that the National Convention only started being held there in 1900.
In my opinion, the fifteen rules are good rules for anyone to follow. For example, Rule Five is "When no work is available, make your own work by using your added talents at crafts." Those of you who read Destination Unknown will remember that Sweetsong earned money by singing and playing her guitar whenever she could.
She might have been able to find other temporary employment if she'd looked for it, but then the Code is guidelines.
Rule Four says: "Always try to find work, even if temporary, and always seek out jobs nobody wants. By doing so you not only help a business along, but ensure employment should you return to that town again."
In fact, we're going to narrow our focus to start with. I figure a fair number of people who read my stories and my blogs, especially the ones where I talk about technical stuff, are the same kinds of people who might watch Destin on Smarter Every Day.
Some years ago, he was doing a video on how smart farmers are, and grain bins specifically. Anybody who's been in the country has seen the ones he's taking about, they're corrugated steel cylinders with a pointy roof. I've seen plenty; if I had a throwing arm like Tom Brady I could stand in my driveway and hit one with a rock.
Minor spoiler, they're more complicated than just a vessel to store grain.
Anyway, he was at a friend's farm where a new one was being built, and he wanted to participate in the process. Of course, a few of pros who are putting this thing together don't have any time for some fool with a camera. And he knew that, too, so he volunteered to help.
I don't know how it is for white-collar workers, I've never tried that. But for tradies, if some schmuck off the street offers to help, the first instinct is to back away quickly. And of course Destin knew that.
In his words: "So to earn the trust of this crew, I asked Danny what is it that they did not want to do, and I immediately started doing that."
Or, in the words of the Code, "Always seek out jobs nobody wants."
We've cycled through a fair number of idiot kids at the shop. If you come in without experience, you start at the bottom, and starting at the bottom at most mechanic shops is you sweep floors and take out the trash and put away stock, you maybe do oil changes or mount and balance tires, and a lot of guys don't like that. Which is understandable.
I got my start at Firestone during their big recall, and my main job during the first few months was putting tires on Ford Explorers. We were doing about 300 tires a week just on Explorers, and I had the rim specifications memorized for every rim that they offered on those trucks, so I could set up the tire machine faster. I knew where the spare tire tools were on every variation—the spare was included in the recall.
As that started tapering down, I got trained on how to do oil changes, and also how to stock the tires that came on the weekly tire truck.
One of our mechanics was older, and like a lot of mechanics he had knee and back problems. He'd ask me to set hoists for him, and I would.
I didn't come in with no experience, but it was limited, and I'm sure that Firestone also cycled through general service technicians (which was my actual title). I worked at that specific store for about two years, and I think we went through a good dozen of them or more, I legit can't remember. In the words of our service manager, the ones that didn't perform got sent down the primrose path.
In case you didn't know, mechanics are often paid flat rate. That means we get paid based on how long the job is supposed to take. If we're fast, we make more; if we're not, we make less. That, in general, incentivizes taking jobs although some of them aren't worth the pay . . . I was still new, I was still being paid hourly, and one of the mechanics offered me a ticket he'd been given. I don't remember what kind of car it was, some GM front-wheel drive that needed a starter. And I knew that the only reason he was giving me the ticket instead of doing it himself was because it was not a fun starter to change.
It wasn't. And I did it anyway.
Doing the jobs nobody wanted me to do earned the trust of the other mechanics. The senior mechanic, who I set hoists for and helped when he needed it (usually doing the dumb or messy stuff) started teaching me tips and techniques. One of them has stuck with me for years. He had an older Mac toolbox that was stuffed to the gills with tools, and I asked him one time why he didn't buy a new, bigger one. He said, "Toolbox doesn't make me any money."
When it came time for me to buy a toolbox, I kept that in mind, and bought a used one. When I needed a bigger one, I traded the old one in for a bigger used one, and I've kept that same bottom box for almost 20 years now; the top box was a more recent acquisition. Also used, and it doesn't match the bottom box but who cares 'cause the toolbox doesn't make me any money. I have zero intention of ever buying a new box, and I'll only ever trade this one in for a bigger one if it gets to the point that I can literally fit no more tools in it.
I realize that the Hobo Code isn't oriented towards people who are seeing long-term employment and the opportunity to rise through the ranks. I feel like the very nature of hobos is more in the transience of them, whether by choice or circumstance. But it's a good lesson for anybody.
Something that most of our fresh-from-high school idiots fail to realize is that the other employees are judging how they do the simple tasks that nobody else wants to. If you can't manage to sweep or take out trash without somehow screwing it up, why on earth would we think you could be trusted to do an oil change?
Addendum from a previous blog post!
There were a couple of things I forgot to say back when I talked about a F350. The kid who owns it is kind of an idiot and he also currently works for us; some of his paycheck is going towards paying off his outstanding bill on his dumb truck (not a good trade IMHO, but I'm not the boss).
This is also gonna cover some stuff that comes up in a future blog post. If I remember, I'll let you know which one it is; if I don't you'll probably suss it out.
At one point when I was working on my truck, he asked me how many times I'd done that particular job before. The answer? Never. It was the first 7.3L I'd ever put an oil pressure control solenoid in.
It was, I presume, also the first one he'd ever done. The difference between us was that I read the instructions, while he just shotgunned parts at it and overtorqued at least one of them.
And that wasn't all I read.
You see, I know the theory. The truck uses a high-pressure oil pump to give the injectors the oomph they need to fire the fuel, but I'm a generalist. We work on all makes and models at the shop, and I'm often fixing something for the first time, so I want more than the theory. I need the specifics, I need to know what tells the PCM that it should make more (or less) oil pressure, what are its normal operating conditions and what does it do when something goes wrong? What sorts of controls are there, what sorts of feedback signals are generated, and how can I tap into them? What's going to be an effective test to prove, or disprove, a particular fault? I don't want to throw a several-hundred dollar part at a vehicle just to see what happens, I want to know that it's faulty first, and the only way I can do that is understand how the system is supposed to work.
. . . unfortunately, this is also gonna come up in a blog post.
Outro!
It's only a matter of time before you've found that someone has LITERALLY shotgunned a part (assuming you haven't already).
Pull and replace mechanics are not fun to follow on any job. It's always worth the time and effort to learn the system and understand how and why it works, which most often leads to the correct repair...been there, done that way to many times.
The things I learned about work from my parents, in so many words and no particular order:
1) No honest work is beneath you
2) There's no such thing as "women's work."
3) When in need, do whatever job comes to hand
I've had to modify this a bit for the office environment. There the women do all the menial work (cleaning the break room, emptying the trash) because the men find it beneath them. And if a man does it, then that man is beneath them too.
I don't like that, and I don't like those men, but I get revenge by finding a higher-paying job every few years and leaving them to cover the gap I leave behind.
Something-something about how overtorquing and snapping a part off in a socket / threaded hole / whatever is what turns an easy 15 minute job into a week of anxiety, torture, and drilling while you hope desperately that it doesn't cascade into breaking something else in the process.
The longer you work with hardware, the more you believe in curses. We have had laptops with persistent problems that still exist after every part inside the case has been replaced. The overheated problem of Thesus I suppose.
When I see hobo stuff I think of Hobo's Lullaby by the Kingston Trio.
5716553
I develop software for a living, and I can't help but agree: curses and/or gremlins are real.
Ah, yes...the tried and true method of, "I'm too smart to read the instructions, so I'll just hit stuff until it works!" approach. Our Neanderthal ancestors would be so proud.
So proud.
5716549
Whoever is doing the menial work (cleaning, trash, etc.), I give respect to because they make the work environment nicer.
Given the option, I like to get the most annoying task out of the way first, just so it's done.
Work ethic is good to gauge in someone when you see how they handle doing the cleanup-- as well as how much they pay attention when passing some wrenches over to the guy elbow-deep in a car.
I learned a long time ago that attitude is more important than knowledge. You can teach someone with a good attitude about the job; someone with a bad attitude will just make everything worse.
Got the brakes done on the '01 GMC, with the use of some... creative line routing. Very much amateur hour, on a vehicle that mostly runs a mile or two running about the farm.
The Case Magnum 340 is acting up again.. and now stuck in the way in the back of the shop. It turns out the errors an operator was encountering were ones that would allow only so many starts of the machine. I. Hate. DEF. Systems. Especially since it's about $300 just for the field service guy to show up. And the diagnostics are expensive and/or proprietary.
Compare that to the 1135 Massey Ferguson that's about 50 years old or so. The alternator started to smoke... that explains why it'd been having problems starting (low battery voltage). Two bolts that I could remove with a couple adjustable wrenches, pull a wire off a terminal... an hour and a half later (trip to a local alternator/motor/generator/battery service shop, great guys), stick the new one on, verify the batteries aren't junk from the bad alternator, do a test start. Refuel the tractor while I'm at it (it's on a liquid waste pump, so not convenient to move).
A thought on over-torquing: I learned a long time ago, in the absence of torque wrenches, to use an undersized ratchet (such as 3/8 drive instead of 1/2), or to hold it lightly and tighten it down to snug. Things like engine heads, of course, need proper torquing. I *can* weld a nut to a broken-off bolt, but I'd rather not if I can help it. And I don't relish the idea of trying to repair threads on an aluminum casting.
There's a manure spreader I need to cut an external nut off that had damaged and then stripped out threads, and need to weld a new one on. It's one of three that hold an access panel closed that's used for draining the thing. I miss working in an electronics factory-- I would usually smell the same going home, as when I came in to work...
If it moves, it breaks. If it's not supposed to move, it's broken.
This sounds familiar.
Rule # 4 brings up an interesting point:
The thing is that hobos never get a chance to work their way up because they do not stay for long.
I said it before and I shall say it again:
A scientist is anypony using the scientific method. You form hypotheses and then test them (try to disprove them). That makes you a scientist.
Ooh, snowpony-nirik cooperation!
5716574
Works that way in most professions, I suspect.
In the games industry, good testers are often moved up to associate producer slots.
In the entertainment industry it's easy to get a job as a PA (Production Assistant) and fetch coffee, move chairs, and lots of other menial tasks. But when a producer needs someone to fill a higher level job, they will often think of the PA that got their coffee order just right, and always had their chair in right place if video village got moved. Heck, I know of two writers that got their start as PAs and moved up just because of their attention to detail and casual conversations at lunch and craft services!
5716541
I just looked over a car where the customer did his own brakes and rebuilt his own calipers (something I've never done and we wouldn't do in-house). I counted a massive number of mistakes on just what I could see, and I don't know what he might have done wrong inside the calipers.
5716543
Not a shotgun, but I've dismounted a Bobcat tire that a customer shot with a handgun. Not sure if he was aiming for the tire or if that was just collateral damage, and I didn't think it was my place to ask.
5716546
Yeah, and the worst part is when they're not forthcoming so you've got to figure out what they were originally trying to fix, and whether any of their repairs made it better or worse than it was. And since you're coming in after the fact, you don't know if something was always like that, or if it's a new problem . . . like on the aforementioned Ford, it's even one step worse 'cause it didn't run when the guy bought it, so there's no way of knowing whether fixing the oil pressure problem will make it start and run, or if that will just reveal the next layer of problems.
I'd imagine this is true across a lot of trades; probably plumbers and electricians and carpenters and roofers have seen all sorts of terrible self-repairs. Heck, the roofers that did my house found some things that raised their eyebrows, like how the previous owner had shingled over a rubber roof.
5716549
Those are all good things.
That's rough . . . sometimes in certain industries, there's a prevailing culture and it can be difficult to fight against. I can tell you, using the current parlance, that auto repair shops generally aren't the most woke places. Especially in the back shop; usually up front the salespeople will behave nice to customers. Having said that, on my short list of good managers I've had, one of them was a woman. In some trades, being able to do your job well knocks down a few barriers.
5716552
That's one thing that separates the experienced mechanics from the novices and wannabes. I know which bolts I can snap off with impunity and easily replace, and which ones I need to spend however much time it takes to make them come out of their holes while leaving threads behind.
You're also right about the 'breaking something else.' There's more than a few jobs where I know how you're supposed to do it, but I'm using a different technique because what you're supposed to do could open a whole can of worms on the job, while my technique doesn't involve touching any of those super sketchy bolts.
Also lube is your friend, and heat for when the lube fails to deliver.
5716553
Yeah, we've had a few cars like that before. One I think I blogged about in the past was a Focus or Fusion that had a charging voltage that was too high, and despite our best efforts we were unable to fix it since we were never able to find the cause.
5716554
Ooh, very nice!
I haven't even thought of the Kingston Trio in years, so thank you for that, too
I think my Dad had a bunch of their records (as well as the Mitchell Trio, who I always loved).
5716565
You're not wrong. It's kind of endemic in our industry, which I think is why some of the older techs really struggle with the new stuff. I'm not entirely unsympathetic; for a long time if an alternator wasn't charging (for example), if the cables were tight, it was the alternator that was bad. Simple. Now that they're controlled by computers, when it's not charging the first thing you have to ask yourself is 'which computer tells it to charge, and what inputs does the computer get that let it determine what it should do?'
5716573
I base it on mood and expedience most of the time.
Yes to both. Our new guy, he can't even get sweeping right, and he doesn't follow simple instructions well. Also he's got an 'I'm smarter than you' attitude. I don't see him getting very far in the industry if he can't change those things. One of the last good new guys we had, he didn't know much but he was friendly and would do the tasks you told him to, and he learned a lot because he'd listen and it didn't feel like you were talking to a wall when you explained how to do something. He was also smart enough to know his limitations; he was never good at remembering the steps to patching a tire, so he wrote them down on a piece of paper and stuck it in the cabinet where the tire repair supplies were. As far as I know, the note is still there.
If you've got a hoist and it isn't too rusty, and you've also got a trans jack or a jackstand, you can lift up the cab some and that really helps. If not, as long as you make sure they're not chafing on anything it's a functional repair and sometimes you've gotta do what you've gotta do.
As a tech and a tree-hugger I've got mixed feelings on DEF. There is a small part of me that does enjoy that customers who used to ignore warning lights on their car until stuff really broke can now be penalized by their automobile. On the other hand, it also sweeps up innocent customers in its wrath . . . we've got a number of customers with diesels who have deleted DEF and EGR systems with various aftermarket, not-legal-for-street-use kits.
I had an old Chevy truck of nearly that vintage. 250 inline six, power nothing, 3-speed . . . it never ran well by modern standards, but it always ran. Including without oil, without coolant, on only three cylinders, and while on fire. Heck, that engine's in a different truck that I'm gonna get around to fixing up One Of These Days, and it still runs . . . with fuel from a gravity bottle, 'cause the fuel pump's broke or else the tank has so much rust in it the pickup tube is clogged.
I've got the same attitude. In fact, I've got a worn-out impact gun for installing lug nuts without overtorquing them. I'll step down a drive size or tool size to avoid getting in trouble. A lot of times, I speed in spark plugs with an electric ratchet if I can; I use a 1/4" with an adapter and then a torque wrench.
And one of the secrets to being a good, efficient mechanic that They won't tell you is knowing what bolts need to be properly torqued and what ones German specs are good enough for.
I think I've mentioned this before, but some of our customers are dairy farmers, and I tell myself that it's just mud on their truck, nothing more.
I spent the last hour of work today getting a bath in diesel, whether I wanted it or not. Leaky fuel lines on a Duramax . . . tomorrow I get to start the day on that truck, too.
Yeah, ain't that the truth
5716574
Amazing how that works, innt it?
5717275
Yep, Kingston Trio did a lot of nice songs. Tony Barrand is another one. It is rare when you can find an artist who doesn't have several dud songs on an album. Youtube has pretty much all of their songs.
5716577
That is generally true. However, I feel in the sense of the migrant worker, there's a chance that they could, if they keep a regular route. Or at least get more favorable options the next time around.
The scientific method really applies to more things than traditional science. When you get down to it, most automotive diagnosis is really having a hypothesis (formed from prior knowledge, research, etc.) and then a means to test that hypothesis to prove your theory right or wrong.
Admittedly, it's usually not as rigid as a normal experiment, but the general principle's the same.
5716595
It's a very good mutualistic relationship. The snowponies get heat, and the nirik can burn off her frustrations.
5716630
Now if only I can get my manager to actually read my work orders. . . .
If you can do a thing over and over, again and again, without ever learning ANYTHNG, every time can be like the first time...forever a blushing virgin wondering 'where's that weird fluid leak coming from' on her/his wedding night.
5717022
At least until you get to middle management, then it's just nepotism and the Peter Principle. One nice thing about the trades is that's less of an issue; you can either do the job or you can't.
Yeah, being the person who's there and getting things done will get you remembered. At my weekend job, there's a guy who's sort of a legend, 'cause he'll take practically any shift that needs to be covered, whenever and wherever. He makes a lot of money (I think he usually picks up 30+ hours of overtime a week) and some of the other staff grumble about it, but they could take extra shifts, too. And the house managers all love him, 'cause when they get in a pinch, he'll fill in. I figure he probably has been offered management positions but doesn't want them because it would be more responsibility for less pay.
In a lot of industries, too, they're smaller than some people think, especially towards the top. If you've got favorable name recognition even for a menial job, you've already got a leg up on every other person who wants that job. "Oh yeah, I worked with that person and they were great" can take you a long way career-wise.
5717287
Yeah, and it's easy to dodge responsibility for disasters when middle managers mostly don't do any actual work on anything, so a bad track record won't necessarily get them fired. (Particularly if it was a frat bro that got them the job in the first place.)
5717272
This brings up an interesting point:
Unfortunately, we are all ambassadors for are classes:
The Negro Motorist Green Book points out that the reader might be the 1st negro a caucasian in a small town has ever seen; so now, if one has a bad day and snaps at a local, one can ruin the town for the next negro. The HoboCode says the same thing about how every hobo is an ambassador; so now, do not ruin it for the other hobos. It is a good thing that your former female boss was good; or else, some of the male mechanics —— ¡but certainly not you! —— could develop a sexist attitude.
5716546
"Back in the day" in TV repair, there was derogatory term for the in-house service personnel: tube jockey. I'm sure that some knew what they were doing, and likely fixed greater than 50% of the real problems, or at least covered them up for a while.
And in IT things are even worse because things are so malleable. Just this week I watched two people hack up a simple install, ignoring my pleas to read the Stack Overflow articles I was pasting into chat on the root cause and how to avoid the problem. The pair's immutable "idiot bit" got flipped that day.
And when it comes to instructions, I always think of Norman Abram's admonishment at the beginning of The New Yankee Workshop: read, understand, and follow instructions. The last step is too frequently skipped, regardless of age and experience.
5717272
I may have already mentioned it, but have you ever read Jack London' On the Road? It's about his life among hobos in the 1890s.
5717274 Ok, my electrical experience is limited to the pointy end of the battery matches up with the + sign on the flashlight, but I'll give it a shot.
Kinked multi-strand cable that broke multiple strands, then straightened up so it looks ok but several of the wires are not making contact. Resistance goes up, voltage goes up...
Possible?
5717291
I've never worked in a corporate setting at all, so I've never had the misfortune to experience middle management in all its glory, but there was some of that when I worked at a Firestone; we used to joke that some of the managers got their job because they used to be manager of the fry basket.
We did have high managerial turnover in most of the shops I worked. The ones with a good general manager didn't; they'd find good talent and keep them.
5717295
I feel that in many cases, changing social norms also play a factor. In fact my first female manager at a shop was useless (she showed up her first day wearing heels!); she didn't last very long. The second one wore sensible shoes, would go back into the shop, wasn't afraid to get dirty if she had to, actually did the oil change cross-training Firestone was trying at that time (all managers should know how to change oil, and should be taught by an experienced tech).
I'm sure some of the older techs, the manliest men, just wouldn't respect a woman in a shop environment no matter how good she was, or it would take a long time to warm to her, while others are just more concerned with 'can she do the job or can't she?' I'm sure I've brought this up before regarding the ponies' reactions to Sam.
I won't claim to be without prejudice, but I do my best to avoid it. Having a diverse friend group really helps.
5717350
Same's still true now in a lot of technical fields. I just spent more days than I should have diagnosing and repairing a fuel system problem on an Escape, some of it 'tube jockying' (that didn't fix it, though, so I had to dive deeper). The root cause was a problem I've only ever seen once before in my life, but I still should have got it a day sooner than I did; I was in the position to do one test but didn't do it because I'd done another test which I thought covered my bases.
There's a fine art to knowing when to read the instructions and knowing when to strike out on your own. My manager thinks that I read the instructions too much, but I'm a fast reader and also like to get an idea how the manufacturer wants you to repair it before I strike out on my own. Maybe they're being overly cautious--or maybe there's something critical but not obvious I really ought to know before I wade in.
5717362
I've read some of it. Someone, maybe you, recommended it to me, I bought a copy, and I read a few chapters of it while I was sitting by the side of the road with a flat tire, waiting for AAA to come and fix it, and now I don't know where the book went
It's somewhere.
5717419
I can never remember the voltage/resistance things, but I can tell you that broken wires that are hiding inside a bundle or even their own insulation are very possible, and cause all sorts of fun intermittent problems. Like on a car, if you open the door and look on the hinge side, you'll see a black rubber umbilical cord between the body and the door. There's a bunch of wires in there which flex every time the door's open and closed, they run things like the power window and sometimes they break from the constant flexing, and sometimes they'll make contact when the door's closed but not when it's open.
I've also see wires that look good where they go into the connector but are internally corroded off the terminal--the usual test for known problem connectors is to pull on the wire, if it tears right off it was bad. Some grounds (usually open eyelet terminals) will hold on to the wire insulation and it looks good, but there's no electrical path there.