The Big Equipment Roundup

First thing I decided to do was sit down and prioritize what I was going to require in order to pull this job off. I needed a good set of hand tools, tons of hardware (like side rail kits, rackmount handles, screws, etc.), plenty of available instruments, rigid cables, BNC cables, power cords, engineering documentation (so I knew what was supposed to go where), and a bunch of obscure random items. Finding hand tools was relatively easy so I took care of that immediately. In a couple of locations on site we maintain rooms called Labstock. They're rat packed with supplies like safety glasses, raw PC boards, soldering irons, capacitors, screwdrivers, and tons of other shit. It's kind of like the Army's equivalent of an ammo dump. So I grabbed a cardboard box and raided two Labstock rooms. I loaded up on wrenches and screwdrivers until the box I was carrying under my arm started to feel heavy.

Next, I went to Shoelaces and asked him for assistance finding a documentation resource. He was super cool about it and he showed me an internal engineering website that had printable instructions for building just about every kind of electronic test rack. The bosses had given me a list of racks with how many of each type they demanded. It was quite a steep order. I spent a few hours sitting in front of a computer one evening going over that engineering site printing out copies of assembly instructions. When I was satisfied I had everything, I went into super scrounge mode for the next couple of weeks. I bugged our equipment maintenance techs for every nut, bolt, and screw they could spare. They were really helpful by showing me where they had collected a large amount of supplies. That took care of stuff like side rails and handles.

My biggest obstacle was locating spare instruments to load into each rack. See, I quickly discovered that while my management team wanted all this shit built and they wanted it yesterday, they weren't willing to pay for what they call Capital Expensed items. Most of the test gear fell into that category. I asked repeatedly for supervisor's approval to purchase equipment or at the very least get some help with locating available instruments elsewhere in the company. Nobody paid any attention. In person they'd usually say that they'd get back to me. Voice mails and e-mails went unanswered. Since they weren't going to buy the equipment brand new I ended up having to beg, borrow, and steal instruments. It's like one of my coworkers frequently says, "The reason they call them managers is because they manage to get in our way all the time."

Like a thief in the night I snuck around the plant scrounging for test gear. I let myself into other production lines' spare equipment rooms. If the shit wasn't bolted down and it was on my hit list, I swiped it. In a couple of cases items I desperately needed were bolted down. I brought tools and took 'em anyway. I got a big break when one of our equipment maintenance techs gave me a copy of his front door key to a secret stash of gear. Once that happened I was able to start wheeling and dealing with other lines. You know the stereotyped man on the street wearing an overcoat that quietly walks up to people and asks, "Pssst. Hey buddy. Wanna buy a watch?" He then proceeds to open his coat to display dozens of stolen wristwatches. Well, I became like that guy but instead of peddling hot timepieces I was making shady lab equipment trades. Maybe another line really needed a particular model of Spectrum Analyzer (which I had access to) and they had an MMS Upconverter that I needed. We'd cut a deal on the down low and trade. It was really going to fuck up inventory counts across the division, but I decided to just say "too bad" and do what needed to be done.

When I had finally rounded up enough stuff for two or three complete racks, I got down to business.