What did your dumbest teacher do?

[Boncuk]

12 volts caps generally make nice fire crackers when charged to 24 volts =)

Best fire crackers yet: a mylar capacitor with a nail driven into it. Connect to mains.

 

[tcmtech]

I had a college proffesor when I went back to college a few years ago loose all of my paper work and class assignment information on his computer.

It was a Methods of Manufacturing class. That was basicaly a class about what I do and have done for all of my adult working life. For me it was like a gourmet chef taking a cooking 101 class. A real no brainer but still fun to go to. I participated in all the lectures, openly discussed what I have done and things I have seen. the proffesor knew me by name and would even say hi to me in the hallways and parking lot.
I attended every lecture and did every class assignment I was aware of.

I went the whole semester without ever getting a grade recorded on anything I turned in. The last week of the semester the campus computer system sent me an email saying I was failing the class. I went to talk to him about it. He said he had been getting all the assignments and test sheets back from some guy in my class but he is not on his computer system and did not know who he was.

I said really? Can I see them? They were every class assignment and test we had. Graded too! With my full name and student ID number clearly printed at the top!
I said how do you not see that this is my work I have been turning in all semester.
He said; I did not know it was yours.
I said; You know my name and you can read the name on the paper work plus there is a student ID number on every sheet!
He said; well it did not occure to me that this was yours. And that name is not on my computer class file. I did not know what to do.
I said you could have just looked up the student ID number and looked to see what the central student records information said about me.
He did then and it took about 2 minutes to pull up my record and find out that I had paid for and was registered for that class.

He offered to give me a D+ because all of my semester paper work was turned in late.
The average grade on everything I turned in was well within the A+ range for that class scoring sytem.

I said are you retarded! You have had it in your office the whole semester how do you figure that qualifies as being late?
He said it wont get recorded in the system untill today and the system will require that it be recorded as late.
I spoke to the department head and they came to the conclusion that they would not record me as an active student and gave me a late drop authorization. WTF!
But they would let me come back next semester and retake the class for free being I had already paid for it. They would not take my paper work and the standing grades on it. Because they felt that I should have brought this to their attention sooner.

I knew I Aced every work sheet and test. I knew I had a solid A in that class! The college grade scoring system did not give you an on the go Grade. I did not give you any information until the last week when it generated the automatic pass or fail post.

I had no way of knowing that I was not even in his grade file.
He said; I should have checked in with him at his office durring the semester. His office was not even on campus. It was at a college owned research center a mile away.

 

[Sceadwian]

Looks like the course you took was mislabeled. What you actually took was bureaucracy 101.

 

[Mikebits]

Ever powered up a tantalum cap installed backwards?

 

[HiTech]

Exploding tantalums is quite toxic. You should not be in the vicinity when that occurs .... and you thought asbestos and radon were bad to breathe in!

 

[Sceadwian]

I wouldn't think breathing the vaporized electrolyte from an alum-electrolytic would do you much good either. Makes me also wonder how much Arsenic is actually in in a Gal/ar IC =\ I know not much really but still some nasty stuff in electronics, even with ROHS compliance.

 

[Hero999]

I used to think the white band on tantalum surface mount capacitors was negative. Luckily I turned the power off when I noticed the capacitor overheating

 

[monkeybiter]

A religious education teacher at my school lost his god and tied one end of his body to a multi story carpark and the other he gravitationally coupled to Earth.

 

[tcmtech]

Was he catholic? And did he actualy read the bible himself?
Those two actions together often trigger highly self distructive results!

 

[bizz]

My 9th grade science decided to make hydrogen gas. He put some sulfuric acid in a glass beaker. Then thew in a couple of pieces of zinc metal in the beaker. He had a baloon connected to a pipe from the stopper in the beaker. After a few minutes the baloon was slowly expanding with hydrogen gas. He then decided to speed up the reaction and took a bunsen burner and started to heat the beaker. I was sitting in front of his desk with some nice girl sitting next to me. When the beaker exploded like a cherry bomb the girl screamed and hugged me. The teacher was scared out of his wits and i thought he was going to have a heart attack. I did not see any blood, acid or glass on me, the girl or anybody else in the front row of class. I told the teacher every one was fine and then the bell rang. That was the first and best hug i ever got in my life.

 

[Sceadwian]

That's not just stupid that could have been fatal or at least blinded someone, Sulfuric acid heated is incredibly dangerous. We used 98% Sulfuric at work and it was the only chemical in the plant my boss was afraid of. A single drop of that in the eye would permanently blind someone.

I see that real genius moment deciding to use the open flame near a hydrogen producing device. And feeding into a cheap baloon? Hydrogen gas will actually seep through the rubber because it's so small, maybe enough to light the baloon in the first place.

 

[tcmtech]

My dad was one of my science teachers in school. We did the Hydrogen gas experiment too. He had me light the end of the flask with a match. It took all the hair off my arm up past my elbow!

 

[Sceadwian]

When I was a wee lad I remember Mr Wizzard being on TV and he did a few baloons of hydrogen via electrolysis, one with just pure hydrogen in it from one plate, the other with the hydrogen/oxy blend from both. The pure hydrogen ones went up in a brilliant ball of fire, The ones with the 33/66 blend made a bang loud enough to set off close car alarms, be glad all you lost is the hair on your arm =)

 

[tcmtech]

Ive got a full T size hydrogen tank in my shop and a full K size oxygen too!
I think I have a good used tractor tire tube around someplace as well. If not I have several good heavy walled 55 gallon drums!
Want to come over for the fouth of july?

 

[Salgat]

My dumbest teacher was from high school electronics shop class. He charged up a capacitor to around 200v, wet the back of a student's neck with a paper towel and then zapped him with it. The kid fell to the floor, hitting his head on the shop bench along the way. He went into convulsions and the medics were summoned to rush him to the hospital. The teacher was eventually fired. I was surprised to learn much later that he was hired to teach at an electronics vocational school where he eventually retired from.

The current from those things is next to non-existent, while he shouldn't be shocking people I'm surprised it did that to him.

 

[Sceadwian]

A 200v cap? Depends on the type. The current from them is MORE than enough to kill from even a modest electrolytics. To the back of the next is just sheer idiocy, it probably came close to discharging directly into his brain at the spinal cord.

 

[Mikebits]

I am surprised the parent did not go and whoop the teachers butt.

 

[Hero999]

A 200v cap? Depends on the type. The current from them is MORE than enough to kill from even a modest electrolytics. To the back of the next is just sheer idiocy, it probably came close to discharging directly into his brain at the spinal cord.

Going from the description he gave and my limited experience regarding this kind of thing, it probably caused a seizure.

Shocking the central nervous system is often done deliberately to induce seizures in mental patients to treat disorders such as schizophrenia. It's called ECT (ElectroConvulsive Therapy) and can have all sorts of nasty side effects, the worst being amnesia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electroconvulsive_therapy

I think he was very lucky, ECT is administered under controlled conditions, a 200V capacitor on the back of the neck in a science class is not controlled.

 

[Torben]

Going from the description he gave and my limited experience regarding this kind of thing, it probably caused a seizure.

Shocking the central nervous system is often done deliberately to induce seizures in mental patients to treat disorders such as schizophrenia. It's called ECT (ElectroConvulsive Therapy) and can have all sorts of nasty side effects, the worst being amnesia.
Electroconvulsive therapy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I think he was very lucky, ECT is administered under controlled conditions, a 200V capacitor on the back of the neck in a science class is not controlled.

The teacher wasn't related to any nurses named Ratched, was he?


Torben

 

[HiTech]

The current from those things is next to non-existent, while he shouldn't be shocking people I'm surprised it did that to him.

I don't know the value of the capacitor but I do remember my electronic shop days with that teacher and he occasionally treated some of us with his dumb trick. The caps were either Sprague or Mallory "blue devils" w/ axial leads and rated near 250vDC. They produced an impressive arc and a loud "thwack!" when shorted out.