Oops! Dang kids!!!

[moored4]

:mur:
This morning I was cleaning out the shop before climbing on the ol-tractor and as I am emptying the trash I see 3 old oil cans in there that are for 2 cycle, Now I know that they should not have been any 2 cycle oil need this or last week. I did tell the kids I use for farm hands to check the tranny fluid on the farm truck (1989 chev. 3/4 ton p/u auto transmission)
YEP! they just told me that's what they put in! So what now! Will it hurt! It's got a small leak, about a quart a month, running synthetic in it! What should I do other than fire the neighbor kids!

 

[deerefan]

:mur:
This morning I was cleaning out the shop before climbing on the ol-tractor and as I am emptying the trash I see 3 old oil cans in there that are for 2 cycle, Now I know that they should not have been any 2 cycle oil need this or last week. I did tell the kids I use for farm hands to check the tranny fluid on the farm truck (1989 chev. 3/4 ton p/u auto transmission)
YEP! they just told me that's what they put in! So what now! Will it hurt! It's got a small leak, about a quart a month, running synthetic in it! What should I do other than fire the neighbor kids!

Drain it and refill, maybe change the filter. Do not fire the kids, have them help you fix it and take the cost out of their pay.

 

[MoKelly]

Wow. How old are these "kids"?

Sounds like something my 12 year old would do but the 15 year old wouldn't be that careless.

MoKelly

 

[dusty3030]

When I was a teenager working on a farm another kid who had been driving a Case had a flat or a breakdown, can't remember, but was sent back to the shop and told to get a JD 4630 and bring it back. He walked back to the shop and after a good long while he walked back up to us in the field. He said he got it out and the radiator was empty so he filled it up but it died and wouldn't crank back up. You know those JD's with the big red radiator cap right there towards the front of the hood? Yep, filled the fuel tank with water. Boss man told him to go ahead and walk home.

 

[jbooth]

The problem with firing someone for making a mistake: That mistaken person should be "considered trained" to not make that mistake again. The replacement may make the same mistake. Unfortunately a person can't afford enough tractors to train everyone. I think water has been put in a lot of John Deeres fuel tanks.

 

[brandoro]

:mur:
This morning I was cleaning out the shop before climbing on the ol-tractor and as I am emptying the trash I see 3 old oil cans in there that are for 2 cycle, Now I know that they should not have been any 2 cycle oil need this or last week. I did tell the kids I use for farm hands to check the tranny fluid on the farm truck (1989 chev. 3/4 ton p/u auto transmission)
YEP! they just told me that's what they put in! So what now! Will it hurt! It's got a small leak, about a quart a month, running synthetic in it! What should I do other than fire the neighbor kids!

Did you show them what to put in the tranny after they checked it like you asked? If not then I think you should change the fluid, fix the leak and make sure you show people what needs to be used.

 

[Johndeere3720]

i have made a few mistakes too, it is a learning thing. I wouldnt go as far as firing them, but make sure they understand what they did wrong and that they wont do it again.

 

[jayste]

i have made a few mistakes too, it is a learning thing. I wouldnt go as far as firing them, but make sure they understand what they did wrong and that they wont do it again.

I grabbed Jakes quote for a reason and I'll get to that in a minute. First, I'd do as others have said and call all your hands in and train them on what to do and not to do. As others have said it was probably just a mistake or lack of knowledge. Now, I'm not discounting anyones response here but Jakes (johndeere3720) response tells it from a teenagers side (15 yrs old I think). Train them, give them an opportunity to learn before lowering the boom on them. I guess while you're at it show them all of the fluids for all of the equipment and tell them when in doubt, call.:thumbsup:

 

[MikeD74T]

moored4, As an employer of children the most greivous mistake is yours. The kids have no reason to know one oil from another unless you told them. Did you??? Just the fact that they put anything in at all says they are trying to do the right thing. Firing or withholding pay is completely unreasonable for a first offense, especially if they did not have the knowledge to do different.
As for your '89 truck, it probably holds about 10 quarts of tranny fluid. If it was 3 qts low, who's fault is that? If it only took one quart from three partial cans & it leaks a quart a month, 50% of the problem will be gone in one month due to leakage alone. Another month the same. Doubt the trans gets hot enough to know the difference & the slight increase in viscosity might even improve performance.
I commend you for providing these kids with worthwile work and an opportunity to learn real life lessons. They'll remember you forever, hopefully for how well they were treated. MikeD74t

 

[easygo]

The kids have no reason to know one oil from another unless you told them. Did you??? Just the fact that they put anything in at all says they are trying to do the right thing. Firing or withholding pay is completely unreasonable for a first offense, especially if they did not have the knowledge to do different.
I commend you for providing these kids with worthwile work and an opportunity to learn real life lessons. They'll remember you forever, hopefully for how well they were treated. MikeD74t

I could not agree more

 

[crazyal]

I had an old Ford 4 door with a 302 and automatic. It leaked tranny fluid but was nothing more than an atv with doors for checking the fields so i really didn't want to bother spending the money to fix it. My neighbor had a 35 gallon drum of old engine oil. That's all I used to top it off. Finally one day the tranny stopped working, figured I finally killed it. Turns out the barrel had water in it and last several times I filled it, usually in the wee hours of the morning before the sun came up, with water. Simply drained it and refilled it with used engine oil and off I went.

Never did kill that tranny. do a quick flush and top it off with the cheapest tranny fluid you can buy and forget about it. If it was a daily driver or a long haul truck, that would be different.

 

[284 International]

At least they told you honestly about it. If you have told them what to use before, and they didn't use that container, or they looked at the jug, read "2 stroke oil" and ignored the label, then that's on them. Have them fix it for you (Drain and replace ATF) on their dime, and put them back to work, on probation, or whatever.

If the containers had no label, and you know that it's 2 stroke oil because you left it there but nobody else could really be certain what it is, then that's on you. Buy it yourself, and make them help YOU do it. It's your mistake, unfortunately.

I use 5 gallon motorcycle racing fuel cans to fuel my tractor. And my motorcycles. I know which container has what in it, and they're in different places. I have 2 adjacent structures, that both have projects and tools in them. One is the garage and the other is the shop, because that's been their names my entire life. Nobody else has any way to distinguish them. I asked my girlfriend to bring a gas can "from the shop" on her way to meet me somewhere, because I needed to get some gasoline, and if there was anything in the jug when she picked it up, to put it into my KTM.

She dutifully picked up the clear container that was beside my KTM, and dumped the contents into the bike, then brought me the (now only mostly empty) container. My bike was full of diesel now, but the fault was all mine. I couldn't be upset. I made the error in not distinguishing for her precisely where and how to look for the can. I made a mistake in not previously warning her that I keep my fuel containers jumbled with different contents, and how to pay attention to what fuel is in what container.

Now I keep my diesel in yellow cans only. Nothing else goes into yellow cans.

My view is just drive the thing. If it leaks that much, you'll be flushing it out anyway. And just run the cheapest bulk stuff from whatever discount retailer you prefer. There's no reason to put expensive synthetic in that thing.

 

[20 20]

Don't fire the kids unless they are idoits that make the same type of mistakes over and over. If anything you may have taught them something without even knowing it. At one time or another we have all made mistakes and more then likely that is how we learned.

I'd just drain refill, maybe even fix the leak{??} and go on about business.

 

[Mace Canute]

:mur:
This morning I was cleaning out the shop before climbing on the ol-tractor and as I am emptying the trash I see 3 old oil cans in there that are for 2 cycle, Now I know that they should not have been any 2 cycle oil need this or last week. I did tell the kids I use for farm hands to check the tranny fluid on the farm truck (1989 chev. 3/4 ton p/u auto transmission)
YEP! they just told me that's what they put in! So what now! Will it hurt! It's got a small leak, about a quart a month, running synthetic in it! What should I do other than fire the neighbor kids!

It's not absolutely clear if the 3 old cans were the original containers for the 2 cycle oil or not. Were containers of automatic transmission fluid easily visible? Did the kids just grab the first containers of oil that they saw? It would be helpful if we knew why they grabbed the wrong oil in the first place. We could give a more meaningful response to your post if we knew that.