The back of most office blocks was the domain of the building services engineer. Out there you would find all manor of old broken equipment scattered about that had long been forgotten.

The main advantage with this barren land was, since nobody ever went out back there was no need for any of the pipe work or unit installation to be up to a good standard as nobody would ever see it.

Many a time people would sling in the tubes without clips or just toss the pipes out of the building and connect up to the unit without having the inconvenience of cutting the pipe or clipping it to the wall. A classic example is shown in the picture.

In these heady days energy efficiency meant nothing, so lagging was an optional extra which was more often used for beating the apprentice than insulating pipes.

Tony and Gordon ruined all this by bringing in the smoking ban. Now hoards of people congregate out the back of buildings having a smoke with little else to do than look at the services installed out there.

The problem is even to the untrained eye this sort of install doesn’t look right and trying to convince them that the pipe work is a piece of modern art just doesn’t work.

Now we have to clip the pipe work nicely, install the wiring on trays and actually mount the units level.

The government has ruined all the fun. What are we engineers supposed to brag about now when we are in the pub? They have turned us into a bunch of boring farts.