Shop humor about electrical failure: motors, drives, boards and power supplies stop working the moment their magic smoke escapes, so the goal is to keep it in. It is used for any burnout, from a cooked spindle drive to a tool battery that shorted, and implies the part is done rather than repairable.
Heard on the job
Hooked the VFD up to the wrong voltage and let the magic smoke out, so that's a new drive on the order.
Also heard as
- let the smoke out
Related terms
Angry pixies
Tool-teardown slang for electricity, the invisible little creatures that bite when you get careless.
Hooped
Canadian slang for broken, ruined or beyond saving, whether a part, a machine or a plan.
Chooch
To run, work or go properly, as in does it chooch; as a noun, the power or oomph a machine has.