The only time I hid something like that was back in my Field Service days.
I smoked a third party data comm board which cost $$$$ while trying to replace it.
DEC had me do something for one of my customers on a third party hardware install. I had no docs, training or experience with the board.
Unfortunately, the vendor didn't key a power cable and I flipped the damned two pin wire blowing the chip top right off the board.
Wasn't sure it was my fault. I stayed with the call until they got another board and they got the box up and running and I finally figured I was the cause
of the issue. Didn't volunteer the info since I wasn't sure. Probably should've taken the hit. When I did the bad thing I took the hit.
One of these was shorting +15v (IIRC) to Init L on the Unibus on an 11/780. Blew the bits off all the boards back to the Unibus termination on the DW780
and out to the M9302 Unibus terminator.
Spent the next two days rebuilding the box.
I still had a great relationship with the customer for the next 4 years at the site.
People understand mistakes and will forgive. Lying to a customer to keep up a corporate image will never be forgotten if you get caught.
I remember stealing HDA's off of brand new RA81's at DEC's Princeton HQ to get them out to customer sites before failures in the field from the glue liquification issue.
Customers will stand by a company that puts them first and delivers serious effort.
Nowadays the outsourced techs are pretty much parts carriers and swappers with no ability to push company deliveries up and often they act as a delaying action until the
company can deliver the correct services.
Bill