An empty chip packet and a 180-year-old scientific discovery have been at the centre of a Fair Work case making headlines in Western Australia.

The Fair Work Commission last week ruled a Perth electrician was fairly sacked from his job for playing golf instead of being at work, allegedly on more than 140 different occasions over two years.

But how did he get away with playing hooky for so long?

It turned out the man had concealed his whereabouts during office hours by storing his personal digital assistant, a phone-like device that has a GPS inside, in an empty Twisties packet.

The foil packaging prevented the device from sharing his location with his employers.

In scientific terms, the chip packet acted as Faraday cage, preventing electro-magnetic signals from reaching the device.

The Faraday cage was discovered by Scottish scientist Michael Faraday in 1836, following up work done by Benjamin Franklin, Australian National University science communicator Phil Dooley told ABC Radio Perth.

"He came from a very poor background and got very interested in electricity and magnetism and ended up overturning our knowledge of a lot of these things," Dr Dooley said.

"He used a metal tin and found that if you put something inside, and put a charge on the tin, then anything inside the tin was unaffected by that voltage."

A Faraday cage in action - the metal bars protect the person inside from the bolt of electricity. ( Flickr: Alex Healing C0 )

The improvised Faraday cage in this Fair Work case, the humble chip packet, worked because it was metallic.

"The main point is just that it is foil," Dr Dooley said.

"A birdcage, anything else metallic would have worked."

Microwaves, planes all Faraday cages

What we might not realise is Faraday cages are all around us.

"The microwave is a Faraday cage," Dr Dooley said.

"That is what keeps the radiation in there cooking your food and doesn't come out and cook you.

"An aeroplane, which is metal, acts as a Faraday cage.

"When you are travelling in a plane, you could get struck by lightning and it wouldn't hurt.

"It doesn't affect the people inside the plane because the electricity stays on the outside of the metal and the people in the cabin don't feel it at all.

"Planes are struck by lightning quite often and you are perfectly fine, thanks to physics."

Golf club and gates records bring electrician unstuck

The electrician with the makeshift Faraday cage was not so lucky, with the Fair Work Commission finding he had been fired fairly.

Commissioner Bernie Riordan described the use of the foil packaging as mischievous and said it clearly showed the man did not want his movements tracked.

But in the end, it was not the improvised cage that failed him.

An anonymous letter was sent to his employer, saying he had been playing golf at least once a week. It included records from the golf club.

Electronic gate records also showed the man had not entered a site on a day when he claimed to have completed work.