[harveynick]

The engineering lab I did my PhD in (the Ocean System's Lab at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh) fit this description.

One example: Myself and two colleagues took two weeks out of our studies to build an autonomous boat after we realised there was enough spare parts lying around the lab to do so. The idea originally came up over beers with the lab supervisor. I think he bet us £10 we couldn't do it in that amount of time.

I'm sure it varies a lot between labs and Universities, but it measures up to my experience.