Stupid actions

[Restorer32]

OK how about the most stupid thing you've ever done while working on your car (dating activities not included) ? I'll start...years ago in a desperate attempt to raise $ for whatever 18 year olds spent money on I agreed to replace the front clip on Dad's wrecked ' 67 Caddy. Job completed we took it for a test drive...smoke begins billowing from under the hood...open the hood..flames everywhere..1/2 mile or so to the nearest phone..no extinguisher...what to do ??? Opened the trunk..only liquid available was a gallon of antifreeze...Dad..."does antifreeze burn"...Son.."yea but it will probably put out the fire"..so we tossed it on...I'm here to tell you..ANTIFREEZE WILL NOT EXTINGUISH A FIRE!!! Firemen who eventually responded found only a smoldering ruin..we hid the empty antifreeze cantainer.

[Guest brh]

This would have to go under another heading as the dumbest thing I have ever seen (car wise). A friend had a 69 Roadrunner that was not idling or running well. When I asked to check it out he opened the hood and I saw a spark plug wire tied in a knot. It had gotten severed so he tied it together!!! After I stopped laughing I explained that electricity goes though these things. Same guy same car-- he loved to rev the engine going through a local viaduct (car had headers). And he always had a habit of slipping the car in netural while making a turn. He forgot the car was in N and when we approached the viaduct he went for the next notch. You guessed it car locked and stalled because he threw it in reverse. The following day we had to take him to the trans shop.

[ex98thdrill]

I take it he thought 'R' was for RACE?

[Mark Huston]

My brother sold a restored 1928 Lincoln Limousine (with custom body) to a big time collector-dealer. The new owner came with a large custom truck/car hauler. He insisted that my brother stay out of the way while he handled the loading and secured the car down on the flat bed of the truck. It was not 10 min after he left he called my brother and complained that it was his fault that one of the rear doors (hinged at the rear) flew open, causing the door hinges to break when the door hit the rear fender. He wanted some of his money back because he felt my brother should have made sure the doors were properly closed and secured. As a big time dealer/collector you would have thought that he would have know better and checked that himself. My brother did not give any money back

[Amphicar BUYER]

I have heard that when replacing the hood latch say on a '69 Bonneville, you must be sure to actually install the latch <span style="font-weight: bold">before </span> you head off down the hiway and preferrably <span style="font-weight: bold">before </span> you go inside for dinner and any sort of surprise your GF may have for you. Maybe leaving the hood up may serve as a reminder. Enuf said.

[1937hd45]

A Type 40 Bugatti has a generator that runs off the front of the crankshaft. If you just drive in the daytime you can get away with just recharging the battery when it runs low. A customer found out that a one pound coffee can was the same diameter as his missing generator, well almost, it leaked a bit of oil. Being a bit of a unqualified do-it-yourselfer he desided that if the coffee can was filled with speedy-dry it would soak up the oil and not leak. Worked like a charm! Packed the intire oiling system, and seized the engine tighter than a frogs butt in water.

[Guest]

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[29 Chandler]

I had just finished replacing the timing chain on my 1968 Mustang at the garage I was working at. It was my first real big project on the car. I was very proud of my results. I cleaned and painted everything before putting it back on the engine. It looked real nice. My dad, in his Chevy sation wagon, offered to follow me home, just in case. A few miles from the shop we came to a stop light and he pulled into the lane next to me. Temptation was in the air. After all I needed to check her out. Well, the light went green we both left the line and my Mustang died almost immediately! I coasted right through the intersection. My dad had to turn around to see what happened. After his station wagon pushed me the few miles home, and a few laughs I confirmed my suspisions when I took of the fuel pump. Yep, I forgot to tighten the bolt that holds the concentric on!

Never done that again! Never had to have a Chevy push me again either, but let's not start another thread on that subject!

Happy Holidays

[Guest]

Too embaressing to login and identify self...

Many years ago I had a fan belt start to peel apart and start flapping under the hood. I pulled over to the side of the freeway and investigated. No problem: I carried a spare belt and tools in the antique car. I decided to simply repair it on the spot.

First idiot trick: I decided to cut the old belt off with a 6 inch bowie knife. No time savings there as I'd have to undo the bolts to put the new belt on. Duh. And, apparently, the belt had a steel layer that I could not cut anyway. Duh. But as I said I was (am?) an idiot.

Second idiot trick: While attempting to cut the old belt off I was surprised by foot steps behind me. I turn around, knife in hand, to face a county police man. I could not figure out what was wrong with how he was acting until I remembered the knife. I promptly dropped the knife and moved away from from it. I could have died then and there. Even idiots some times get to keep living.

[56clipper]

This is a little long but very idiotic...

This stupid action has to do with a '54 Clipper Club Coupe that two of my friends and myself purchased during college. The car was in primer, but ran like a top. Starry-eyed that we were at our fantastic purchase, we decided to get an indoor storage spot at a storage facility. One problem with the car was that it didn't have an attached gas tank. There was a replacement one that hadn't been hooked up yet (owner had a minor stroke, didn't get to it) The owner had the gas line routed up through the trunk floor to a gas can. Like I said, car ran fine.

We come with the tow guy to pick up the car. There is a noticable absence of the gas can in the trunk. Apparently the owner wanted to keep it. No problem, it was being towed anyway.

We get to the storage place, the tow guy drops it in front of the garage, but perpendicular, not point in. He asks if we needed help to angle it in and push it. Being idiotic college students, we said "nah, we can do it." He leaves. Two of us push, another steers. We get it angled in but couldn't get it over the inch-high lip of the garage floor.

My friend who was driving (also the only one fluent in stick shift) gets the bright idea to start the car in gear to lurch it over the lip. But he starts it with the clutch in. Low and behold, the gastankless car starts running! Yay! Let's drive it in with the little gas remaining in the fuel line.

This is where we learn the first important lesson of old car purchasing: ASK IF THE BRAKES WORK!

The brakes didn't. My friend's panic look and frantic stamping were enough to know this would end bad. One crunched front fender later, the car was in the garage. The only redeeming thing was the grille and bumpers were off.

[Dave@Moon]

Two dumbest things I'm glad I never saw:

One day my father was summonded to rescue a neighbor who, after driving her husband to the airport, had stalled by the side of Pittsburgh's busy Parkway interstate. He came home absolutely in stitches.

Apparently, as she'd left the airport the temperature light had come on. It was promptly ignorred. The car at that point had no coolant, the lower hose had blown off.

A short distance later, the oil light had come on. It was promptly ignorred. The overheating car had blown all of its crankcase oil. On she went.

Finally the car came to halt by the side of the road. <span style="font-style: italic"> <span style="font-weight: bold">She had run out of gas!!</span></span> The only fluid my dad didn't have to replace was the tranny fluid. filled everything up, reattached the hose, drove the car for 2 more years.

Now for the single stupidest thing I ever saw. I mentioned this car once before, I think on the BCA forum. My graduate school had a number of federal government cars owing to a cooperative with the Fish & Wildlife Service. Among them was a '69 Belvedere station wagon, bone stripped down to the taxicab seats but with a 318 for towing boats. The custon built tow hitch had been permenantly welded to the car, via the frame, bumper mounts.....<span style="font-style: italic"> <span style="font-weight: bold">AND THE GAS TANK!!!</span></span>

One can only imagine the minimum bid genius that came up with that brilliant welding technique!

[DizzyDale]

I should get some kind of prize for this one.Last time i took a car to the drags,1948 Fiat altered,big block Chevy,powerglide ran 8.20 160m.p.h.in the quarter.Now for the GOOD part,i left the wheelie bars in the trailer cause it ALWAYS spun the tires off the starting line at this particular racetrack.Soon as i let go of the trans brake button the front went straight up, shifted it went a long way down the track,came down,broke the left front tire and wheel right off the chassis,upside dowm at the finish line.YAHOOOOOOO!diz

[1937hd45]

.......and the croud goes WILD!!!!!!!!!!! Carpenter and a racer, we have to meet some day.

[Guest]

The stupidest thing that I ever saw was long, long ago in high school. I had a friend with a Mustang (can't remember the year...70's?) who was always doing some sort of modification. Anyway, he had taken the hood off the hinges (because it was easier to get to things I guess) and he would for a while drive short distances (down the block) with the hood just sitting in place. Well, one evening, we were going someplace (party?) and being the stupid teenagers we were, were racing through small town proper. I was in my car (76 Nova) ahead of him. I had a fairly good lead on him with a stopsigned intersection coming up. I make the stop and can see him from my rearview mirror barrelling up behind me. I take off thruough the intersection just as he is about to brake for the stopsign. I am through the intersection and wathcing his postion from my rearview mirror. As he hastily brakes for the stopsign, all I see is his hood lift off his car, flip upside down and go skidding (paint side down) about 30mph through the intersection (sparks a flying!). The hood, like a skipping stone over a lake's surface, veered and jumped the curb. It went flying and came to rest (about 30 yards) in a vacant lot. Luckily, it was a small town, late evening and nobody else was able to see it.

[Guest brh]

Reading one of these posts reminded me of something real stupid I did. I was in college headed home and noticed white smoke pouring out of the back. Blew a heater hose, well I always had my tools in the trunk so I cut the good hose and bypassed the heater. I noticed the car kept missing you could floor it and it would jerk back and forth. When I got home I checked everything, after all I was a mechanic and young so I knew everything right? I fought this problem with several test drives and could not beat it. I pulled the car in the garage and went through it one more time-- nothing. Pulled the car out and it died, wouldn't start. I tried points condesor, taking fuel line off and differant gas, etc. My dad, and several of my friends were gathered around the open hood as I'm cranking this car for the 100th time. Mom walks out and looks down and says "is that suposed to be there?" I had forgotten about the utility knife I used to cut the hose with, it had slid down with the blade grounding a wire on the starter, the drive had a downward pitch which caused the knife to slide into the starter. Took the knife out and the car started no problem. Can you just imagine being out done by your mom in front of your friends stupid and embarassing in one shot!

[DizzyDale]

This is the second part to the STUPID race story.The girl i took to the races that day was pretty IMPRESSED.I had to go to the hospital and she rode along,for the life of me i had NO clue WHO she was or WHY she was there,pretty scary huh.After the hospital we were on our way home with a bent up piece of sh-- in the trailer,she asked me if we could fix it?I thought ,i cant let this one get away,we have been married 3 years and NO i dont go back to the races anymore.diz

[Guest imported_jmarsicano]

I was about 3 years old when I did this, you racers will get a laugh. My dad had always owned race cars, and one day he brought home a brand new engine. I was eating a box of raisens, and appearantly I didnt want them anymore so I figured they fit nicely in the spark plug holes. You guessed it, the car didnt start that night. I wasnt allowed in the garage for about a year.

[Restorer32]

Years ago Dad and I hitched the boat to the back of the '64 Coupe de Ville and headed to the Chesapeake Bay for some fishing. At the end of the 120 mile trip we opened the trunk to unload our supplies and there in all it's glory lay the nut to the trailer hitch ball.....ain't gravity a wonderful thing ?

[Mark Huston]

I fellow I know is very hard on his cars. Drove like a mad man and a good car in his hands quickly became a parts donor. One good car he acquired was a 1965 Chevy Impala Super Sport. He would race around with the car taking corners very fast with a large horse shoeing anvil in the trunk (his job was shoeing horses), anyway in a short time he had the trunk beat from the inside out from the force of this large anvil sliding side to side in the trunk. After he had a good start on the custom body work with the anvil he picked up a girl and wanted to take her someplace secluded and quite for a little midnight parking in the Chevy. From his job taking care of horses on local ranches and farms he knew of some good spots. On this one night he took off across this field that bordered a river in the Chevy (fast of course) drive through tall grass and weeds with just the headlights to guide him. The next thing he knows the cars engine was revving and he was falling. The car landed in a very large and very deep hole. It took a wrecker with a winch and 4 wheel drive to get the car out of the hole the next day, both he and the girl had a long walk at midnight to get back to the nearest house that night. A few weeks later this same guy was driving very fast on the freeway and knocked two rods through the block because he never checked the oil. What was a mint near perfect ?65 Impala Super Sport was completely destroyed in just a few months in this guys hands.

[ex98thdrill]

Where did you do that at? Lancaster?

[DizzyDale]

Dear Ex98thdrill,Lancaster is only 1/8 mile,i put my SHOW on one Saturday afternoon in 1995 at Motor City Raceway it use to be Empire Dragway in Leicester.diz

[ex98thdrill]

Being from Buffalo, I automatically thought of Lancaster. I've never actually been there for a race, but my father raced there in the 60's. Motor City Raceway is actually closer home. A friend of mine use to race there with a green '78 Fairmont (and usually had our trailer). I haven't been there in years, but I am familiar with the place.

[Guest Skyking]

This story happened a long time ago. My oldest brother bought a 283 engine from a local junkyard to put into his 58 Chevy. After he got the motor in his car it ran like S%$#. We pulled it back out & put it back into his trailor to return it back to the junkyard for a better running motor. As we were driving back to the junkyard, he was slowing down for a red light and guess what? The trailor we were pulling was now passing us without the motor. It fell out about 50 yards behind us. Talk about being embarressed. We had to chase after the trailor, (thank God it didn't hit anything in it's way) hook it back up, and with the help of passing motorist, lift the engine back onto the trailor. When we arrived back at the junkyard you had to be there to listen to the great B.S. story my brother told the junkyard owner, explaning all the scrapes & bruises that this sorry motor had. The guy finally gave him another and we laughed all the way home.

[critterpainter]

Thank Goodness I didn't do this one:

A good frind of mine had a 64 El Camino in1977. Took it into a tire shop one day for 4 new tires. While it was up on the lift he decided to grease the u-joints (heavy equipment operator by trade, carried grease etc with him). One zerk he couldn't reach so he climbed into the car and "popped" it out of park. went back under and finished the grease job. A while later the new tires were on and paid for so he hopped in, turned the key, and as luck would have it, it didn't turn over....since it had a VERY BAD starter solinoid on the car, he grabbed his screwdriver (don't get ahead of me now) popped the hood, reached along side of the carb and flicked the choke mechanism to set the high idle (we had lots of practice on this car) and touched the solinoid with the screwdriver. As the tips of his boots got run over by the El Camino, he realized his error. By this time the open drivers door caught the edge of the bay and the doors hinge pins snapped removing it from the car. Dave chased after the escaped vehicle, wrenched the steering wheel and just missing two parked cars. he hopped into it (an easy task with no door) and stopped it just as it started to knock over a pile of used tires. He closed the still-open hood, picked up the amazingly undamaged door and tossed it into the back and drove off. He was so embarassed by this little foopwa that he has NEVER done business with Wayne's Tire since.

I helped him replace the door the next day... Next time I will tell you how he lost one boot in the Denney's parking lot...somthing to do with a very cute willing waitress and no money for a motel room....but I digress

[Guest boettger]

Think about this!

What color is your bottle jack?

After pulling one of the daily drivers onto the drive-on lift for some repairs,

I spent about 1/2 hour wandering around my cluttered garage looking for the bottle jack to lift a wheel.

I had the red handle in my hand, found that right where it was supposed to be.

After the 1/2 hour of fuitless searching I went into the house with a sad look on my face. I could see the dollar signs in the wife's eyes, because that's usually what a trip back to the house in the middle of a job means.

I explained my predicament to her. She asks, "Is that the same thingy you used when you leveled the deck?" "Yup!" says I. SHe walks into the garage and says, "This it?" It was sitting right on the bench all the time. Only trouble it's silver grey and not RED. I'd forgotten that mine was silver grey. My dad's bottle jack from my youth is red. I was looking for a red jack! After all the handle is RED. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/icons/blush.gif" alt="" />

The RED handle now has a note on it in pen stick that says that the matching jack is silver.

Good laugh that day! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/icons/crazy.gif" alt="" />

I may never live this one down with the wife.

I fixed her,and bought a new 20 ton bottle jack!!! That one's BLUE! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/icons/tongue.gif" alt="" />

[1937hd45]

My Snap-On floor jack was red. One day I had rented a 24 foot Ryder truck, (now Budget)to move a load of new kitchen cabinets for a job. The $200.00 V-12 Jaguar with the flat tire was between our house and the Ryder dealers lot. I stoped at the house to get my floor jack and a star wrench. I remember telling my wife I'd be back for dinner in about an hour after I stoped to remove the Jag wheel, and drove off. Got to the Ryder lot, walked to the back of the truck to get the jack, DOOR WAS UP! No jack, but I had the star wrench. Jumped in the van and retraced my route looking for the jack. Then it hit me, what if the jack fell out and went into the windshield of the car that was following me? If so did I really want to claim the floor jack? Never did see it again. I do check the rollup doors at least twice before rolling now.

[R W Burgess]

Bob, Those rollup doors have small holes in their apparatus that a "master lock" will fit in perfectly! And Steve, WalMart has large racks of "rattle can" paint in bright colors that you can paint the real important stuff with. Of course every time I clean out my pick-me-up truck, I find 3 or 4 cans of something that's been missing for months, along with a lot of spare parts that don't fit anything anymore, since I sold the particuliar vehicle that they fit years ago. Wayne

[Bill Clark]

Long ago I saw my sinful ways and I have not treated an old car poorly for decades. But you asked for stupid. When I went off to college and my brother went off to Viet Nam, my Mom called the junk man who took 19 cars from the lot behind our house, among them treasures like a 56 Dodge Convertible and a 35 Ford Coupe. One afternoon while driving one of these lot cars I rolled it over and really impressed my Mom watching out her kitchen window. I've kept the photo I took that day of my 1940 Packard 110 to remind me of my stupidity.

http://clarnp49.netfirms.com/packard.htm

Bill

[rgshafto]

When I was 17 a neighbor gave me a 51 Ford. The horn button connection didn't work, so a friend and I thought we'd fix it. We undid the horn button, then removed the steering wheel hold down nut, but as hard as we tried, we could not get that wheel to come off. After pulling on it with all our might with no success, we just put the horn button back on, forgetting about the nut.

A couple of days later my mother was driving the car. You guessed it. As she was making a left turn across a state highway, the wheel came off in her hand! Fortunately (a) there was no oncoming traffic and ( the car was heading for a strip mall parking lot. She got it stopped in time, but sure got a good scare. I caught hell when she got home, and have been very careful ever since to put things back the way I found them. Pretty stupid of me.

[Guest]

These are a few of those teenage moments - glad I've out grown them?!?

One night I was the last to leave work on a cold night. It was around 3:00 am on a very cold December morning when I jumped in the '68 Cougar to leave head for home. But the car didn't go anywhere - the tire was just spinning on the ice. There was no one else to help, no phone to call (before cell phones) so I decided to put the car in reverse and push it out my self You can see this comming now right? But I couldn't at the time. Of course the car kept moving after it was off of the ice. God or good fortune was on my side that night, I was able jump in far enough to shut off the engine an entire 3 inches before before my darling Cougar slammed into a dumpster!!

Same care different night, again comming home during a teenage moment. Me and the Cougar against a '67 Mustang (I didn't race, I was a good kid ) I was just starting to pull ahead, when it occured to me that he was slowing down. Curious, I wonder why? Then I remembered the railroad tracks at the bottom of the hill, less than a block away. I slowed down consideribly - before I took the tracks at around 70, and launched the Coug some 4 feet into the air.

After gaining my composure, I made it home. Next morning I got a good look at the damage; 2 broken shocks (they needed to be replaced anyway, right?) broken mainspring hanger (easily replace when doing the shocks, right?) both engine mounts (need to rebuild the engine someday anyway, just as well start with the mounts, right?) For some reason I have lost my desire to "go fast", and still like working on cars. But I have never forget where those tracks are.

Hopefully I'm getting smarter, not growing older, or growing up.

Ok, I'm almost too embarassed to let you know....

cj

[Guest imported_SKYSTHELIMIT]

Ok hows this one. Replacing the steering wheel on my buick the orginal was shot, with the original steering wheel removed it hit me, I forgot to get the adaptor for the Grant wheel. Got a bright idea (not) to get me to the local auto parts dealer without either waiting for my parents to get home or puttng the old wheel back on I grabbed a pair of vise grips(your probably laughing your @$$ off at this point) clenched them onto the shaft and headed to the store. Just as I got home I pulled into the parking lot making a left turn, the vice grips let go and I side swiped my moms new Dodge Omni (she just got home just before I got there) causing no damage to my 72 Buick but tearing up both doors on my moms Omni. In the end I lost my driving privelige for a month and was grounded for the same. Did I mention my mom took me off her insurance and made me get my own

[Guest boettger]

All these sttering wheel stories brougt back a BAD MEMORY from my innocent youth!

In 1974 I acquired a 1947 Chevrolet 4dr Sedan.

I had it at the gas station I was running.

Proceeded to remove the front fenders to start som restoration work,

when word came to get that "ole POS" outa here.

So the younger me proceedes to borrow the wrecker from the used car lot

across the street, hook on to the rear of the '47 Chevy, Rope tie the steering wheel to the door post, and off we go for home!

Unbeknowst (is that a word?) the nut was not on the steering wheel.

About 1/2 mile down the road the steerin wheel decides to remove itself.

The Ole Chevy starts a fishtailing. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/icons/shocked.gif" alt="" /> Took a lunge into the left lane.

The front wheel caught a 2 week old Pontiac Grand Am smack in the middle

of the trunk. Pontiac was stopped to make a left turn.

Finally took that '47 to the great scrap heap ans the front frame rails were

bent after it's little skirmish. The brand new Pontiac didn't fare all that well either.

[Guest]

My wife was getting ready to drive to her folks, when I notice that there was a nail in her tire. I told her that she couldn't drive with a nail in her tire, to which she responded that if it wasn't leaking air, she was going to drive it. For some reason I can't recall, I then grabbed my pliers and pulled out the nail. This resulted in tire deflation and wife inflamation. I appealed to our neighbor, who happened to be in his yard, to explain to my wife that you can't drive around with a nail in your tire. He said that many people have nails in their tires and don't know it, as the rubber tends to seal around the nail. Oh well.