Stupid is as stupid does..................

So i'm doing my front brakes on Saturday. All is going well. It is, after all, disc brakes. Not like the old days when all four corners were drums. This should be easy, right? Wrong!!

All went well. Or so I thought.

I did the front brakes without a hitch. Ex was off the jack stands and ready for the road test. I decided to clean up before the road test.

While I was cleaning up I found one of the new pads by the driver side wheel. My first thought was that the idiots at the factory put an extra pad in the box, right? There is no way that I reassembled the driver side without installing one of the pads. I mean come on, no way.

Well, I'm an idiot. Not only did I forget to install one of the pads, I didn't tighten the caliper bolts!!

Good thing I decided to clean up before the road test and not after.

I got the "extra" pad installed and all was well!

Just goes to show you that you should always check your work.

Hey, nowhere on my resume does it mention intelligence.

 

[koda2000]

My $750 wrench...

I as working in a office building and there was a new multi-level office being built next door. There was a small parking lot between the two buildings and that's were I'd parked my, then new, Suzuki Samari that day. Sometime during the day, I noticed that someone had dropped a 12" adjustable wrench from the construction site. Later that day it was still there, so I thought, if it's still there when I go home I'll snag it. It was winter, so by the time I left work it was dark out. I started to leave the parking lot when I remembered to check for the wrench. I put the Suzuki in reverse and started to back up, letting my headlights sweep across the parking lot. All of a sudden the Suzuki came to an abrupt stop and I was showered with about $5 in change I kept in my ashtray. I just sat there for a minute trying to comprehend what had just happened. Turns out I'd backed up into the cement base of parking lot light pole. I got the wrench, but it cost me $750 to have my Samari repaired ($750 in 1986 dollars)!

 

[BigRondo]

Well done my friend, well done!

 

[koda2000]

This is my 3rd and last post to this thread, not that I haven’t done many more stupid things in my ’65 years, but it’s the last one I’m willing to admit to…

When I was 13 my dad thought that getting me an old car to work on might cure me of my car craziness (it didn’t). Anyway my best friend (Tommy) and I eventually got the old Willy’s Jeep station wagon running and we’d drive it up and down my cul-de-sac until the neighbors started complaining. At that point my dad told us to stay off the street. One hot summer day, my dad took my mom grocery shopping in his company truck. We knew they’d be gone for at least 45 minutes to an hour. So we got in the Jeep and went up at down the street a few times until, wouldn’t you know it, we ended up running out of gas at the far end of my street. We ran back to the house and got a coffee can full of gas and filled the carb’s float bowl. We tried to start the engine, but it was flooded and we killed the battery trying. We then ran back to the house a stole the 12v battery out of my dad’s Jag. We were running out of time, so as soon as the Jeep fired, I raced up the street, up the driveway and into the carport. I went to hit the brakes when (just for a split second) I thought, “if I hit the brakes I’ll burn out the 6v tail light bulbs with the Jag’s 12v battery”. This delay caused me to run into the wall at the end of the carport, which pushed the wall in and started collapsing the carport roof. My mom and dad would be home any minute, and my dad would have killed me! We pounded about a dozen big nails into the base of the carport wall, attached a tire chain to the bumper of the Jeep and managed to pull the wall back to w/in about 6” of vertical. Not good enough. I then remembered there was an old ceiling jack in the basement. I got the jack, stuck it into the doorway and cranked it up. This got the wall w/in 1/2” of vertical. Close enough. We put the jack away and put the battery back in the Jag just as my dad pulled into the driveway. We were soaked with sweat and breathing hard. He knew we had been up to something, but couldn’t figure out what. For the next 20 years, every time he used the carport door, he complained how the door was hard to close. I didn’t tell him this story until I was almost 40 years old. His response was, “yeah I would have killed you”.

Tommy passed away about 10 years ago, but I’m sending a copy of this story to his daughter, Krista. I think she’ll get a kick out of it.

 

[waskly]

One of my finer moments when i first started in a dealership.

i was working on a contour, a coolant flush, and some minor repairs. so we had a coolant machine, sucks it out, and fills it, no problems, start the car, degas bottle cap lose, with the car running, just do a once over, throw it back up into the air, its running, all of the sudden a nice hot shower of coolant.

silly me never plugged in the coolant fans back

 

[mr cribb]

Okay, spent days putting a new timing belt, water pump, pulleys, motor mounts, spark plugs, plug wires, crank seal and belts in my daughter's PT Snoozer. You just about have to pull the engine out to do this job. Got it all back together, but it wouldn't start. Thought about it for a day or two, figured I'd done something wrong timing the cams. Tore it all apart again and checked. Everything looked okay. Put it back together again, but still nothing... Then checked the gas gauge. It was below "E" (why to kids never put gas in their cars?). Having the front wheels off the ground while working on the car was just enough to not allow the fuel pump to pick up any fuel. Threw in 2 gals gas and away she went. Spend a week working on this car and then her knuckle-head boyfriend totaled it.... arrrrggg!

I helped my dad do the same job on his PT..... I told him I'm not doing it again. That job was a PITA.

 

[blueoval9erlifer]

i have a friend who had never changed his oil and was about 35ish had a nissan truck so i told him id save him some money and show him how to change it. crawled under truck showed him the oil plug and he went to get wrenches and then drained the oil pulled the filter, put everything back together and filled with oil. he got about 2 miles and thought the vehicle was acting kinda weird so called me and stupid me did not check the dipstick when we were done just put in how many quarts the book called for. Once i checked the oil found out that it was overfull but for some crazy reason the tranny did not have any oil in it. YEPPERS he pulled the drain on the tranny needless to say i did not save him any money and he has not done an oil change since.

 

[fedyfedz]

hahah this thread is amazing, something like this happens to me every time I work on my cars/trucks. Its the feeling you get of accomplishment and they eagerness to start the engine and test the new part that makes you sloppy.

My favorite mishap of mine...

I had a 1991 honda civic 4 door 5 speed(tin can muffler), i just got it back from the body shop after a 16yr girl in a land rover rear-ended me. I was so happy when i got my car back casue it was fresshly painted. I came home after numerous doobie snacks with my friends and parked as I normally do in front of my house.

10 minutes later my mom says:
MOM:"wheres your car?"
Me: answereing with an attitude "IN FRONT OF THE HOUSE"
MOM:"UM no its not.


I looked out the window to see nothing, i ran out side thinking someone stole my car. But lucky/unlucky for me i forgot to engage the emergency brake and it slipped out of gear rolled down my block that is on the hill picked up speed managed to roll 3 blocks and then hit and get wedged underneath a van. Damaged front end both headlights hood and radiator. thats when the FML was invented

 

[College Student]

So everyone know to always get a second opinion on health care stuff well its similar for car related things. So a year or two ago I asked the dealership in town if they could tell me what is wrong with my exterior button station. They checked the system and blamed it on the station itself. So I let it go and recently bought a replacement off of Karl. Plug old one back in doesn't work, okay as expected. Plug in Karl's, nothing.Hummm. Close the door, Karl's can now lock the car. Plug old one back in same thing. Search my car for the receipt that says the code Ford told me. Type it in the old one, nothing, again as expected. Plug Karl's in nothing. Decide to finally just pull the panel for the hell of it. Code on the actual box in the rear has a different code than what the dealership told me . Use it on the new one works. Plug old back in to see if its still good it works as well. SO long story short stupid me should have just checked the code from day 1.

 

[BigRondo]

No sense in executing step 1 first. That would make too much sense, right?

 

[College Student]

not me but just to make fun. When calling IT,
Person: Why isn't my computer working?
IT: Is it plugged in?
Person: Why would it be unplugged? (looks then has to make it seem like something else was wrong)

 

[Dano!]

So a few years back when i was a part of a squadron, we had this aircraft tug.. this thing was a POS, governor kept it from going past 10MPH, it had no brakes and you had to use the E-brake to get it to stop, hell we weren't even supposed to drive this thing. but our shop was in a shack about 800 yards from the hanger and that's a long walk.
I got a call in the shop that the guys needed a different tool box to do maintenance on their aircraft, so i took the tug.

When i was heading back to the shop i brain farted the E-Brake, came around a sharp corner to park in front of the shop and crashed into the cement guard separating the parking lot from the flight line. i pushed that thing 4 inches and almost ruined my Navajo parked on the other side.

i rolled it back and parked it. The front tow hook took everything just scratched the paint, no damage to the tug, needless to say i secured the tug for the rest of the night.

-Dano

 

[mr cribb]

So I have made the DUH list again.

While working on the gen 2 window motor/regulator upgrade in my 92, I was working on DRIVERS SIDE and having a hell of a time trying to figure out why I couldn't get the window motor to line up properly to attach to the door.

Well stupid me was trying to mount the PASSENGER SIDE window motor to the door.

After getting it right I got done with the job in 10 minutes. Before this I had spent several hours spread out over several days (work 2 jobs, time limited).

 

[BigRondo]

Nicely done mr cribb.

 

[XLT99]

Well i finally made the list lol

So almost four weeks ago i started to swap a four barrel intake/carb setup onto my old Ramcharger. After a few gasket issues, I finally got it on. But the damn thing kept flooding. No matter what i did, changed the fuel pump, added a fuel regulator, replaced parts in the carb, kept doin the same thing. Since id been tryin and tryin for a couple weeks and school is starting soon, i was ready to give up, junk it, and buy something else cause i was loosin patience with it. Had a buddy come over, still couldnt get it. It was flooding so bad i had to siphon gas outta several cylinders, and drained over three gallons of gas/oil outta the motor, along with fouling several sets of plugs
Well, the other night another buddy came over, took one look, and started laughing. The stock carb's fuel line hooked up in the front. There was a barbed fitting on the front of the new one that the fuel line fit on perfectly... Needless to say, that was a vaccum hookup, the fuel inlet was on the side... And i had gotten so mad at one point that i punched my fender in a bit and kicked my door in At least its runnin and drivin now

 

[BigRondo]

Welcome to a special group!! :

 

[Willcall]

Okay so here's my story...
So on my 01 X, I had pulled the valve body to replace the the shift acc. and the springs (two had broken). After reassembling everything and putting lots of brand new Mercon V, I noticed this black bracket looking thing. But it was clean and dry so I though it must be from my Audi (which I had torn apart). I started her up and shifted into reverse... Nothing. Shifted her into drive. Nothing. Tried 2 and 1. Nothing. Gave it a little gas. Nothing. So I put it in park and got out, engine running, and look underneath. No leaking fluid but I could hear a low, electric whirring noise. About three seconds later, the X shot forward IN PARK, but the parking lock caught it. Turns out the little bracket was for the EPC solenoid and the noise was it starving from lack of fluid as it slid out of its place in the valve body. That lead to no ATF in important areas and then my forward clutch welded itself together from the heat... Took me a month to get that fixed.

 

[BigRondo]

:biggthump

 

[leftlane36]

I see the "WHOOPS!!"club is still gaining new members.

 

[JamesRolls5.0]

no where near as bad of the stories on here BUT this happened this morning ,

i was kinda late for school and i grabbed the keys on the ledge and i put my keys in my ignition and they wouldn't turn , in like a rush i kept trying for about 5 min i figured the key may just have worn to crap.. after about 10 min of frustration and anger and a few curses i figured out i grabbed my dads expedition keys...... *sigh*

 

[BigRondo]

I see the "WHOOPS!!"club is still gaining new members.

Yes it is. Good to see ya!