Car DIY Errors

[Badger_Boom]

And this one is no word of a lie about my dad.
When I was young we lived in Chester and my dad had a Austin 1100 with a knackered engine.He got another engine for it and erected three scaffold pipes into a tripod over the engine bay to lower the replacement engine in with a piece of rope.
I was only little and I came home from School walked past my dad who was wrestling away trying to get this engine in ,with my only intentions of getting in to watch Play School.
Well, Play School came and went and so did Blue Peter and it was now the Clangers and still no sign of dad.
When Nation Wide came on I looked out the window to see where dad was was.
He was still in the same position as when I came home standing upright in the engine bay.
I went out wondering why tea wasn't made only to discover he was wedged into the engine bay.
The daft bugger had stood in the engine bay and lowered the engine down and ended up getting his legs trapped against it and the inner wings.Worse still he didn't have the strength to lift it up to free himself.
He was stuck there for 3 hours in the freezing cold until I got the neighbours to come round and lift it off him.

That reminds me of my father's story about helping my uncle change the engine in his Reliant Robin. My uncle (who was a talented engineer who always seemed able to repair anything with few tools) held forth for some time during the process about how his training and experience in the RAF had made him very flexible and aware of his surroundings when working in tight spaces. The effect was ruined, however, when he stood up, smacked his head on a garage shelf and knocked it and all the contents all over the shop.

 

[Bazzer]

When I was I very young we had a family day out to Chester Zoo; me, Mum and Dad and my Grandparents who were visiting from Lincolnshire. All 5 of us travelled in our Standard 8 from Stockport and I remember nothing about the day except a single incident.
This was long before the M56 was a twinkle in some asphalt's eye and we were in very slow moving traffic near the zoo. As was quite common at the time, a queue of standing traffic was a guarantee of finding a car's weak spot and sure enough the overheating fairy visited our car.
Dad managed to get the car to the side of the road and all 5 of us decanted. Dad seemed to think he could give it a few minutes, then remove the radiator cap, add more water, and we could continue the journey home. The radiator came to a different conclusion and fired boiling water into his chest.
Dad was saved from serious injury because he happened to be wearing a chunky sweater knitted by Mum, which took the brunt of the jet.
I do recall Mum not being pleased, both about Dad's irresponsibility and his sweater being ruined by rust tinted water.

 

[tyred]

Not cars but a neighbour had a well-worn Fordson Dexta tractor that wasn't keen on getting going on a frosty morning.

It was always common to just drain the water from old tractors rather than use antifreeze which is what my neighbour did. He used to pour kettles of hot water into the block in the morning to make it easier started.

Once, when he had family staying, he gave the kettle to his nephew and told him to fill the radiator. His nephew, who had no idea about mechanical things went out and poured the boiling water down the exhaust...

 

[johnnyb47]

I remember years ago when I was a skinny 17 year old runt with arms the thickness of a couple of straws working on the farm.It was a cold December morning with thick freezing fog and were in the middle of building a huge concrete underground slurry tank.
My gaffer was made of old school granite and was a tough as old leather boots and thought anybody who worked with him should also be of the same.
Every morning he got me to start the old bamford or Benford (I can't remember the name now) dumper truck up.It was a big old diesel thing and it had a crank handle on it to get it going.I would have to put a brick on the accelerator pedal, knock the decompresser lever and spin the crank handle like hell before flicking the decompresser lever down hoping the engine would catch.
With the oil in the engine being like treacle combined with my punny arms and the thing being knackered, I just could not get it going on a cold start.
After a few attempts and some angry exchanges with my gaffer the thing finally burst into life.
The only problem though was that the cast iron cranking handle got stuck on the shaft and as I had a brick on the accelerator peddle the engine started revving flat out.
I stupidly went to the front to get the brick off the accelerator and hit the kill switch, and just as a walked past it ,the heavy crank handle snapped and disappeared skywards into the fog.It took an eternity for it to come back down, and not being to see it up their, in the fog it turned it into a lethal weapon that I couldn't see.
A few moments later it came flying down out of the fog and buried itself deep into the mud.
Thinking back this could of killed someone if it were to of hit them.
The gaffer went nuts and booted me up the back side.
On the plus side I didn't have to struggle again trying to start that rotten thing.We just towed it with the tipper truck and let it run all day.
By the evening all was forgotten and we were down the pub having a beer again

 

[Profpointy]

I was welding a patch in to a rear wheel arch of a rust Land Rover Discovery and at neglected to remove the carpet inside.
I got to use my fire extinguisher....

A pal welded through the petrol pipe on his car. He got away with it somehow.