Dumbest things done while working on a car

[thaphatty]

i've spilt copious amounts of beer down open rocker covers, then car wouldnt start.

worn down brake pads so far through the backing plates that the whole pad has fallen out and had to handbrake home.

[Crampy]

Working on my S/C AW11 (back when I had it).
The car was locked and I had the engine cover and boot open. Decided to put the keys in the open boot, so wouldn't misplace them. Finished working on engine, closed engine flap. In doing so, the folt caused the boot to close also.

I don't know why I left the car locked, or why I decided to leave the keys in the boot, but it was funny as hell watching the locksmith trying to break into my boot. He ended up doing quite a bit of filing and then opened the boot with from memory a butter knife. Yep, that meant getting the boot lock replaced!!! Damn it.

[Crampy]

Ha, another one With my MR2.
Had the back jacked up on both sides with sissor jacks. Decided to lower it, so got my brother to help. Both of us lowering it, car swings to the side, tipping both jack over. Smashes one of the screw threads off on the concrete and the other narrowly missing the sump.
Now that's some speedy jacking. (Not recommended)

[loudsir]

Working on a mates famila interplay a few years back... He wanted to do an oil change, and we had been up late drinking home-made bourbon the night before so my mind was a little fryed. Anyway, warmed up the car, jacked it up, removed the plug, drained the oil, changed the oil filter, started filling up the engine oil and wondered why it only needed about half a litre to fill up...

Turns out we had drained the gearbox oil instead - wrong sump plug. DOH! Off to repco for some gearbox oil - kill two birds with one stone. I think we ended up doing air filter and spark plugs as well - may as well make it a full service!

[Punter]

Working on a mates famila interplay a few years back... He wanted to do an oil change, and we had been up late drinking home-made bourbon the night before so my mind was a little fryed. Anyway, warmed up the car, jacked it up, removed the plug, drained the oil, changed the oil filter, started filling up the engine oil and wondered why it only needed about half a litre to fill up...

Turns out we had drained the gearbox oil instead - wrong sump plug. DOH! Off to repco for some gearbox oil - kill two birds with one stone. I think we ended up doing air filter and spark plugs as well - may as well make it a full service!

Ha!
I had a mate at school that did that, only he didn't realise.
Put 4 extra litres of oil in it, then proceded to drive it. Gearbox seized shortly after.

[Kahlua]

This thread is hella funny.

Mate and I were rangi-ing up a rivercar and had to do some disc grinding under the bonnet but couldn't be arsed taking the battery out, hence lots of sparks on the battery so it blew up. Couldn't hear anything for about 10 seconds and then realised we were covered in acid.

Also been working under the bonnet and gone for a test drive, only to come back and find half the tools I was using still lieing around the engine bay. (x too many to remember)

Also not really working on a car, but anyone here who knows me knows my claim to fame, stopped at a servo in the rallycar to check oil and water, took off, neglecting to slide the bonnet clips back in place, doing about 100km/h down the motorway the heavy as fark bonnet came up smashing the windscreen and causing a very quick and blind maneouver off the road.

[Dell'Orto]

Also been working under the bonnet and gone for a test drive, only to come back and find half the tools I was using still lieing around the engine bay. (x too many to remember)

Crap, I've done that too. Lost my 10mm spanner the other week

[Punter]

Also been working under the bonnet and gone for a test drive, only to come back and find half the tools I was using still lieing around the engine bay. (x too many to remember)

Crap, I've done that too. Lost my 10mm spanner the other week

When I was working at a panel beaters (family business) I managed to re-assemble a truck door with 3 sockets inside it. Didn't figure out where they were for a while

[Kahlua]

Also been working under the bonnet and gone for a test drive, only to come back and find half the tools I was using still lieing around the engine bay. (x too many to remember)

Crap, I've done that too. Lost my 10mm spanner the other week

Its funny the amount of tools you can pick up lieing around the corners of Ruapuna when changing courses and doing a track clearance.. obvious some were a bit too rushed to get on the track..

[Boosted_162]

In my old Detomaso, for some reason i was doing something with a pair of big pliers. Drove to Whangarei (2 hours), lifted bonnet to find them still on the strut .

And when we did the gearbox in my old ST162, didnt remove the battery cable . Engine earth + starter power feed = burnt earth wire and SMOKE! We all went running for fire extinguishers!

[Lloyd]

Also been working under the bonnet and gone for a test drive, only to come back and find half the tools I was using still lieing around the engine bay. (x too many to remember)

Crap, I've done that too. Lost my 10mm spanner the other week

Managed to lose a 10mm SnapOn ratchet spanner one day under a bonnet only to find someone elses under the bonnet of a different car that came in to work the next day

[Silent Knight]

Do I still win the 'Biggest Blunder' prize?

[blackmk3]

I would say my biggest stuff up would be learning the hard way to start tighnting up spark plugs with your fingers...on my old civic wagon (paddock basher luckly ) pulled the plugs out to take a look (i was a noob ) and put them all back in and tightned them up with my 1/2inch socket set, 3 out of the four were ok, the fourth however only got halfway down and i couldnt figure out why, pulled it out to see it nicey cross threaded, so i wound it back down as far as it would go. lesson learned! car still ran on four cylinders to!

[Tozza]

Ha! Well lets start off by saying that im a chick, and these are just a few of my "blonde" moments i have had.

Forgot to tighten my wheel nuts on my new car, i could hear this clicking sound and as it was the first time i had driven it, thought it was the exhaust or something. Suddenly this cop pulls me over and says that im about to lose my rear wheel.

Had my directionals on the wrong way for a month until my mate showed the arrows on the tyres pointing the correct way they should go

Had 2 spacers on one of my mags and couldnt figure out why my steering wheel was jolting so much.

Asked my Mate Abbey what a Front mount was cause it looked cool. She told me and i replied that it would look cool on the "Rolla" She looked at me blankly and cracked up laughing. I now know that you need a Turbo first.

I havnt had much luck with wheels.

[Quint]

I now know that you need a Turbo first.

hahaha.

Been asked if the car had struts in the back or the front, after i said it had dbl wishbone all round. Was like..... what?

[TRD_ZERO]

When i had my turbo mazda i decided to do an oil change. So i did the usual warm the car up and so on drained old oil, removed the oil filter replacing it with the new one. Put new oil in, started it up and just started reversing out my drive when i noticed a massive puddle of oil. Looked under my car and noticed it was coming out the oil filter, so i tightend it up as good as it would go but it proceeded to piss out with oil. By that time the filter was put on so tight it was munted all bent out of shape. In the end i found out that when i removed the other filter it left the little rubber ring behind and wouldnt seal properly.

Oh few years ago my next door neighbour who makes himself out to be a car guru was talking about getting a BOV for his wholsley cause he liked the ppppssshhh not knowing it was only for turbo cars, idiot.

[AE86less]

While i was putting a new 3au in my 85 i had my head under the bonnet pulling on a hose that was seized to the metal pipe that i now know connected to the heater core.

I yanked it really hard, tore the metal tube out of the back of the heater (which i still needed), hit my self in the face, hit my head on the bonnet which proceeded to fall down on me when it poppet out of its little hole thing. The worst part was cleaning up all the blood that was pissing outta my nose...

I've also got a blood nose from pulling the steering wheel off into my face

[solitaire]

.....

Oh Man you win! thats awesome... ive come so close to doing things like that myself

[AE86less]

I still don't think it's very funny, but it was stupid.

[solitaire]

No offense intended mate