DIY Mechanics Fail Stories

DIY Mechanics Fail Stories

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Discussion

Perd Hapley

1,750 posts

172 months

Sunday 10th May 2015
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Esotericstuff said:
Story 4:
Mate offers to help me change a rear axle. I get two jacks set up to support it and he says don't bother he'll hold it like it was a bench press. Last bolt undone he finally realises it weighs more than he can hold and the beam crashes down on him giving him a cracked rib for the pleasure.
rofl

LukeSi

5,753 posts

160 months

Sunday 10th May 2015
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It once took me 8 hours to change shocks and fit lowering springs. 20 minutes to change the rear springs (didn't do the shocks) an hour to get the shock off on one side (including calling a mechanic friend to find out how to get the bolts out that hold the shock to the hub, 20 minutes to fit the top mount to the new shock and spring.

6 hours to figure out that you have to have both sides jacked up otherwise you can't get enough leverage to fit the shock over the wishbone because of the holding the hub up, 20 minutes to repeat the job on the other side.

And then a couple of days to realise the positive camber looked worse due to the wheel bolts not being fully tight. To be fair there was no wheel wobble. My friend noticed that, luckily the swarf around the bolts wasn't major and they were safe to continue using. Even more lucky my wheels didn't fall off haha.

Gary C

12,313 posts

178 months

Sunday 10th May 2015
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Topped up my rx8 engine oil with brake fluid !

Both in the same size and colour container on the shelf. Bugger to drain and flush the engine with expensive dexelia

Gary C

12,313 posts

178 months

Sunday 10th May 2015
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Lol, just read estotericstuffs and it reminds me of a friend

Welding a sill on his rally car

Hits fuel line

Line burns back to tank

Tank not empty and car goes up in flames

Handbrake cable snaps from the heat and car rolls into his dad's wooden garage

Burns garage to the ground and destroys car.

He also juggled a gas soldering iron at collage and caught the hot end smile

caelite

4,273 posts

111 months

Sunday 10th May 2015
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Err had a wee fail yesterday that I still havnt resolved. Was taking the stock stereo out of my fabia to install a Aux lead adaptor. I put the stereo keys in and 2 of the channel preset buttons popped off. On top of that the clips to the stereo have gotten stuck so I need to remove part of the dash to get the stereo out (aparently a common fault on 55 and 06 plates fabias).

Anywho im too lazy to take the glove box out and fix the stereo and of the 2 buttons that popped off 1 is now gone forever. Looked under every seat and under every carpet and no stereo button.


sc0tt

18,032 posts

200 months

Sunday 10th May 2015
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Bought new wheels for fiesta, bolted on and went for a drive.

Bolts apparently weren't right for the fiesta.

Drove like the qe2 on rough seas. Luckily I only went 100m

lost in espace

6,136 posts

206 months

Sunday 10th May 2015
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Had a Volvo V70 that was being scrappaged, had a decent set of tyres on it but couldn't sell them for love nor money. Stuck them on freecycle thought I might help a fellow impoverished owner, hate seeing waste. I am out somewhere and a guy comes and swaps them on his 850, gets to the end of the street and they rub. So he comes back and swaps over. The wife take the car for its final drive to the dealer and then phones me to say she has parked up because the car doesn't feel right. Turns out the guy who swapped the wheels didn't bother tightening the nuts. Last time I do anyone a favour.

OK OK I should have checked them.

calibrax

4,788 posts

210 months

Sunday 10th May 2015
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caelite said:
Looked under every seat and under every carpet and no stereo button.
I bet the button is in the seat rail groove.

Rikki55

677 posts

148 months

Sunday 10th May 2015
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Changed the engine oil and filter on my MG TF, being lazy I decided not to remove the engine cover - far too much hassle! And decided to refill the oil through the remote filler point under the boot lid... 2 litres of Shells finish poured in and it all decides to back up over spilling all over my parents block paved driveway!! :/ cue a good few hours pressure washing the driveway before they got home!

Lesson learnt! Don't cut corners even on very basic jobs! smile

hman

7,487 posts

193 months

Monday 11th May 2015
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P I Staker said:
You sound like a liability.
I think careless probably covers it,

"letting" your mate hold up a rear axle instead of using the axle stands - dumb and dumber would put this to great use in one of their films.

soad

32,829 posts

175 months

Monday 11th May 2015
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Dave^ said:
P I Staker said:
You sound like Emsman.
EFA...

PS - Anyone know if he's still about?
Dusty964

DaveBenyon

60 posts

238 months

Monday 11th May 2015
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The worst cars are French and quite frequently working on them is like peeling an onion as vital components are buried under layer upon layer of other components. I had trouble with a Renault Espace MK3 2.2 dt sucking air into its fuel so it was a case of removing the fuel tank and re-piping the fuel line. In particular those infernal snap-action fuel line connectors were eliminated where possible. The car which had a good battery had in the past been started by jumping in another good battery and with two fully charged batteries it would just about start. Unfortunately by the time that the fuel line was re-piped, the starter motor was knackered but curiously it would crank OK for about a second then become lazy doing a perfect impersonation of a dud battery. A brand new 096 battery was purchased thinking that the others were now duds but the fault was the starter! After doing a LOT of onion peeling a fresh starter motor was fitted but with hindsight I'd say that if one was planning to keep the car it might be worth upgrading the starter to the £250 heavy duty cold-climate Bosch. Anyhow the car would now start OK on just one battery and using a 4x4 for tow starting was no longer required!

During the starter motor replacement the accelerator cable was moved out of the way. Unfortunately the cable inner was frayed and moving the cable caused the frayed strands to unwind making the cable very stiff. A new OEM cable was purchased but fitting it is absolutely pants. Inside the car it looks as if the proper method is to remove the steering wheel then peel away the "furniture" layer by layer but it is possible to spring things apart. In the engine compartment things are far worse as access to the grommet is blocked by the windscreen wiper motor. Getting the motor out is a PITA as firstly the wiper arms need to be removed. One then discovers that Loctite or similar has been used so its a blowlamp job which has to be done without breaking the windscreen. A wet towel and heat shields made from cut-up drinks cans works OK but I thought that the cable would be a fifteen minute job. The large nuts on the wiper spindles can only be reached after the plastic trim is removed but this is a bonnet-off job and to be honest getting the wiper motor out is tricky. Even after all this work the accelerator cable does not want to go into place and it looks as if some kind of guiding cone is used at the factory.

Long term I hope to sell or scrap all my vehicles that use timing belts. Top of the list is a Peugeot 306 2.0l HDi which has a leaky water pump. The design is anathema as far as I am concerned as on a proper car a water pump change is a fifteen minute job.

The curious thing about all this is that the European Union brought in laws that restricted the scams on printer cartridges (some cartridges used chips that detected when the cartridge was empty and "killed" it)

Just why the EU doesn't clamp down on what I call Negative Equity Car Designs is a mystery but it is a fact that with a lot of modern cars fixing any little fault can cost more than the car is worth.

Bradley1500

766 posts

145 months

Monday 11th May 2015
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Got a few…

Servicing my Civic. Drained the engine oil and went to replace the filter before refilling, except it wouldn’t budge. No problem, I’ll whack a screwdriver through it to give me some leverage. I wasn’t expecting quite so much oil to be left in the filter, which was released all over me when the screwdriver pierced the outer casing. hehe

On the same car I was replacing the engine after big end bearing failure. Removed the old engine and refitted the replacement over the course of a week. Got it started but it was running like a bag of ste, hunting on idle badly. I checked everything over but couldn’t find anything wrong.

Drove to a mechanic mate to ask for his expertise – problem found within 30 seconds, I had forgotten to connect the mass air flow sensor.

Not me but a friend was replacing the gearbox on his Clio 172. Everything refitted but it still had no drive and now wouldn’t go into gear either. Lots of head scratching later, checking linkages, adjusting the clutch cable but still no joy. He admitted defeat and got a garage to fix it, turned out he had fitted the clutch the wrong way around. He wasn’t best pleased.

Edited by Bradley1500 on Monday 11th May 16:35

Toaster Pilot

14,615 posts

157 months

Monday 11th May 2015
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Bradley1500 said:
Got a few…

Servicing my Civic. Drained the engine oil and went to replace the filter before refilling, except it wouldn’t budge. No problem, I’ll whack a screwdriver through it to give me some leverage. I wasn’t expecting quite so much oil to be left in the filter, which was released all over me when the screwdriver pierced the outer casing. hehe

On the same car I was replacing the engine after big end bearing failure. Removed the old engine and refitted the replacement over the course of a week. Got it started but it was running like a bag of ste, hunting on idle badly. I checked everything over but couldn’t find anything wrong.

Drove to a mechanic mate to ask for his expertise – problem found within 30 seconds, I had forgotten to connect the mass air flow sensor.

Not me but a friend was replacing the gearbox on his Clio 172. Everything refitted but it still had no drive and now wouldn’t go into gear either. Lots of head scratching later, checking linkages, adjusting the clutch cable but still no joy. He admitted defeat and got a garage to fix it, turned out he had fitted the clutch the wrong way around. He wasn’t best pleased.

Edited by Bradley1500 on Monday 11th May 16:35
hehe I use a screwdriver as an oil filter removal tool often but always prepare for the inevitable gush of oil!

Changed a clutch for the first time a few weeks ago, was paranoid about making sure it was fitted the right way round and checked so many times!

Mr2Mike

20,143 posts

254 months

Monday 11th May 2015
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DaveBenyon said:
Long term I hope to sell or scrap all my vehicles that use timing belts.
With the number of modern engines suffering timing chain problems at relatively low mileages, I'd rather stick to a timing belt. It's not rocket science to change them, even if it can be a bit tricky on some cars.

feef

5,206 posts

182 months

Monday 11th May 2015
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I VERY nearly came a cropper at the weekend. I'd been doing various things to the car over the weekend, including wiring an engine-start button and ignition cutout switch into the new gauge panel. Obviously the battery was disconnected, wiring chopped and rerouted to various places, joints connected and soldered and engine start button tested. All was going swimmingly thus far.

To install some of the other bits, I was sprawled across the interior so stuck it in 3rd and let the hand-brake off so I could do it more comfortably (you can see where this is going already.. start button, ignition circuit, battery disconnected, handbrake off)...

anyway, everything else done, wiring all stashed back up and I went to connect the battery. As soon as I connected the battery, the car lurched forward and headed for my C6 parked across the drive (the MX5 battery is in the boot). I managed to grab at the battery terminal and get it off before contact was made, thankfully.

But how to get the car back up onto the drive? I just stuck it in reverse and did the same again...

Turns out it was a little bit of errant insulation tape which had come adrift when I was tidying up the wiring, and there was a short on the starter circuit. That'll teach me to use insulation tape when my shrink-tubing has run out!

Still, it was a close call, but no harm done.

Gary C

12,313 posts

178 months

Monday 11th May 2015
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Ooh, just remembered.

The Carreras front caliper pistons were sticking. Took them off and stripped them down. To push the Pistons out I used my bike pump. As it is a dual opposed piston it would push out one before the other so held it in with a bit of wood. On a trial refit, I needed to pushe them out again but as they were only just in, I used my finger to hold the first one to move, the second proceeded to stick then eject with some force crunching my finger between them, ouch !

ChocolateFrog

24,852 posts

172 months

Wednesday 23rd November 2016
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Bit of a cool story.

Decided to be uncharacteristically proactive and get the car (04 V70) in for its MOT 3 weeks early, failed on rear drop links. Do some googling, ECP have Lemforder ones for £40 ish each, genuine are nearer £80 each. Check ebay and Meyle HD 4 year warranty are £25 for the pair, great order those. A few days later one arrives so I check the advert and it states it should be a pair. Message seller and yep they've cocked up, a week later the second one turns up. Manage a free afternoon to fit them, end up cutting 3 of the 4 bolts off but no bother I get them fitted. Rebook mot on the last day eligible (today) all good drinking my free coffee when t he tester calls me over. I've only gone and read the test sheet wrong. It was the bushes not the drop links that failed.

Anyway curse myself and think I can do a quick regain so I call Volvo thinking they'll have them in stock. Yes sir we only sell the whole anti roll bar at £180, great! Look online and there's one company in Latvia that stock just the bushes and from reading around the quality is not great. To compound my stupidity the mot runs out tomorrow.

Oh the joys of old cars and diy.

Edited by ChocolateFrog on Wednesday 23 November 13:14

matchmaker

8,463 posts

199 months

Wednesday 23rd November 2016
quotequote all
ChocolateFrog said:
Bit of a cool story.

Decided to be uncharacteristically proactive and get the car (04 V70) in for its MOT 3 weeks early, failed on rear drop links. Do some go ogling, ECP have Lemforder ones for £40 ish each, genuine are nearer £80 each. Cheap ebay and Meyle HD 4 year warranty are £25 for the pair, great order those. A few days later one arrives so I check the advert and it states it should be a pair. Message seller and yep they've cocked up, a week later the second one turns up. Manage a free afternoon to fit them, end up cutting 3 of the 4 bolts off but no bother I get them fitted. Rebook mot on the last day eligible (today) all good drinking my free coffee when t he tester calls me over. I've only gone and read the test sheet wrong. It was the bushes not the drop links that failed.

Anyway curse myself and think I can do a quick regain so I call Volvo thinking they'll have them in stock. Yes sir we only sell the whole anti roll bar at £180, great! Look online and there's one company in Latvia that stock just the bushes and from reading around the quality is not great. To compound my stupidity the mot runs out tomorrow.

Oh the joys of old cars and diy.
Could you get polybushes from the likes of Demon Tweaks?

s p a c e m a n

10,752 posts

147 months

Wednesday 23rd November 2016
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Can you not just remove the entire roll bar? Can't fail on bushes if there's none there biggrin