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Jun 23, 2016 13:52:24 GMT
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I'm guessing that there aren't many of us who haven't mucked up mechanically over the years or tried something that didn't work out very well but what about total morons? There must be lots of tales out there of people who have witnessed friends or acquaintances doing something really mad? I'll start the ball rolling ....
Years ago one of my neighbours fancied himself as a Rally driver cum engineer despite the fact he'd have struggled to change a wheel without a manual. He was forever bolting daft bits onto his Cavalier or tinkering under the bonnet with little or no idea of what he was actually doing. I passed him in the street one day when he was under the bonnet tugging away on a bar, the engine was idling, "What you up to Dave?" I said, "Big job," he replied, "... I think the head gasket has gone so I've bought some sealer to do it, just taking the cylinder head off." This imbecile was removing cylinder head bolts while the top end of the car was intact & the engine was running!! On top of that he was obviously planning to use a tube of instant gasket to replace the cylinder head gasket.
I explained to him the likely consequences if he persisted in this course of action and while most of my explanation was water off a ducks back I think the "expensive damage" & "serious injury" bits sunk in as he abandoned the job very soon after.
Anyone encountered any similarly clueless would be engineers?
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93fxdl
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Jun 23, 2016 14:15:29 GMT
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Davey
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Resident Tyre Nerd.
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Jun 23, 2016 14:55:19 GMT
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I worked with a girl who after asking me what oil her car needed preceded to fill the engine until oil was visible under the filler cap. Near on 20 litres apparently. Seems this is quite a common mistake.
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K11 Micra x3 - Mk3 astra - Seat Marbella - Mk6 Escort estate - B5 Passat - Alfa 156 estate - E36 compact Mk2 MR2 T-bar - E46 328i - Skoda Superb - Fiat seicento - 6n2 Polo - 6n polo 1.6 - Mk1 GS300 EU8 civic type S - MG ZT cdti - R56 MINI Cooper S - Audi A3 8p - Jaguar XF (X250) - FN2 Civic Type R - Mk2 2.0i Ford Focus
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Jun 23, 2016 14:58:03 GMT
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Jun 23, 2016 15:10:38 GMT
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Seen a few,mostly electrical i suppose with stereos badly wired into various unsuitable switchable feeds.
Came across an old girl when i was in the trade who regularly topped her oil up by pouring it in the fuel tank.
Worked on a single cylinder Tamaha bike once that had a plug fitted that was too long and hit the piston when tightened.The guy ran it like that just making sure the thing was three or four turns unscrewed before he went anywhere.
An old mate of mine who had a Volvo 343 vario used to make me laugh. He was clueless and didn't attempt anything himself but when i worked on it he would always rub his hands around under the bonnet and get them mucky so it looked like he'd done something useful !
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Jun 23, 2016 15:26:01 GMT
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A mate of mine a couple of years back bought a clio sport off his cousin that he was going to turn into a track car.
When we went to pick it up his cousin told us he had just topped the oil up as the engine was rattling abit. We didn't think anything of it and drove off, got a few hundred yards down the road and the car started spluttering, looked in the rear view mirror to discover we had caused the biggest smoke screen I have ever seen through the main high street, you honestly couldn't see anything through the fog for whole distance we had driven.
Turned out he had topped the oil up to the top of the dipstick!
Luckily we drained a few litres out and the car survived.
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Jun 23, 2016 15:52:54 GMT
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I worked with a girl who after asking me what oil her car needed preceded to fill the engine until oil was visible under the filler cap. Near on 20 litres apparently. Seems this is quite a common mistake. My Dad's old Boss went one better than this! Early 1980's in the Engineering Department of a Council which I won't name, the Boss in question was Head of Department & a Civil Engineer. He'd recently bought a new car, a Granada I think. One lunchtime he asked my Dad to have a look at it as my Dad was known for his under bonnet tinkering and the Boss couldn't figure out why it had used so much water since he bought it, he'd just had to top up nearly a gallon of water - did it have a leak? My Dad went down to the Executive car park to diagnose the problem. The problem was that the Boss had removed the oil filler cap thinking it was where water went in, (even though it was nowhere near the rad), worried by not being able to see the water level he'd tipped water in until the engine was full up to the top with water!!
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Jun 23, 2016 16:03:59 GMT
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Seen a few,mostly electrical i suppose with stereos badly wired into various unsuitable switchable feeds. Came across an old girl when i was in the trade who regularly topped her oil up by pouring it in the fuel tank. Worked on a single cylinder Tamaha bike once that had a plug fitted that was too long and hit the piston when tightened.The guy ran it like that just making sure the thing was three or four turns unscrewed before he went anywhere. An old mate of mine who had a Volvo 343 vario used to make me laugh. He was clueless and didn't attempt anything himself but when i worked on it he would always rub his hands around under the bonnet and get them mucky so it looked like he'd done something useful ! Yeah, old girls in cars do the funniest things! I knew a mechanic in a quiet village garage, a local old dear was regularly bringing her Vanden Plas 1100 in with starting problems, the plugs were always sooted up even though she was only doing low local miles, he'd altered the mixture & generally tinkered but it kept coming back with the same problem. After doing a bit more fiddling one fine day, he handed the car back to her in good running order, as she climbed in he noticed she pulled the choke out before starting the car & proceeded to hang her handbag off it. He stopped her leaving, asking why she had choked the engine when it was already warm & ticking over, she had no idea what he was talking about. He pointed to the choke and again asked why she had pulled "this" out, she replied as if he was an idiot, "Well that's my handbag hanger, I always hang my handbag off it when I drive". Sooty spark plug mystery solved!
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Last Edit: Jun 23, 2016 16:05:11 GMT by MkX
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Jun 23, 2016 16:31:35 GMT
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Seen a few,mostly electrical i suppose with stereos badly wired into various unsuitable switchable feeds. Came across an old girl when i was in the trade who regularly topped her oil up by pouring it in the fuel tank. Worked on a single cylinder Tamaha bike once that had a plug fitted that was too long and hit the piston when tightened.The guy ran it like that just making sure the thing was three or four turns unscrewed before he went anywhere. An old mate of mine who had a Volvo 343 vario used to make me laugh. He was clueless and didn't attempt anything himself but when i worked on it he would always rub his hands around under the bonnet and get them mucky so it looked like he'd done something useful ! Yeah, old girls in cars do the funniest things! I knew a mechanic in a quiet village garage, a local old dear was regularly bringing her Vanden Plas 1100 in with starting problems, the plugs were always sooted up even though she was only doing low local miles, he'd altered the mixture & generally tinkered but it kept coming back with the same problem. After doing a bit more fiddling one fine day, he handed the car back to her in good running order, as she climbed in he noticed she pulled the choke out before starting the car & proceeded to hang her handbag off it. He stopped her leaving, asking why she had choked the engine when it was already warm & ticking over, she had no idea what he was talking about. He pointed to the choke and again asked why she had pulled "this" out, she replied as if he was an idiot, "Well that's my handbag hanger, I always hang my handbag off it when I drive". Sooty spark plug mystery solved! Lol,something my good lady would no doubt do if she had a choke ! Currently she hangs her bag off the gearlever even if i'm driving. Reminds me of another one,i'm sure she won't mind me telling. One dark night she came home from work and said her Tigra had "felt a bit funny" on the drive home. Cue me going out and seeing a cracked wheel with the offside front tyre almost off the rim and a hole the size of a tea cup in it.Turns out after a bit of questioning she'd had an altercation with a traffic island about 5 miles away,not stopped to check anything and driven home at normal speeds which would have been 50 mph plus for most of it..
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Jun 23, 2016 16:51:08 GMT
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Lol,something my good lady would no doubt do if she had a choke ! Currently she hangs her bag off the gearlever even if i'm driving. Reminds me of another one,i'm sure she won't mind me telling. One dark night she came home from work and said her Tigra had "felt a bit funny" on the drive home. Cue me going out and seeing a cracked wheel with the offside front tyre almost off the rim and a hole the size of a tea cup in it.Turns out after a bit of questioning she'd had an altercation with a traffic island about 5 miles away,not stopped to check anything and driven home at normal speeds which would have been 50 mph plus for most of it.. I heard of something similar years ago, Police pulled a car over at night because it was listing, weaving, making a horrendous grating noise & trailing a heavy shower of sparks. At the wheel they found a crotchety old dear who agreed that the car wasn't going right, the Officer pointed out that she was missing one of the rear roadwheels on her fwd car and asked what she intended to do about it, (expecting a reply something along the lines of "I'll telephone a recovery truck"), what she actually said was "Well I turned the radio right up about 5 miles back, I don't know what else I can do!"
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Jun 23, 2016 17:06:21 GMT
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Yeah,it's frightening really.. I wouldn't swap her for the world but she really has no concept,feel or awareness of things being wrong. Its a strange mix,she'll ring in a panic because the low screenwash light has come on but drive home on a rim and not realise That wasn't the first time she had driven miles unknowingly on a flat either,but it was at least still on the rim the previous time!
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Jun 23, 2016 18:47:30 GMT
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stupidest ive done was jacking a saxo up on one side and undoing the anti-roll bar, big mistake as it promptly shot up into the arch ahaha
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v8ian
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Jun 23, 2016 19:09:40 GMT
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My Cousins Partner is pretty special, Personally, I think he is just plain dangerous, he asked my why the brake pedal keeps going to the floor? Are you using brake fluid was the first question? "Oh yes, I top it up every day!!!"------ so you must have a leak!, jack the car up and look to see where,Then he told me he knew exactly where, because of the puddle in the street every morning, the fluid was pishing out of the handbrake shaft on the rear caliper, I told him not to drive it, and get it fixed.... OK he said. and went off to call his mate. I thought that was the end of it till he called and asked me where to get a caliper, now this was THREE MONTHS later, Have you been driving about with the dodgey caliper? Yep I put a plastic clamp on the flexi pipe so the fluid would not come out, so the Cretin drove about for 3 months with the rear brakes clamped off. Worryingly, he could see nothing wrong with this as he had stopped the leak!!!!!
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Last Edit: Jun 23, 2016 19:13:37 GMT by v8ian
Atmo V8 Power . No slicks , No gas + No bits missing . Doing it in style. Austin A35van, very different------- but still doing it in style, going to be a funmoble
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Wilk
Part of things
Posts: 528
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Jun 23, 2016 19:56:59 GMT
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I noticed a bloke at work had a rear brake light out on his Yaris When I next saw him I explained his drivers side rear brake light bulb had gone. He said that there were also a couple of other bulbs gone, one of them being a headlight He said it'd be ok as he was swapping the car in September I quickly pointed out that at the time It was only April. His reply was that bulbs on the Yaris are very difficult to change and only the main dealer could do them Anyone know how to change a bulb on a Yaris? ??
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Last Edit: Jun 23, 2016 21:19:01 GMT by Wilk
If it can be fixed with a hammer, then it must be an electrical fault
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BT
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Jun 23, 2016 20:15:42 GMT
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I worked with a girl who after asking me what oil her car needed preceded to fill the engine until oil was visible under the filler cap. Near on 20 litres apparently. Seems this is quite a common mistake. Yup seen it myself. I am pretty sure that I was once told this could result in a runaway if started? Anyone know if that's true? Had a chap come into us once asking us to check his 710. 710? What do you mean 710? He promptly walked over to his car, popped the hood and pointed and an oil cap, which had tightened itself upside down showing "710" rather that OIL. CHUMP.
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Davey
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Resident Tyre Nerd.
Posts: 2,163
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Jun 23, 2016 20:17:15 GMT
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I worked with a girl who after asking me what oil her car needed preceded to fill the engine until oil was visible under the filler cap. Near on 20 litres apparently. Seems this is quite a common mistake. Yup seen it myself. I am pretty sure that I was once told this could result in a runaway if started? Anyone know if that's true? Had a chap come into us once asking us to check his 710. 710? What do you mean 710? He promptly walked over to his car, popped the hood and pointed and an oil cap, which had tightened itself upside down showing "710" rather that OIL. CHUMP. It can cause diesels to run on there own oil.
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K11 Micra x3 - Mk3 astra - Seat Marbella - Mk6 Escort estate - B5 Passat - Alfa 156 estate - E36 compact Mk2 MR2 T-bar - E46 328i - Skoda Superb - Fiat seicento - 6n2 Polo - 6n polo 1.6 - Mk1 GS300 EU8 civic type S - MG ZT cdti - R56 MINI Cooper S - Audi A3 8p - Jaguar XF (X250) - FN2 Civic Type R - Mk2 2.0i Ford Focus
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bortaf
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Jun 23, 2016 20:41:24 GMT
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WAY roo many to list them all but a woman came in for some new speakers, they had blown cos she ramped the volume up to max cos the brakes were noisy, wipped the front wheels of to find only 1 disc and no pads, they had worn out, fell out and then the pistons did the braking till they ate through the disc on one side, when i asked her if she'd noticed at all she said the brake pedal vibrated (ABS kicking in) so she popped into us for "a look" She didn't seem at all phased by this as she "only used the car to run the kids to and from school" The above is the exact reason i didn't want the MOT to move to more than a yearly check. To be perfectly honst i allways thought the 710 cap thing was plums till a woman came in asking if we could take her 710 cap off so she could top up the rad The MIL did once top up the engine oil via the dipstick BUT she didn't overfill it or spill a drop !!! and in her defence she had watched somone top up an auto box in the same way, my MIL is great even using the 710 hole i make a mess
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R.I.P photobucket
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Jun 23, 2016 20:42:14 GMT
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If the engine's that full of oil, it'll just hydraulic 'cos of the oil in the bores. Drain it off, & smoke out the neighbourhood for a few hours!
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awoo
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Jun 23, 2016 21:08:40 GMT
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Back in the day my mate had a chavved up nova, which was half nato green half black. He used to carry around a can of spray paint to spray over the dirt as he couldn't be bothered to clean it.
Another total stupid one, another bloke, completely oblivious type, his brakes were squeeking so he sprayed wd40 on them.
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v8ian
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Jun 23, 2016 21:25:59 GMT
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One of our better electricians (lol) had a light come up on his dash of his vitara?, not knowing what the light meant,he pulled into a service station, checked the oil level, and found it to be low, so he topped it up, he has a 40 mile slap down the M1 so off he went, shortly afterwards, it filled with smoke, pulled over and switched off with the key, nothing happened, he had a runaway engine due to having filled it to the top of the filler, and the engine was now dieseling on its own oil, eventually the thing burst into flames and he had to call the fire brigade, which caused the M1 to be shut on a monday morning rush hour, Ooooops
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Atmo V8 Power . No slicks , No gas + No bits missing . Doing it in style. Austin A35van, very different------- but still doing it in style, going to be a funmoble
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