That Fuckit moment!!

[daveb47]

That moment when you  realise something has gone badly wrong.

 

In the 60s i had a rather nice Triumph Herald and was given Rac membership by my dad.

So i had nice blue badge to install & was well chuffed to be able to do iteasily with forward opening bonnet.

Took all of 5 minutes.

Closed it and,FUCKIT.

Forgotten to shorten fixing bolts which had now punctured radiator in 2 places.

[rainagain]

Fitted head gasket to OH's Stilo, the locating dowels stuck in the cylinder head so I held the cylinder head the right way up and slipped the gasket on underneath before I lowered it onto the block. Built the rest of the engine backup and started it up only for FUCKIT what's that terrible rattling noise coming from the now oil starved cylinder head, I had installed the expensive MLS gasket 180 degrees round the wrong way and didn't notice. Had to buy another head gasket and strip it all down again. The best thing about this engine as well was the cylinder head was in two piece that had to be separated to get it off. 

[steve_earwig]

If we're doing cock-ups, the first time I fitted a car stereo (age 18) I had a door card off to look for somewhere to put a 6" speaker, not wanting to put it too far down I found a space big enough almost 2/3 the way up the door nowhere* near anything, great. Cut hole in the card, fitted the speaker and proceeded to put it back together. It was all going swimmingly until I got the the (yeah, you guessed it) window winder...

 

ANd there's been plenty of times where I've had a door or dash in bits, got it all back together and, while I've been clearing up the tools, I've found one of two vital screws/nuts/bolts that have had me taking the whole lot to bits again.

[smellmycheese]

Sold a pullout stereo in the LOOT for £30.

Mush turns up hasn't got a clue.

Stupid me offers to fit it.

Smoke billows from back of Goodmans p.o.s.

Mush fucks off with my thirty notes in his pocket.

[Skizzer]

I once bought an MGB.

[derskine]

Get yourself to KFC for a fuck it bucket.

[Taff]

In Bosnia in '96, fitting a new clutch to a L/R. Motor out, old clutch off, new pressure plate fitted to flywheel, motor back in, all tightened down, quick final check and spotted the friction plate next to my toolbox. That explained why the motor went back in so smoothly...

Still, it wasn't that dark by the time I finished.

 

 

tapped on the radiator using morse code

[Six-cylinder]

Fitting an underdash radio pod to a 1972 Fiat 500 I drilled a hole, there was a bit of a gap and then another layer so I keep drilling and then the petrol smell started!

[messerschmitt owner]

fitted a brand new cabrio roof on my Messerschmitt - then I took it out of the garage -door up and roof up and it caught on the door of the garage and I heard the riiiiiiiippppppp

[chaseracer]

^ Ouch.

[saucedoctor]

Fitting a bass cannon in to boot of one of my mark 4 Escorts (well it was 1992!). Job done, wiring very neat, feeling very pleased with myself. Drove the car out of the garage with the tailgate still open. Smashed the rear screen on the up-and-over door.

 

Another mark 4, this time my mate's RS Turbo. At this time he was also my boss @ East Antrim Motor Factors. He was running late for a date or something and he asked me to jet wash his car. I went to the petrol station and someone was using the jet wash. I decided to use the drive-through one instead, despite it having a sign on it saying "NO CARS WITH BODY KITS". Ripped off one side skirt and the back screen popped out. Lucky enough it didn't hit the deck as the wires for the HRW just about held on to it.

 

The best of it was my mate did the same thing himself a while later.

 

Same car wash in my 1991 Accord, went for the full monty wash/wax/dry thing. Thinking "This is taking a long time, I'll listen to the radio". Aerial comes up, and promptly gets torn off.

[jonny69]

Fitted a brand new engine in my Prefect with some other mods and got it all buttoned up and working, ready to leave for a weekend show. Different gearbox to standard so I had cut a new hole for the gearstick. Just as I was about to leave, dad decided to drill the four new holes for the gearstick gaiter and drilled straight through the fuel line in two places. ARGH!

 

Another time, also in the Prefect. Sunday, third week of September 1997 and the car was completely loaded with all my things ready to move out to university. Dad behind me on the drive, his Citroen BX also loaded up with my things. Went to pull out the drive but there were cars coming, so I waited. *BLAM!* Dad has nailed it and punted me out into the road. I looked back to see the wing and bonnet on the BX all stuffed in and the headlight smashed. Worrying about my poor cherished Prefect I jumped out to find a cracked lens and otherwise not a mark on it, not even the bumper was bent!

[dollywobbler]

I'd had my 2CV's body restored for the first time. It was immaculate. To save cost, I was reassembling the car. Front door hinges were amongst the first things I fitted. Naturally I had a huge jar of bolts rather than bolts carefully placed with the item they held in place. I found two that looked about right, though it was odd that they got difficult to turn some time before being tight. Then I noticed how they were pushing the outer skin of the A panel out as they were too long. DOH! The 2CV still bears these scars. 

 

During that same mission, I also hooked up the speedo drive to the gearbox and drove the car back and forth. Speedo not working and what's that odd noise? I'd not fitted it correctly and the speedo drive had burrowed its way through the back of the gearbox! Doh! Thankfully, I had a spare backplate, so it wasn't the end of the world, but I would still have rather not done it!

[Steviemillar]

When I was reading Trigger's gearbox upgrade posts on his 'Tina, I remembered the time I was fitting a 5-speed Type 9 gearbox to my old MK2 Capri 1600. I had taken ages to get the rear gearbox mount just right, nice tidy wiring for the reverse light switch, new prop bearing, 'box fitted with oil the works. Last job was to fit the starter and the b*****d wouldn't go in the hole. Only then I realised that the thin sandwich plate on 4 & 5 speeds have different starter motor cut outs in them...............

[Asimo]

Used expanding foam to fill the sills of my 1500 Beetle (after brazing on mot patches - the foam was to support the carpet and stop the draughts)

 

Then found that I had foam filled the hot air heater channels as well.

[brickwall]

Everything after age 25

[Fabergé Greggs]

Changing the clutch on the x1/9 in a hurry, I gave it a last squirt of clutch cleaner for good measure. As I scooshed all over the new clutch I thought to my self "this doesn't smell like clutch cleaner, it smells like oil".... Balls.

[Fabergé Greggs]

Also, when I first rebuilt a puch maxi engine and it took off backwards.

[Ghosty]

Get yourself to KFC for a fuck it bucket.

 

Last time I did that I got the shits.

[forddeliveryboy]

Having sorted out a cracked fuel filter top - it had a hairline crack in it, I wiped my mitts on the rag I'd stuffed between the filter housing and the top of the bellhousing. I forgot to stuff it back in place and quite a bit of fuel managed to leak over the clutch. Spraying brake cleaner didn't seem to stop the clutch from slipping badly, so in the end made multiple crossings of the local ford. First time through I very nearly didn't make it up the gentlr ramp, things were so bad.

[beko1987]

When the wheel fell off the zx and I thought "why didn't I check the wheel bolts at the services 1.2 miles back?" whilst hitting the deck at 55mph heading for the hard shoulder...

[twosmoke300]

Not me but a techy at a mb dealer I know . C class kompressor hire car comes in with a flood damaged engine . Insurance pay for a new complete motor inc charger , ecu , loom the lot . 8 grand ! Techy fits it all . Starts up - lovely . Lets it tickover while he tidies his tools/ checks for leaks etc.

 

After 10 mins he gives it a rev and bang - all the water that was hidden in the cooler/ pipe work gets blown in and hydraulics the new engine .

[beko1987]

Ouch!

[anonymous user]

That moment when you  realise something has gone badly wrong.

 

In the 60s i had a rather nice Triumph Herald and was given Rac membership by my dad.

So i had nice blue badge to install & was well chuffed to be able to do iteasily with forward opening bonnet.

Took all of 5 minutes.

Closed it and,FUCKIT.

Forgotten to shorten fixing bolts which had now punctured radiator in 2 places.

It has to be asked, did you call the RAC to sort it out?

[Parky]

My favourite was I was fitting some speakers for a friend in their mark 3 Escort parcel shelf. The kit helpfully had a template in it for cutting out the holes, so lined it up and off I went with the jigsaw. Two lovely neat round holes.

 

Except I had cut around the outer circumference of the template, not the inner.....

 

Cue comedy scene as I dropped the speaker onto the shelf - and watched it fall smoothly into the boot!

[Forty-two]

Trying to impress a young lady I had my eye on, I offered to install a tape player into her mum's car.  Did I know what I was doing?  Did I fuck!

 

One live wire attached to what turned out to be a speaker output and cue a plume of smoke out of the tape orifice.

 

Both relations with the young lady and the tape deck went up in the same puff...

[danthecapriman]

When I worked in a garage I had a Fiat Ulysse in for some job or other. Did whatever the job was, fired it up, ran to the big roller door and wound it up to put the car out in the car park, jumped into the car and reversed out the door... Or rather through the door as it happened!

I hadn't been looking and the door rolled itself back down again! As I reversed the Fiat out the bottom of the roller door smashed through the Fiat's back window!

I was sat in it and all of a sudden there was a load boom, followed by a rush of wind and smashed glass blowing through the car. I got out to have a look how bad it was and I'd bent the aluminium roller door and broken the windows in that too!

I felt fucking awful as it was a customers car and I couldn't believe I'd been so stupid! Fortunately my boss was very understanding and so was the customer believe it or not.

[captain_70s]

My thermostat in the 1850 jammed shut and the car overheated, the resulting pressure blew out the seals between the water pump and the thermostat housing which is built into the inlet manifold.

 

So, I got the carbs and inlet manifold off after much fucking about, and then got the new O-rings and bypass tube fitted, spent ages scraping off the old manifold gaskets and got it all bolted back on and reconnected most of the coolant pipes. I was working outside by lamp light and it was coming up to midnight at this point. I drop the new thermostat into place, put the top back on the housing and start tightening the bolts. All was going well until the LAST bolt, just as it got tight it started spinning freely.

 

The thread on the inlet manifold had disintegrated, FUCKIT. I was so close to having it sorted! If I wasn't used to every single job on my cars being an utter ball ache and far more complicated than they should be I'd have pushed the fucking thing into the sea, instead I threw all the tools into the back seat and went to bed.

 

The following evening I managed to bodge it back together by removing the washer giving access to a tiny amount of undamaged thread on the manifold and very gingerly tightening it with a spanner rather than a ratchet. 

[fred]

Having a strop on and in a mood about being nagged to shift  some dining room chairs over to a relative I could'nt abide threw them in the back of my Xantia and slammed tailgate down - ensuing lots of broken glass as chair leg was sticking up - which turned me into a foot stamping hissy fitting 2 year old as it was pissing down as well.

 

Xantia didnt fair well back then as a year later I had one of those Rockstar moments after spending two hours trying to fix my printer - rag was truly lost ripped it off its wires opened the bedroom window and threw it out

only realising as said printer was in mid air waiting for gravity to do its job - my Xantia was parked below my fecking bedroom window - Fuck it!

[jakebullet]

Mate #1 had an RS turbo vaguealike powered by a 'hot' 1.6 cvh motor. Silly boy had a head on with an astra and totally wrecked the car. We introduced it to the gas axe and salvaged what we could.

 

Mate #2 wanted the engine, sure we can squeeze it in a 950 fiesta. Took it back to his shed, when we hit on the idea of checking it still works. He borrows my spare gearbox, and we fire it up. It revs to eleventy thousand rpm, then there's a bang, it stops dead and a huge chunk is blown out of my gearbox. Turns out timing belt jumped a few teeth in the crash. N gearboxes don't like going from fast to stop suddenly.