Worst bodge you've seen

[HillmanImp]

What was that thread on Retro Rides where some maniac was welding up an old motor (Fiat???) and he was going hell for leather wanging bizzarely shaped plates all over the place, then doing welding that a blind man riding past on a galloping horse would wince at.

 

I've tried searching but had no luck.

 

It really was terrifyingly bad and the guy was really getting stuck in, replaced about half of the chassis legs with washing machine sides just tacked on one of the corners and then leathered with a hammer til it touched most of the way round then snotted on, you could have pulled most of it off with your bare hands no problem. It was like that video where they gave spiders LSD and watched the shape of webs they made.

 

Wasn't it a Triumph Dolomite/Toledo?

[cobblers]

Might have been, it was something about that size

[dollywobbler]

Worst once I've seen on a car I've owned was the seatbelt 'fix' on my Nissan Bluebird.

 

Just insane! The clip was held to the buckle by the flimsiest chain in the world, and insulation tape...

 

Needless to say, that was sorted before the car went anywhere near the road.

[twosmoke300]

Wasn’t that terrible welding one a simca ? The predecessor to the Rancho?

[beko1987]

One of the rear seat belts in the xm never reeled back in properly, and the catch was a bit sticky...

 

 

My old Puma was good too, and affirmed my love of Court Motors in Marlow, on its last ever Mot, they wobbed up the very rusty jagged hole in the arch with black sealent! That repair outlasted the car

 

If I'd have cut 5mm off the bottom of the drivers wiper blade on the old laguna I'd not have had an advisory for 'big fuck off chip inside the swept area' but that was the least of its problems!

[TripleRich]

While stripping a Datsun 240z for restoration I discovered the whole rear panel was fiberglass and held on with filler and pop rivets.

 

[red5]

Friend of a friends Capri mk2 had brake judder forever. Had discs and pads done at least twice. I took drums off to check and noticed that the o/s b pillar looked bent. Some gentle probing revealed a lot of Wob. Some removal of b post trim revealed a length of wood screwed in forming bottom of b post and sill joint. Lovely.

[Skut]

Might have been, it was something about that size

 

http://retrorides.proboards.com/thread/135621/84-talbot-simca-1100-pickup?page=4

 

I believe this is the thread. Some images have survived the photobucket genocide on page 4.  Philibusmo commented that some of the pictures appeared to have been taken with a toaster.

[cobblers]

Yeah that's the one! The remaining pictures don't look as bad as I recall, maybe I've done my nans trick of telling the same story to myself til it's mega exaggerated.

 

That said the welding is really really bad but the panel fit is a lot better than I recall, perhaps the pics of the real bad stuff have disappeared.

[cort16]

Thinks of all the projects and stuff that have been ruined by those photobucket cunts they should be burned off the internet.

[Mr Laurence]

Most of the photos on that thread were working for me - it just seems like you have to refresh the page once or twice to get them to load properly. Here's a highlight;

[dollywobbler]

Perhaps it's stronger than it looks, because he towed another car to the NEC with that a couple of years ago!

[Bren]

[cort16]

Fuck I've done worse just need to hit it with a flap disk. Boom.

[Crispian_J_Hotson]

In the 90's and after the back box fell off, I made a rear section of exhaust for my Orion out of 110mm drainage pipe which was painted metallic blue/silver... Sounded like a fucker but attracted plod who thought it was an actual real exhaust pipe.

 

Also had a MK3 polo that after years of abuse started sicking oil up through the crank breather and making a bit of a mess of the carb so I disconnected it and put a coke bottle on it. Once full just tip it back in! Sold it like that with no attempt to hide the fact that it had a performance oil catchment vessel fitted.

[Bren]

You can be a shit welder but a good grinder.

[cort16]

That looks like gassless mig welding , which is virtually impossible not to pigeon shit.

[catsinthewelder]

I was quite pround of my sandwich packet and sweet wrapper indicator that was designed to last a week but was in place for nearly a year,  not even an advisory on the MOT.

 

I've posted photos before but can't find them.

 

[TripleRich]

That looks like gassless mig welding , which is virtually impossible not to pigeon shit.

 

It is, welding without gas looks like that no matter how good you are.  It will be full of pinholes, impurities and lack penetration through to the other side of the panel.  It will be reasonably strong and it will last a few years at least.  Wont be as strong as original but far better than filler and fiberglass.  

[SiC]

Reading the thread, it appears that he was using MIG gas but outside in windy conditions.

[UltraWomble]

Trowel mastic is also very good for automotive repairs*

[Christine]

I may have made an oversize steel inner bush and hammered it in  to take up the slack in my pajero rear damper worn rubber bush the other day. Passed mot...  

   Tap washers make good drop link rubbers if you drill them out a bit bigger too...

[overrun]

I once had a 'sports car' made up out of chopped up Metros.

 

The front hubs still had the CV joints in but minus the driveshafts

 

 

[overrun]

Are you talking about an MGF?

You beat me!

[Uncle Jimmy]

I once used a red crisp packet loosely taped over the bulb after someone drove into the back of my Imp.

 

Or be period perfect and use the yellow wrapper of an old school Lucozade bottle to mend a cracked indicator lens on your 70s banger.

[Uncle Jimmy]

The top bearing on the steering column of a certain 'ahem' vehicle I owned was fragged. Rather than buy the correct bearing I spun up a hardwood one on the lathe. Bish bosh bash, a dollop of grease job done

[They_all_do_that_sir]

Stupid Question possibly but what site?

https://mattersoftesting.blog.gov.uk/category/horror-stories/

 

Sent from my SM-A510F using Tapatalk

[Shep Shepherd]

Or be period perfect and use the yellow wrapper of an old school Lucozade bottle to mend a cracked indicator lens on your 70s banger.

 

I did the same with the inner wrapper of a packet of Jaffa Cakes on The Volvo in 2012 

[Talbot]

The first bodge I ever did was the tried and tested baked bean tin and jubblee clip to join two sections of exhaust together.  MOT man didn't even blink at it.

 

A 405 I owned for a couple of years had a non-working rear window, which I completely ignored.  When the vehicle went for scrap, I pulled the door card to find there was no mechanism at all, and a pair of self-lock grips were clamped to the runner to stop the glass falling down.  I kept the grips.

 

I also once had a BX that had a very leaky exhaust, which I really couldn't be arsed fixing properly, so welded it up where it needed, and then welded all the joints up too.  It then was one piece from the turbo outlet to the tailpipe... Would have been interesting seeing someone try to change a section on that car, but it ended up under the side of a 40-tonner about a year later (not by my hand, I hasten to add)

[somewhatfoolish]

The top bearing on the steering column of a certain 'ahem' vehicle I owned was fragged. Rather than buy the correct bearing I spun up a hardwood one on the lathe. Bish bosh bash, a dollop of grease job done

This is not a bodge, wood has a long and illustrious record as a bearing material. Lignum Vitae is still used in ships' stern tubes. As long as you avoid wood with a high mineral content like Teak which would abrade the steering column it's a perfectly acceptable substitute for what are usually plastic bushes.