The DIY Workshop Incompetence Thread.

[RoadworkUK]

For those of you aware, I've been up to my molars in unloved "executive" V6 car for the last couple of weeks, during which I was frequently moving one step forwards, two steps back during the process of changing the cambelt.

 

Several times I had to stop what I was doing, and then strip down to where I was several steps previously, 'cos I'd forgotten something, or done it wrong.

 

Most notably an innocuous looking pipe that I didn't pay due attention to, and later found that I'd routed it the wrong side of the PAS pump and into danger of a pulley/plastic water pipe/ steam everywhere interface scenario. Sorting it out required the fanbelt, several pulleys and brackets and the PAS pump itself to be removed, just to move that damn pipe.

 

After mentioning my own problems, Dollywobbler confessed to:-

 

"....Getting the exhaust manifold back onto the 2CV and sealed perfectly (which is not easy!). Then realising that the cowling is meant to go on BEFORE the manifold. DOH!"

 

And Pillock comes to the party offering:-

 

"....Bolting the gearbox up to the Golf engine, and doing all the engine mounts before realising the end of the driveshaft doesn't fit between the bulkhead and the bottom of the box, and is currently lying on the floor....."

 

In your efforts at waving spanners at your chod, which have been your favourite near-terminal errors?

[Negative Creep]

Jacking up an AX by the sill, watching it come crashing down as the sill breaks. Or jacking up a golf with a dodgy handbrake and watching it slide off the jack to the ground in almost comical slow motion

[Pete-M]

Peugeot 205 GTi clutch went wonky. Twas my mates car and we wanted to go and

spectate at the RAC rally at the weekend. This being the case we set upon an

evening of Pug fettlage fuelled with lager, naturally. Few hours - and too

many lagers - later we've got the gearbox out. Upon inspection we noticed

there's a little alloy stump that the clutch release arm pivots on, and that

it had parted company from the bellhousing.

After a couple more cans and a bout of head scratching we decided that if

the Pug was going to live in time for the best spectator stages we'd better

try to "temporarily repair"[1] it, after all, you can drive with a broken

clutch cable as long as you can keep the thing rolling and we really wanted

to get upto Kielder forest pretty soon.

We tried welding it, but that wasn't going to happen - especially with the

two of us being crap welders. Time for a few cans, and another ferret round

the workshop. Thought about drilling a hole in the bellhousing and shoving a

big bolt through, but couldn't find any decent drill bits.

 

We did find chemical metal though..

 

Couple of hours later the Pug is back together and the clutch feels fine,

all the gears engage, no clutch slip, so we lock the car up, and go home for

some kip.

 

4.30 am We return after a good few hours kip. Me in my Escort RS2000, and my

mate in the Pug.

 

4:35 am We're hooning it down the local lanes heading out towards the

motorway

 

4:36 am The Pug decides to disengage 3rd gear at around 90 mph on a tightish

left hander. It oversteered violently, left the road, caught the kerb,

flipped up into the air, caught a telegraph pole, snapped the telegraph pole

and barrel rolled into a field.

 

Never use chemical metal on Peugeot gearboxes.

 

[1] Botch.

[RoadworkUK]

 

...Never use Peugeot gearboxes.

 

 

EFA?

 

Pete's winning so far...

[scaryoldcortina]

A very long time ago, I bought a Talbot Horizon. It cost £10, I should have been buying bread and milk. I was young, inexperienced and had never owned or worked on anything not made by Ford.

 

The Horizon was a series 1 1300 - 4 speed gearbox and knackered with it - crunchy, vague and generally naff. Armed with the Haynes manual and some spanners, I decided to change the gearbox. I located a donor in a local scrapyard (a 5 speed series 2, already missing its hubs - bonus) and bought the gearbox out of it, transported it home in the boot and tore the car to bits. It took 2 days just to get the shaft nuts undone and the hubs off the bottom ball joint (this is when I learned the "hit it with a hammer" method of removal and the "get a bigger hammer" procedure) but finally, in a huge puddle of very smelly oil the box was out. In with the new box.... Oh flip it won't fit! Traced the not-fittingness to the clutch plate, which had the wrong splines for the input shaft. An older, wiser me would have got a 4 speed box about now, but young me didn't. I went back to the scrapyard (on the bus) and got the clutch off the S2. It didn't fit the flywheel... back to the scrappy for the flywheel. This did fit. Chuffed. On with the clutch, offer the box up again. It mated with the engine, but only 2 of the bellhousing bolts lined up. No longer caring, I decided 2 was enough. On went the starter motor. Then it's driveshaft time, and guess what? they are not only the wrong spline for the box, they are the wrong length too. Back to the scrapyard..... by now, it's been a week and I've spent over £100 at the scrappy and almost a tenner in bus fares. 5 speed shafts in place, hubs back on, wheels on, gerbox filled with oil. It is finally time to put the battery on and start it. Yay! I R mekanix god!

 

except..... the flywheel ring gear didn't mate with the starter pinion. It did make alarming metal-eating noises though. I bump started the car and drove to the scrappy for the starter motor. On the way there I noticed that the gears were still extra vague and it still crunched into second. AND didn't have enough power to accelerate in 5th. Oh, and I'd obviously squashed the speedo cable with something because it read 20 - 50 - 20 at 30

 

A short time later someone ran into it, and then it was stolen and vandalized so it got a short trip along the scotswood road (to see the Blaydon Metals)

 

I did learn a lot doing that. I swore I'd never have another Horror*, and started driving a W reg mini I was given for free. That's a whole other tale though

 

*I did accidently buy a pug 309 once, but before it had a chance to break down it rolled over on the road and tried to kill me.

 

 

Pete posted while I was writing this. Guess who Talbot got the gearboxes from?

[Volksy]

 

Not jacking on totally level ground.

 

bah...

 

That'll be a bent jack, sill, and spare... bailed out by my mates 207D bottle jack.

[Des]

Example of professional incompetance and what was kind of the final straw ending my time in the motor business about when it turned sour in the early '90s. I was sole mechanic in a small but busy workshop, came in early as there was a few jobs booked in, usual bollocks, all had to be done today, no question, after a long day of chaotic frenzy not stopping to even scratch my balls, it was getting dark when it was pointed out that I had 15 mins to get a half serviced Nissan Sunny to the MOT station, hared off down the road, realised I'd not refilled the engine oil, Nissan engine didn't seem bothered but I darted back anyway and threw in the plug, filter and some oil and got the thing MOTed, went back to workshop and straight onto assembling some disgusting twin wheel Transit rear brakes that the parts had only just turned up for, outside in the dark while the punter tested my patience.

Came in next morning and found the front pulley bolt from the Sunny sitting on the ramp where I'd left it when changing cambelt, I'd been in and off the Nissan countless times, courting disaster, had to ring the punter and lie that a small insignificant service item had just arrived and pop round to his home to fit it, the thing had done a fair few miles with only the woodruf key driving the cam, amazing engines Mr. Nissan.

[r.welfare]

Spending two hours assembling a suspension strut, only to realise upon offering it up that I'd put it together back-to-front so the lower mounting points were 180 degrees out. And you couldn't rotate the top mount separately...

 

It took two hours to assemble because I managed to compress the spring in such a way (compressors 90 degrees apart instead of 180) that I ended up with it banana-shaped, and couldn't get one of the compressors off it. Resolved by bashing one of the compressors round with a lump hammer - not recommended.

 

Using same lump hammer to free the alternator (the bolts were all undone but it still wouldn't budge...) from an Omega V6, in doing so causing an oil leak that I never got to the bottom of and resulted in me selling the car shortly afterwards. The car survives, though, so it can't have been that terminal.

 

Same Omega - cambelt change. Just couldn't seem to get the timing right - belt on at all the right marks on two cams and crank pulley, but when turned by hand always ended up a tooth out on the crank. Had to be towed to the garage for them to do in the end, as after I'd disassembled and re-assembled the pulleys 20 times I'd turned the hex bolts to cheese.

 

Using a ratchet strap wrapped round the lower arm to get a new suspension strut fitted to a Volvo V40 (just couldn't get the lower mounting bolts in otherwise) - in doing so I managed to pull the inner CV joint apart. Cue lots of grinding noises and no drive once I finished the job and tried to move it...and another tow to the garage. They love me there.

 

Trolley jack through the (rusty) floorpan of a Belmont - I thought I was jacking the bugger on a fairly solid 'rail' but apparently not. I must confess to 'sorting' it with P40 and underseal, mind you it only made £170 when I sold it (I did buy it for £51) and went over the bridge at the next MOT I believe. Shame, with the 1.8i it was a flyer.

 

Avensis dropped off the jack when I was trying to change the wheel - luckily with no damage to the car (the wheel was still on). Turns out, the jack supplied with the car was not the factory one - I should have realised this as there was a pictogram of a Sharalhambralaxy on it. And really, I should have been less lazy and used a trolley jack and axle stand. "New", genuine Toyota one dispatched from a helpful eBay-based breaker shortly afterwards and the original thrown in the bin.

 

Changed the front brake pads on a Mazda 323. A week later decided to investigate why the new pads squealed so much - and discovered that two of the four caliper retaining bolts (one on each side) had gone missing Quick trip to the Mazda dealer and all was well.

[dollywobbler]

Remember that shonky Bond Equipe I saved from scrappage? Stupidest bodge ever but within a mile of leaving the dealership in Wolverhampton, for the drive all the way back to Peterborough, the rear brakes were seizing on. We pulled over, jacked up the rear and had a look. What we should have done was back the adjusters off (though they might have been seized) but what we actually did was remove the shoes...

 

This proves that I had absolutely no understanding of how brake systems worked at this stage (scary to think this was only a couple of years ago!). You can probably guess what happened next. Yes, no brakes at all as all the braking pressure was taken up by wheel cylinders pushing against nothing at all and, of course, no handbrake either! Thankfully, I quickly realised this and my friend who was following wondered why I suddenly without warning turned right into a different road. I'd spotted the uphill gradient which was by now my only hope of stopping!

 

It did at least prove that years of driving older cars have left me always formulating a back-up plan should the brakes fail. I never panic if I can't stop and always opt to steer my way out of trouble, rather than simply pressing the brake pedal as hard as I can and screaming "mummy!!!!" I did feel like a complete an utter idiot though.

 

Happily, once I finally got the car back home, I set about fettling the entire braking system on that car, if only to teach myself how it worked to avoid yet more stupidity!

[Father Ted]

Trailered a BX back from Crewe.

Discovered that whilst on the trailer the hydraulics had settled and that it wouldnt start at all.

Discovered trailer had rather useful tilt bed action.

Discoverd that BX was so low that when trailer jacked up and handbrake on BX relaesed the tow-bar was low enough to embed itself in the tarmac leaving both rear wheels in mid air with BX rather amusingly half on half off trailer and jammed firmly into the A583.

Discovered who my mates are as they all fecked off at this point and the heavens opened pouring gallons of water through the open windows of the car.

[Cavcraft]

Attempting to change the fuel filter on my beloved BX 1.7 n/a diesel I managed to knacker the filter housing up (parcel tape sorted that) and break one of the LHM pipes that go to the reservoir. The later was unbelievably hard to fix, should have been a simple bridging pipe or suchlike but in the end I flogged the car to one of the BXP gang.

 

Real shame because I loved that car and had many great journeys in it.

[ashmicro]

Engine swap on my sister's old Scenic II. Total bastard whore of a job. Anyway after much grunting, swearing and spilt blood the donk was in, it took nearly 10 hours. I got in, put the keycard in the dash, and pressed the strt/stop button. Nothing. Nary a click. FUCK! I got out and checked the battery, starter connections, and all were OK. I got back in the car and tried again. Nada. I decided to have a smoke, so I lit up and threw my lighter in the general direction of the passenger seat. The lighter bounced off the seat into the passenger footwell with a "CLINK". As it landed on the engine ECU, which was on the floor.

 

D'OH!

[M'coli]

While removing a CV gaiter with a pen knife, I somehow managed to cut the brake flexi hose too - I don't know how!

Driving my first car off the end of the ramps on my dad's driveway .

Melting a Metro CV gaiter while heating up a balljoint with the blowlamp.

Etc..

[Louise2cv]

About a week after a gearbox swap for the 2cv (carried out in the compost shed at work) I went to lock the gates and thought "ooooo they look like driveshafts bolts" when I spotted three or four bolts scattered on the the drive

 

Rebuilt the calipers and thought I'd have a little test drive before putting the wings on. The nuts for the wings were on the bonnet hinge/scuttle panel. I whizzed off down the drive and slammed on. Of course the nuts went flying never to be seen again.

[Captain Flimble]

I tried to jump start a mate’s Discovery in the dark using another mate’s car, I got the terminals back-to-front. Required replacement parts so far:

 

2 x alternator

1 x battery

1 x main engine fuse

1 x alarm ECU plus 2 x key fobs

1x CB radio

This was in January and we are still trouble-shooting.

 

As a yoof I spent a day getting covered in gear oil in my Uncle’s pit swapping the gearbox on a MkII Ezzy for one that I exhumed from a compost heap. The gearbox was fine apart from the fact that I had reassembled the clutch release arm back-to-front. I realised when heading home at ten in the evening and the gear changes were a bit “notchyâ€Â. Back to my uncle’s for a long night of black-golden showers.

[John F]

Rebuilding a boxes 'o bits 1972 Triumph Bonneville... I'd assembled the bottom end & gearbox, was fitting the pistons when I dropped a small end circlip into the bottom of the engine.

 

I was busy swearing at it & contemplating having to strip everything down again when this little hippy lass that I knew popped over for a visit. "Why don't you turn it upside down & see if it drops out?" she suggested, innocently.

 

[facepalm]

 

Out it dropped, good as gold.

[flat4alfa]

Alfasud clutch went

 

I had no money. But I did have Mum's patio and a weekend

 

Up went the car after hiring a hoist from Mr HSS.

Down went the subframe/engine/box all together as Mr Haynes said so.

Apart the engine and box went.

In went the new bits.

Up went the subframe/engine/box all together as Mr Haynes said so.

Down went the hoist.

 

Out I went for a drive. Gears wouldn't engage. Oh no!

 

Rang the Alfa owners clubbers. Rang the friendly Alfa specialist. What had I done?

Up went the hoist again

Down it all came again

Ah I remember now! While it was all on the ground I had rebushed (bodged) the sloppy soup-stirring gear stick fork and tightened it with a fist of ham. Could have done this in-situ!

Up it all went again

 

Out I went for a drive. No speedo this time. Oh no!

 

I'd forgotten to connect it into the gearbox. And on these inline flat-four with gearbox behind engine, it's nigh on impossible to get it back in when fitted.

 

Mum wanted her patio back. So didn't fix it.

Went though 3 MOTs with identical mileage on the clock. Expected a letter but it never came.

 

Dick.

[AeroNautiCal]

A gazillion years ago, and this was my first ever engine rebuild, on my MZ TS 250/1.

 

I'd got the Motorcycle Mechanics magazine, MZ Engine Rebuild issue, the Factory manual and the Haynes Book of Lies... Confidence was not my strong point!

 

I used cardboard to keep all the engine bolts in the order they came out, boxes to keep each component in, and cleaned everything as I took it off, I was meticulous (actually I was afraid that I'd fuck it up!).

 

Engine rebuilt, it started first kick, and sounded great!

 

My girlfriend was hugging me, and as I looked up from the warmth of her congratulatory embrace, my eyes caught sight of the two bottles of Castrol EP 90 (IIRC) gearbox oil stood on the toolbox!

 

Despite my cleaning all parts to operating room spec', and hopelessly failing to lube all the parts which required lubing prior to reassembly, and utterly failing to reset the ignition timing, the little bugger ran beautifully!

 

A few months later, fitting new brake shoes on my girlfriends MZ Simpson, and a circlip goes 'ping' and flies off the circlip pliers. In my capacity of a novice dork, I'd not invested in such luxuries as spare circlips, and despite searching the entire workshop, including moving everything out of it (and I do mean everything!) I couldn't find the circlip.

 

As it was by now getting light, and I was absolutely hacked off and puzzled as to where the circlip had gone, I decided to go to bed, and as I stepped out of my overalls, the circlip fell out of the right leg turn up where it had landed several hours earlier, and rolled across the bedroom floor!

 

Thereafter, all circlips were referred to as "Ping-Fuck It's!", because they go "Ping", and you go "Fuck It!"

 

Fast forward a few years, and I'm fitting new offside rear wheel bearings on my Lancia Delta, all the while a friends son is talking to me, and (finally) as I pull out the trolley jack, there's the new bearing seal lying on the tarmac...

[Station]

Using a just-sharpened screwdriver (on a grinding wheel) to make a hole in some plastic engine component, and slipping with the end going a good 2cm into my hand.

 

[dieselnutjob]

the gearbox won't come out of an Audi that has procon ten cables still attached

this took me many, many hours to realise

also a 1.9D gearbox has different driveshaft drive cup things on it to a 1.9TDI

it would have been useful to realise this before getting the replacement gearbox in and reassembling a good bit of the car

 

also started up a 305 1.9D after a new timing belt but without the alternator drive pulley, just to see if it ran okay

I didn't realise that the drive pulley stops the timing belt wandering off all the sprockets until it did exactly that

luckily managed to turn the engine off with half of the belt still on

 

using plastic tie wraps to hold a spring compressed doesn't work. yeah like a 3mm strip of plastic will hold about 300kg of tension

 

changed the thermost on my sisters 309 D. one of the bleed screws snapped so I epoxied it up and hoped it would be okay. the resultant airlock blew the head gasket

[dollywobbler]

Once drove my 2CV over a set of ramps. Thought it was one more bump to get to the top but no, I was already there...

 

Thankfully, I had the front suspension set quite high at the time and got away with just a mild scrape on each sill...

[oldford]

I spent a couple of hours putting a clutch in my Cortina. Front end up on ramps, gearbox on the chest, covered in gear oil. Got it all back together, took it for a drive and the clutch felt lovely, I didn't even have any bits left over and remembered to put the oil in the gearbox. I got back, opened the bonnet with the engine running and noticed a scraping noise which was coming from the bell housing.

 

The following weekend I had it all to bits again to discover a nice groove worn into the inside of the bell housing by the new clutch. I removed the clutch to discover that I had put the plate in the wrong way round.

[dieselnutjob]

our 806 currently has two crank shaft oil seals at the clutch end

I was fitting a new one and pushed it in a bit too far

so I got another one and put that in as well

is that likely to cause a problem?

[M'coli]

Once drove my 2CV over a set of ramps. Thought it was one more bump to get to the top but no, I was already there...

 

Thankfully, I had the front suspension set quite high at the time and got away with just a mild scrape on each sill...

Y'see, when I did that it was in my first Metro. Dad had a set of ramps that were home-made (not by him, they probably came from the coup) and, while sturdy, had a steep approach ramp. He had made a couple of wooden extensions for them to help the Cortina's rear overhang clear the ramp and no doubt to make it easier to get up, but seeing as the Metro has such a short overhang I thought that it wouldn't be a problem.

 

So the first, gentle, attempt saw the car push both ramps up the driveway with neither wheel getting on the ramp. A quick re-position and try again - one side had made some progress but the other pushed the ramp forward. This probably happened a couple more times, I can't remember.

 

The attempt that was successful was a accomplished by taking a short runny-up at them and then climbing both successfully, up, onto the flat and on further to the stop (a bit of 2" angle) at which point the ramps tipped up onto their rear clattering the underside of the car, and before I could find reverse the pair of them skewed to the left, the car skewed a foot to the right, the left ramp popped out as it toppled over, the right one did much the same sort of thing except for punching the jacking point up through the floorpan as the car fell down on it.

 

The wooden extensions were used from then on, and I have a pair for the Halfords ramps I bought about 10 years ago.

[jonathan_dyane]

Another MZ related tale.

 

Fixing up a TS150 and building an engine out of a crate of three different engines, I discovered that assembling the engine required heating the castings to about 100 degrees C. At the time I was living at home, and normally such a task would be a simple case of waiting for mother to be out so as to borrow the oven, but unfortunately the parents cooker was a Rayburn which would only attain a suitable temperature when going out or just being lit. To get around this, I was very pleased to find at the tip a Belling plug-in oven, which I eagerly plugged in to find that the reason that it had been thrown out was that as soon as it was plugged in it tripped the electric. I could find nothing obvious wrong with it, so in desperation removed the earth wire from the plug, after which it heated up nicely.

 

Castings heated up, I removed them with my welding gloves and set about assembly, which I reasoned would have to be relatively rapid so as to be completed before the thing cooled. Placing the crank in position, I steadied it with my left hand and gave it a good with the mallet, which sucessfully drove it home, but unfortunately trapped my finger between the edge of extremely hot engine casing and the flywheel. The finger could not simply be withdrawn, and I could not remove the crank with one hand. Some moments passed before I realised that the only way to remove my finger was to rotate the crank (and so my trapped finger) to the point where I reached the big hole where the barrel fits. As I rotated the crank, the sharp and ill-finished DDR casting added a deep laceration to the badly burnt digit.

 

I then had to finish reassembly whilst bleeding profusely before the bastard thing cooled off...

[jakebullet]

Everyone's prolly done this: Finding a small hole in the floor when you've only got a part bottle of gas left for the mig. Then finding the hole is a bit bigger. Then finding you're out of gas, there's no floor left, the sills knackered etc.

 

3 days, 5kg of mig wire and several lifts to the panel shop later the small hole and the rest of them are fixed.

[fiatdaft]

edited as i was a page behind!

[Albert Ross]

Dollied a well tidy Mk1 Fiesta from Lincoln to Nottingham to sell it to an old Lady. Removing it from the dolly, the centering pin slipped out, and one wheel fell off the ramps, leaving it suspended, one one front wheel, early doors on a Sunday. It took an understanding pub footie team to lift it all off for me (I made a donation to their half-time "oranges" fund) Basically a fistful of notes shoved in one guy's hand. I hope they won their match. Certainly stopped me looking a proper tool. It was a honey of a 1.1 GL in Signal Yellow, with houndstooth trim. SKO773X where are you now?

[ashmicro]

All this talk of ramps has reminded me of the first time I put a rear wheel drive car on ramps. Prior to this, I'd only had my Samba and mk1 Fiesta on ramps. This was 21 years ago when I was 17. My mate's Dad brought his 2.9i mk3 Granada round for me to disentangle a load of baler wire he had run over. This car was an ex police car (RUC) and had the nuts tuned off it as they were armoured when in service. I put it clean over the end of the ramps, and it was stuck GOOD. Luckily, I was able to borrow a BFO jack from another mate who had a humungous Iveco Ford van.

 

I'm blaming my Mum for this one: when changing the damaged centre and rear section of the exhaust on my Dad's 190er. I had the arse end of it on the ramps in the driveway, and managed to get said sections off. However, it was getting dark, so I decided to call it a day, and put the car in the garage. It's important to note that even a manual 190 has a footrest, to the left of the clutch. Dad and I pushed the car off the ramps, with mater at the wheel, and told her to cover the brake and let the car roll into the garage (Mum had never driven the car). She mistook the clutch for the brake, and the Merc hit the back wall of the garage with a right old thud. Sum total of the damage to the 190: a wee tiny mortar-dust mark, which I rubbed off with my finger. PHEW? NO! When I opened the back door of the garage the next day, the bleeding wall started to come down! I managed to jam the door as closed as I could, we frantically pushed the Merc out, and called my mate Rab (bricklayer) who came round fast with 2x acroprops and a bale of block. He laughed his baldy head off when we told him what happened.

[jonathan_dyane]

Removing towbar from dead CX Safari, axle stands under jacking points.

 

I duck under and wire brush the fixings and spray them with diesel, then extricate myself to fetch the socket set. As I stand up I lean on the bumper to help myself up and with a crunch both axle stands disappear into the sills. Peering underneath my legs turn to jelly as I realise that the space beneath is no longer Jonathan sized...

 

I should have known better than to trust the jacking points, but it didn't look that rotten, and the sills were covered with natty plastic shrouds which hid the fact that it was rotten as a peach