winter clutch project - phasers set to FAIL!@#$%

[sand_man]

In all my years of doing my own repairs, I've never had a car/project fight me like this one!!! Not to mention all the times I've been into this particular engine compartment without a single problem. In the faithful words of uber underachiever, Bart Simpson: "I didn't think it was possible, but this both BLOWS and SUCKS at the same time"!

I think my car must have sensed my lust for the M5 (in that other thread)...let me tell you, hell hath no mercy!!!

From the word, "GO", I had nothing but problems.

Act One: It all began with the simplest of chores, draining the oil. I have several containers that I use to collect oil. All of my regular suspects were full, thus I looked to the only empty one I had, normally used for wifey's car. It's a large sealed pan with a shallow dish on top, and a small hole for the oil to drain into. I normally don't use this one because the oil flows faster (out of my car) than this pan will allow past it's small collection opening. Yep, you can see where this is going. To make matters worse, I dropped the freaking drain plug and it made a bull's-eye right in the pan's drain opening, causing a total blockage. OIL...OIL...OIL EVERYWHERE!!!! I've never seen anything like it!!! I nearly cried!!! My garage floor is toast!

Act Two: After fifteen years of trouble free service, my 3.5 ton floor jack blew a seal (more oil on the floor) as I was attempting to slowly lower the engine/tranny down onto my furniture dolly. Even though the car wasn't jacked up, and there wasn't a great deal of height, the whole shootin' match came down HARD! Furniture dolly broken!!! The dolly took the blow, so the engine was undamaged. BUT now it was crooked and listing and practically resting on the floor!!! NOW WHAT???!?!?!?!???!?!?!?

Act Three: It sucks to be a lone wolf! I found a floor jack rebuild kit in my garage and was able to get the jack fixed. So I jacked the car up, and with only two wheels working on what was left of the furniture dolly, and the engine practically on its side, I was able to drag it out from under the car. I separated the tranny from the engine so that things would be lighter and less awkward. I then ran to Sears and bought a shiny new ATV/motorcycle jack to replace the furniture dolly. However, how was I gonna get the engine up onto the ATV jack?

Act Four: I never should have sold that engine hoist (cherry picker)! So I pushed the engine over to my work bench. Then I made a loop out of heavy chain by connecting one end to the rear engine crossbar and the other end to a the lift eye on the front of the engine (near the throttle linkage). I then stuck a long pressure treated 4"X4" post through the loop of chain and rested one end on my work bench top. "Son, can you please come out here...I need you". I squatted down and rested the other end of the post on my shoulder. With every fiber of my goofy 6'-3" 190lb body, I stood up and lifted the engine off the floor! I was actually making up my own curse words as the engine dangled from the chain. It was like my own language! "SON...!@#$%^&...PLEASE...!*#%$%^%...GET THE JACK...!@#%&*$...UNDER THE...!@#%^&*...ENGINE...!@#$%

Act Five: Back in business? Not so quick! One of my "to-do's" was to replace a cracked throw out bearing release fork. The fork is held on to the vertical shaft in the tranny bellhousing by a roll pin. No amount of hammering with the properly sized punch would remove that pin. No amount of heat or PB Blaster or Kroil would touch it!! Even attempts at pressing it out wih large Channel Locks and another small pin would work. So three broken drill bits later, and the pin no longer existed!!!!! Luckily the new fork and roll pin went together without issue.

Act Six: Did I tell you guys about my new language? !@#$^& !@#%&* !@#$%&* !#^()#~!@#$ !#%&*(()

Act Seven:Time to put it all back together. So armed with my new ATV floor jack I get the engine back in. However, this jack has a safety feature!!!!!!!!!! All my attempts to lower the engine ever so slightly to get the mounting holes lined up, FAIL!!! The jack's safety catch is jammed!!! Here, have some more of my new language: !@#$%^!@#$%^&.....!#$%^&*(....!@#$%^&*()! At this point I am yelling!!!! I know people walking by heard me! I was beating on my new jack with a hammer to release the safety! Wouldn't budge!!!! I had to carefully disassemble this so called safety feature, while the jack was supporting the engine! I took all the shiny bits of metal that were once a Sears-"Deluxe"-Aluminum-Light-Weight-ATV-Jack safety feature and proceeded to pound it with a sledge hammer, once I got it off!

Act Eight: All of this Tom Foolery caused me to miss the Hickory/Asheville NC run to meet some other Pelicans and see the Drendel Collection! !@#$%^&...!@#$%^&*...!@#$%^&*(

In short, this is how I spent my weekend, and I'm still not done:

[930gt-40r]

This sounds like something out of "Christmas Vacation"
Don't worry about getting that pissed- I get so pissed sometimes that I speak in tongues as well. Ive thrown a 2-1/2 ton steel jack across my garage because the wheels kept getting hung up when I was trying to send the motor back into my car- my back didn't really appreciate that too much...
I guess its just one of those days.

[sand_man]

YES! That's it! I was speaking in tongues!!!! Not one thing went smoothly!

[AFM744]

Ahhh memories. Like when I was dropping this engine back in July. I got everything done, everything, except the actual lowering. I then realized I simply could not balance the engine and lower the jack at the same time. "Well I'm sure my wife could turn the jack handle and lower the engine... I mean that's not too hard".
FAIL.

I clung helplessly to the engine as it freefell 2 feet and my wife went into best-defense-is-good-offense mode "YOU shouldn't have made me do that!!!"

[onboost]

Sand_man,

You're correct.. you're wide-hip 930 is smack'n that azz for casting a lustful eye at that short skirted M5!!

Don't feel bad.. sounds like you're at least making a little progress. I'm kinda stalled at the moment based on the weather up here.

I ventured out to the garge on Saturday to get a few small things done, now that I've figured out I can handle a few tools with the new plastic splint on my finger.

What I didn't figure on was the pain I'd be in after 15 to 20 minutes in the cold (before the heater warms the garage) as the stainless steel pin in my finger transfered that cold right down to the bone and that hand started to throb!! Curses, foiled again!!!

Betcha got more done than me!

P-

[slow&rusty]

Bro - I applaud you!!! You are a survivor and inspire with your determination, regardless if all your tools break, your clothes are soaking in oil, the trouble light keeps blowing bulbs you keep soldiering on...way to go.

Plus your light hearted and humorous soul is definitely appreciated especially from the Slow 'N' Rusty camp.

Yasin

[911boost]

It happens to everyone now and then. I had some persistent oil leaks coming from the fancy valve covers I had on mine, so I did some research, read a bunch of posts on here, ordered the factory 964 turbo valve cover gaskets (the carboard type ones, basically 930 ones) and put the car on the lift in the garage.

Once up there, I removed everything, cleaned all of the dried baked on oil and grime, and absolutely FAILED to notice that the vavle covers were designed for the 964 type valve cover gasket.

Reinstalled the valve covers with the cardboard type gaskets, put the wastegate back on, was happy with how it looked, and started the car.

It didn't leak oil, it absolutley poured oil out of it onto the floor. I mean a complete steady stream out of the drivers side. Then it hit me, 'Doh!

Long story short, I don't have any leaks anymore, but what should have taken a little bit of time, ended up taking a lot longer than I suspected.

(the fancy valve covers I had for the twin plugging where machined incorrectly, and I was very pleased that when I pointed it out, the company sent me a whole new set overnight via UPS no questions asked. I should also mention that they had been on my car for about two years as well.)

Bill

[full quack]

Ok....I can relate,
Many moons ago, I'm out in a friends grandpa's garage, ten miles from nowhere, 1am in the morning, doing a clutch job on my 1969 Plymouth GTX. Car is up in the air, I'm under it trying like hell to slide the 200lb. A833 hemi 4spd out of the bell housing. Yank...pull...yank..pull...nothing. I'm doing this for a good 20 minutes..nothing, it's stuck at about half way out. Soooo...I look away, just for a second to reach for the drop light...as I turn back with the light...wooosh the tranny slides free, all by itself, and drops the 10 inches dead center onto my chest. The drain plug impales my just below the sternum, and knocks the wind out of me. Mind you, it did not drop far enough to clear the under pan, OHHH NOOO, just enough to pin me between the tranny-the under pan-the garage floor.
Did I happen to mention I was on a creeper!
So here I am, can't breath, got 200lbs of tranny on my chest, bleeding, alone, trapped...swell. I manage to twist sideways a little, allowing the tranny to slide down my side toward the edge of the creeper...do you see where this is heading? Yep 200lbs of cast iron hitting the edge of a creeper with a 135lb human on it. It spit me out faster than a hooker giving a blow job.
Did I mention the jack stands were right next to my head?
Yep, now I'm bleeding from 2 places...did I mention I had to be at work at 7am, and the GTX was my only car....yeh clutches can be more than they seem sometimes...sighhhh.
Mark

[mark houghton]

Man, I'm laughing my ass off here and not getting any work done today! These garage antics are just killing me, 'cause of course I've had my share.

On the topic of oil changing and the ultimate spills, I have sworn a blood oath to myself over the years to never spill a drop during routine oil changes. But for some reason - and it never FAILS - I always end up with oil down my arm, on the concrete, drop the drain plug into the murk. Never, in over 30 years of doing this, have I experienced a surgically-clean oil change. Never.....and it just baffles me.

Full-Quack's experience of being pinned beneath a 200 lb. tranny - while hilarious to read - was I'm sure a terrifying experience. Safety first, always have a spotter handy to rescue you. Of course, I can't say that I follow my own advice (witness: The time I had my thumb firmly trapped by the infamous Omega spring with no help in sight).

And on dropping the engine out; well, last winter I almost rolled the car by force of gravity through the garage door when I realized I didn't have the front wheels chocked well enough. With the car about a foot and half off the ground (I used a transmission scissor jack under each rear wheel to raise the car high enough to drop and slide the engine out the back) the car started rolling forward and the only thing stopping it was the rolled-down garage door. Just as the front bumper contacted the door, the car rolled off one of the scissor jacks and dropped onto the motor which had already been lowered onto my hydraulic ATV jack. So there I stood, with the car resting on the motor - with dire visions of huge dollar signs flashing through my mind. Well, no damage was done (other than a little engine tin being tweaked). Learn and let live. At least I wasn't under the car at the time!

[onboost]

Mark.. that one's hard to beat..

Sand_man.. back to work damn-it!!

[sand_man]

Thanks for sharing in my shame, guys! What was odd about this adventure, is that nothing went according to plan...NOTHING!

When I got a taste of how this was gonna play out, I didn't dare tear into in my cam housings to replace some weeping seals, which was on my project plan. Luckily, I can do that with the engine in the car...so I'll save that for another day, when all of this bad ju-ju has passed!

[sand_man]

full quak, that was a scary story, my friend!!!

[AFM744]

Last summer I did exactly the same oil change. I came home from a 20min drive and popped the oil tank plug... only to drop it right into the drain pan's hole which plugged it. The oil was hot enough to burn my hand when I went to retrieve it... and by then it was too late. Ten-odd qts of hot synthetic onto the contrete. I used a dustpan to scoop up most of it, then Simple Green and a scrub brush. But oil seeped up from the cracks for months!
I was finishing reinstalling the motor on my Audi S4 (turbo swap joy). The rear wheels were on the Rhynos and I had just lifted the front when the rears got down the ramps and pinned the car to the garage door!!! I couldn't get to a jackpoint (ramps in the way) and I couldn't get the garage open to lift from the rear!
I WAS under a new S-10 when the jack slipped on the undercoating and fell until it caught the sway-bar and bounced three times. Almost got my Darwin Award there.

[full quack]

I still have the scar from the drain plug, but alas not the GTX...damn thing would be worth 50-60k right about now!!
Mark

[cl8ton]

Last summer Bryan (x86boardwell) and I bleed my brakes after a caliper rebuild.
I bought one of those super easy, pressure bleeders from PP to perform this.

I was stationed at the master with the pressure bleeder pumping it up while Bryan went to each corner to crack the bleeders.

We kept yelling at each other “Howz it going?”…replies…”Looking good, 2 corners done and rounding the rear bumper to start
the other side”…I reply…”Great but man this sure is using a lot of brake fluid!”….”No problems, I’m just about done”

Bryan finishes up and comes to the front of the car and as we high five each other we discover 1 quart of brake fluid running down the
garage floor all the way to my driveway, I forgot to pinch off the overflow tube from the fluid reservoir

It’s amazing how much surface area 1 quart can cover!

I kept waiting for the Budweiser radio commercial “Real Men of Genius” to start playing

[A930Rocket]

Those stories are too funny!

I used to have a Triumph TR6 that I replaced the clutch in. Some work is done from above (they have cardboard trans covers!), some from below. While it was raised up with me under it, I moved and my forehead hit the trans. Your natural instinct is to move away from the problem. I did... The back of my head hit the concrete floor. Moved away from the new problem and hit my forehead again! After all the bleeding, cursing and brain damage, I finally got the trans out.

That car was a love/hate relationship.

[krasuskyp]

Jeff-

MAN - what a saga! I feel for you brutha. Best of luck on the rest of the process! I'd say 'hey well at least it can't get any worse' - but - note recent economic times - I dare not!

Anywho...

and

You Fargin Sneaky Bastage! F'n A, I was just LOL'ing here in me orifice - people all around walking by with me now crying over your FAIL pics and story, asking "are you OK"? Er, wait, isn't that a loaded question anyway???

ANYwho...

Again, tx for the laughs. I love others' stoopidity - I have sooooooo much of my own it's nice when it's not yerz. Hang in there, you WILL persevere. That which does not kill you only makes you stronger, right? Or like something, and stuff, and things - I think.


ps. I remember dying laughing when I saw that episode with that Bart quote - priceless. To that, I'll add one from the Sea Captain, as he exits Flanders' religious amusement park: "THAR!... She BLOWS!!!!!!"

[purplehaze]

I don't know whether to laugh or cry. So I laughed!

I feel for you, AND you had me in stitches. It takes a strong man to laugh from adversity, and you're the new poster child. Thanks for sharing your saga. We've all been there, well maybe close to there, but I think you set a new record.

Best of luck from here on out.

[sand_man]

Thanks for the kind words, Glenn! Walking away to create a thread like this, helps me! Honestly, the issues with the new ATV floor jack, pushed me to an entirely different plain!

[h20cooled7]

Good stuff , I got a good chuckle out of that story!!!! The stuff about the oil was classic, Im the same way about my floor,hate oil stains but own a aircooled flat six go figure.