admit to your stupidity

[Hugh R]

Quicksilver, I think you get the prize. Lighting your flooded carburetor, now that really takes it.

[wheatdog]

Just finished total rebuild on VW motor and am ready to fire it up. I duck under the rear cover with a paper cup half full of gas, dump a little into the carb and tell my wife to turn it over before getting clear. The engine backfires and blows flaming fuel over my left chest and head. I run out into the yard and begin rolling frantically trying to put myself out. No luck yet, still rolling and getting very warm. My better, and wiser, half puts me out with the hose. I got off with some pretty ugly 2nd deg burns and total loss of hair and eyebrows. I looked as stupid as I felt. Had to lie to friends and aquaintances for weeks about my appearance.

[Jupiter]

A couple of years ago, my younger brother bought an old Volkswagen Golf Diesel, it looked quit good but technically it was a mess. The engine would not always start, and the shifting of the (manual) gearbox was far from accurate. He came by to let me testdrive it, and we could not get it to start again. So we decided to tow the Golf with my Volvo to start it, by putting the Golf into first gear and release the clutch, while the car was being towed. The engine of the Golf made a lot (A LOT!) of noise, but did not fire up. After two blocks we decided to stop because it was no use. It was then that my brother relealised, he had put the Golf in reverse in stead of first. We tried the same procedure in first, and to my astonishment it did start right away.

[Jamie Summers]

Three confessions here :

1. My second ever car - Peugeot 205 Turbo Diesel. I left the car at the pub over night and the following morning got my dad to run me down there to pick it up. I decided to let him drive it home to see what he thought of my new car. I gave him the keys, he unlocked and cranked it but it wouldn't turn over. We assumed the battery must have been too flat to crank it so we gave it a tow start and sure enough it started no probs. I got home and rang the dealer and gave them an ear-full about my 'non starting' car - they told me to bring it in next morning. So next morning tow started again and took it in to the dealer who looked confused and said ' you did unlock it with the key fob right ?' 'err no said I (left the keys in overnight as it was going nowhere !)'. So anyway it seems that when I gave the keys to my dad he unlocked it with the key and not the fob. Sure enough the fob is connected to the immobiliser circuit so there's no way it would have started !!!!!! So did I feel a bit stupid ?????????? Anyway what amazed me is that a factory fitted immobiliser is only fitted on the starter circuit, so all you ever need to do to steel a Peugeot diesel is tow start it !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2. Driving to my girlfriend's parents the alternator on the 911 decide to pack up - just managed to limp there by turning off lights, stereo, wipers, demist etc etc. Left it for a while on the driveway to see if it would mysteriously 'recover some charge' to get it to a nearby mechanic. Cranked it a few times with no result etc. Anyway had to roll the car forward to allow another car out of the driveway, so let off the parkbrake to roll down the hill a few feet out of the way and hit the middle pedal to stop which just went straight to the floor (no vacuum left in system !!) didn't have time to panic and grab the park brake so went straight into the back of future mother-in-law's Ford Station wagon which I punted into their garage door ! Fortunately no serious damage done, but felt pretty stupid !

3. Changed rear brake pads as a temporary fix for a stuck caliper this weekend - put the wheel back on and did the nuts up finger tight before dropping the car down to torque them up - only forgot to do that bit !!! I realised driving to the same girlfriend's parents' house on Sunday evening !!!!!! Pulled into car park on side of road and duly tightened them up, and once again thanked my lucky stars !

[JK-81SC]

My "learning experience" happened 20 years ago. My Honda Accord needed to have the parking brake adjusted, but I found by parking at the crest of our driveway it would stay in place. Stupid act part 1, done many times.

One evening I left the engine running, pulled the worthless parking brake and started opening the door. I heard the sound of the idling engine getting louder as I reached for the handle, my back to the car. Stupic act, part 2.

I spun around, ran a few feet towards the car, and got in my Superman getting ready to stop a train pose. Really stupid act, part 3.

Luckily the car brushed me off to the side instead of smashing me into the door. I stared at the splintered garage door and got the shakes. It's obvious that even a small import car rolling downhill is no match for a person, but my young attitude made me think otherwise.

[azasadny]

Several weeks ago I was doing a partial engine drop to replace leaky fuel and vacuum lines in my '74 911 and my neighbor and I wrenched on the motor mount bolt so hard we bent the rear engine bracket and had to use a die grinder to remove the bolt. Turns out that you need and air impact wrench to remove the motor mount bolts without damaging the rear engine bracket. Now, after replacing the parts, everything is back together and running well! I wish that I would have used an air impact wrench to remove those motor mount bolts!! Doh!!

[UTKarmann_Ghia]

I broke one end of mine clear off and had to have it welded back on. It's kindof a weird design and easy to screw up...go go gadget impact wrench!

[rgruppe 912]

my stripped 912 except for suspension fell on me the other day. i dont know how it happened. it was jacked up and i was only under checking out how to take it apart and it came down. i was on a creeper too so i was pretty sandwiched. luckily there was someone
there but when he tried to jack the car up the jack needed to be pumped a lot before it would work so i had to try and hold off the weight myself for a bit. now i have nice aluminum long throw jacks.

[rgruppe 912]

sucks when your cars try and kill you

[Jamie79SC]

We have a winner! Thanks to Rgruppe 912, this thread can now be closed.

[singpilot]

I have the winner of the stupidest thing.

A guy walked up to me on the street and offered me crazy money for my '80 911SC. He said he HAD to have it.

I took the deal. It's gone, and I am having serious withdrawl. All of my 911 parts are on eBay, and there is a big gaping hole in my garage.

Yep. Stupidest thing I have ever done. I still have the 944, so I have some red p-car blood in me, but it's just not the same.

[Hugh R]

Originally posted by Jamie79SC
We have a winner! Thanks to Rgruppe 912, this thread can now be closed.

I don't know, I think Quicksilver's post about lighting the gasoline in his flooded carburetor is pretty close. Although come to think of it, you can run away from a burning engine, kind of hard to run away from a car thats on top of you.

[Emission]

Originally posted by singpilot
I have the winner of the stupidest thing.

A guy walked up to me on the street and offered me crazy money for my '80 911SC. He said he HAD to have it.

Yep. Stupidest thing I have ever done. I still have the 944, so I have some red p-car blood in me, but it's just not the same.

First, I'm in shock your car is gone!

Second, what is "crazy money?" Let us be the judge!

[unclebilly]

I say that the guy who peed on the distributor is still the stupidest...

I'm guilty of a few of these: starting a car with a screwdriver while it was in gear and me standing outside of it, and giving my parents' driveway an oil bath on another occasion...

Here's one I did about 4 weeks ago, I put a new motor in my chevy. I was anxious to get it started before I had it all hooked up and put together so if there was something wrong I could yank it back out without undoing a bunch of stuff.

Initially, it wouldn't start - there was no compression, I had the valves tightened down too much (after they pumped up) so they weren't closing all the way.

I backed them all off and fired it up and continued to set the valves, back them off until they rattle and then crank them down 3/4 of a turn, move on the the next one. I was going through them the second time when my neighbor asked me, "how long do you plan to run it without coolant in it?"

It idled maybe 5 - 10 minutes, didn't seem to hurt it any but it can't have helped it any either...

I decided it was time for a beer (or 5) and waited for the engine (and my head) too cool off before adding coolant and putting the rest of the truck back together and restarting the truck.

[Craig 930 RS]

Spending 3 or 4 time the cars' actual value on a 3.6 Varioram engine transplant & trans rebuild ******

HAH gotcha all beat!

[bigrubberjeep]

My first car was not a Porsche.

What was I thinking?

[bill3667]

This thread is very entertaining, makes it so I don't feel as bad about some of the dumb things I've done w/ a car.

Worked at a gas station/garage:
1) trying to get a fan belt on w/ a pry bar that had a very sharp edge on the end I was holding, had my co-worker bump the starter, wound up with a nasty cut in my upper lip requiring stitches when I popped myself w/ said pry bar.
2) pouring gas (from a cup at least, not from the pump nozzle) in the carb of a car next to the gas pumps, car backfires, I flinch backwards throwing what's left of the gas in the cup all over the side of my head and right arm. Fortunately the hair grew back after a few weeks...
3) Popping the radiator cap off an overheating car..., again fortunately I was close to the water hose so the scalding coolant didn't stay on me too long.

At home, admiring the nice new fresh paint on my Volvo 242GT, I back the car out of the garage with the hood up, now my fresh paint job has a nice scrape where the hood hits the garage door handle on the way out the garage.

I don't even want to get into the things I did under the influence of "recreational chemicals"....

great thread,
Bill W.

[rgruppe 912]

by the way i had four jack stands under the car. the back of the car tilted and the front fell on the two front stands.

[vash]

wow, rgruppe. this belongs in the "luckiest thread"!

glad it wasnt a chevy.

[rgruppe 912]

thanks