I think Mythbusters were having trouble getting the thing hot enough to ignite the cap.

1980 MGB LE with a Weber DCOE 45. Throttle cable breaks. Pull out my Swiss Army knife and take the broken cable off. Then took the manual choke cable and hooked it up in place of the throttle cable. Used the Choke cable as a hand throttle. Made it to work on time.

On the way to Dodger Stadium my S line broke and I dumped 9 quarts of oil in a gas station in Barrio Hell.

Took the bus to an Auto Zone, bought a water line that fit the OD, some clamps, 12 quarts of oil, some extra tools and did the repair in the lot. Bone dry for a week until the correct part showed up from PP. My best tool was my Buck knife and a 99 cent screw driver from the bargain bucket at AZ.

Didn't get mugged, made it to dinner then the game.....drove 100+ miles back home.

I had an old ford Capri that had a Holley 4 barrel on it, drove to the beach with my gal, parked and tried to leave about 4 hours later. Car had a hard time starting. Found that one of the small O-rings that connects the front float to the rear was broken. Hmmmm I thought and then I noticed my gal was chewing gum. Took gum, wrapped around pipe, shoved it in and it got me to the hardware store about 10 miles away.

My old lifted beat up 4Runner snapped the lower cam bolt for the front a-arm. Basically, the entire suspension folded under itself. I was far from home, and far from civilization (I mean, 40 miles from the next intersection in the Arizona desert).

I carried spare parts and tools, but not a cam bolt (who would?).

The factory lug wrench was a two piece deal, with a rod that went laterally through it for torque.

Jacked the front end up, put the rod in place of the cam bolt, used Vice Grips on both sides to prevent it from walking out, and then used a ratchet strap around the whole thing to prevent the Vice Grips from opening. Drove home 60 miles that way, then found out it would take a week to get a new cam bolt, so I drove daily for the week with it still cobbled together.


Broke the driver's side motor mount in that truck when I flopped it offroad. Someone in camp had a welder, so we welded 3 links of chain between the frame and motor, with just enough slack so as to absorb the vibration. That chain is probably still on the truck to this day, many many years later...

I've helped rebuild transmissions, front hubs, axles and differentials while sitting on rocks in the desert. Off-roading tends to force you to learn how to McGyver things under the worst circumstances.

Rebuilt the oil cooler on my Peterbilt (3406B Cat) had trouble getting the rear end cover to slide on over the O ring finaly persuaded it with a piece of 2x4 wedged behind it. Finished bolting it up, filled radiator, ran it for half an hour no leaks.
Leave home drive to Albany N.Y. load up, just shy of Whitehall,N.Y. over heat light comes on then the buzzer WTF.... it's 18 below zero 2:30am.... coast into the Cumberland Farms, only thing open. flop the hood open,anti-freeze everywhere. yeh you guessed it pouring out the back of the OC.
Go inside to try and figure out what to do and as I'm talking to the girl at the register I spy a tube of Crazy Glue on the peg board behind her. So I sez to my self if I'm lucky that O ring might have a clean break in it so.... on go the coveralls and off comes the end cover.
Back inside, glue O ring , buy anti freeze, re install end cover and deliver load.
Sold the truck 2 years later never leaked a drop.
I still carry the new O ring with me.

From my former employer, a Mercedes mechanic since the 50s:

Visiting family in East Germany in the 70s. Driving an illegally hired Trabant and running it pretty hard on a hot day up a hill. This happened to be a high output P60 version [23 hp]. Oil and smoke start spewing out of somewhere. Tow trucks apparently don't exist. They remove the head of the 2 cylinder aircooled motor and find a hole burnt in the cylinder. They take a bolt from the door hinge and screw it into the hole. Replace head, keep going. Return car without mentioning anything. The best part is that apparently the thing ran for YEARS without a problem, other than a sagging door.

I've seen a number of bullets tossed into fires. Most the time they blow out the side of the casing. 22's will send shrapnel flying though.

Wow, some great on-the-road fixes!

My only one (well, 2) isn't so dramatic.

1) snapped clutch cable in city traffic in 914, where I had to stop at red lights. Kept it in second gear, drove slowly to try to time lights, but when I had to stop I shut the car down, waited for the light to turn green, and restarted it in second gear! The starter had enough torque to pull it off.

2) broken fan belt, 914. Had an old spare belt, but no way to safely jack the car up, get under there with tools, etc. Put the spare belt on as tight as it could go, then turned on the engine, which popped the belt in place.

My favorite rigs were on my 914s a long time ago, both times with my girlfriend (now wife).

Once we were driving down the interstate between Lafayette and Baton Rouge -- rural -- and I hit a pothole and broke a motor mount bolt. I was able to jack the cross bar back up and use the long bolt that my dual carb linkage pivoted on (found a nut to fit in the toolbox). I dropped a screwdriver in place of the bolt on the carb linkage. Got us home to New Orleans. About 80 miles.

My favorite, though, was when the then-girlfriend was driving the car down a two-lane country road about 60 miles from home. Throttle cable broke. I was able to route it through the grill and through the driver window. I had a clamp for, of all things, making fly fishing lures (I used it to clamp closed the gas lines that I tended to break until I got the proper psi fuel pump for the carbs). The lure clamp thing was the perfect handle for the throttle cable, I was able to pull it with my left hand through the window. Fun drive home that was.

Shawn

also, broken clutch cable. coming up to a stop sign i push the clutch in and thunk to the floor. as im coasting i blip the throttle and put it in gear and shut it off. a very painful stop ensued. in first gear, i crank the car. lurch, lurch, lurch until it gets up to about 2-3mph, give it some gas and off we go. as you approach the shift point for second gear, i let off on the gas a bit and ease it out of first. then i gently apply pressure to lean the shifter against second gear. as the engine revs drop the transmission sync's up and almost like magic it just slides into second. give it some gas and off we go into second. approach third gear shift point and again let off on the gas pull the shifter from second when the revs sync, blip the gas a little and when it drops down to where the trans revs match the engine revs it slips into third. you get the picture.

not sure about the science behind it but in high school i helped out at a mechanics shop and we used to do this to fetch cars with broken clutch cables. i have yet to run across a vehicle that you cant do this with (other than ones that require your foot to be on the brake when you start it). I was told its why they call it a syncromesh.

Yes, Porsches have synchromesh. They are essentially little spring loaded clutches that contact each other first so that the gear speeds synch up nice and smoothly, then the clutches can be compressed out of the way and allow the gear teeth to mesh for a positive gear engagement. Before synchromesh, on old cheap cars like VWs, or when the snychros wear out, you need to double clutch the downshifts and just time the upshifts right.

Wow, some awesome stories here!

My contribution isn't a big deal, except that it was my first ever DIY repair on the Porsche, or on any car for that matter. I had replaced the leaky fuel pump and, needless to say, I didn't quite get it right. I found myself waiting at a red light with my fuel tank emptying pretty quickly. Made it to a parking lot, shut the car off, and had a look. Whipped out the duct tape and taped the living hell out of the fuel lines coming in and out of the fuel pump. It got me home, barely.

Nice!

The mighty Trebant pictured below:

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1315966244.jpg

Back in the mid-80's, when I was commuting deep into the bowels of Northeastern NJ (Bergen County) I was driving a 75 BMW 2002. One morning, the car quit on the ramp from the Garden State Parkway to Route 17 in rush hour traffic. Anyone here from NJ would know that this was a major suck.

So there I am with the hood up (wearing suit & tie) checking it out. Gas in the fuel filter, accelerator pump in carb pumping fuel, distributor cap off & getting spark from coil wire by moving the points. Cars whizzing by my ass.

Something looks wrong....oh, the rubbing block on the points has gone missing. Five miles to work...crap. The points were Bosch, and had the opening in the contact arm, which suggested maybe wedging something in there to double as a rubbing block. I found an empty Tic-Tac box in the glove compartment, ripped the lid off, and wedged it into the points. I put the cap back on, and it fired right up, all though the dwell was probably a little off.

I drove to work, had one of my coworkers drive me to a foreign parts place at lunch for new points, and put them in after work, gapped with a match book cover. MacGyver, before MacGyver.

Pushed my 911SC - wearing suit and wing tips - 3/4 mile to my house. Rear tire ran over my toes.

Got me...beer out the nose...

Once in band camp, we was driving in a rain storm....wipers went out. So I disconnected the arms under the dash, ran a rope to each arm on the windscreen. Driver pulled, then the passenger pulled...voila.....

I'll play!

While this story is related to my long departed '79 Triumph Spitfire (think Lucas... Prince of Darkness), my permatune in my 911 decided to repeat the performance.

My Spitfire would intermittently die on the road. I would crank and get no spark. I would push or get it towed home and 20 minutes later, voila! it started right up as if nothing happened. Thinking the CDI Unit may be going bad due to overheating, I bought a can of spray coolant from Radio Shack, and the next time it died, I walked out, sprayed the electronics until they were nice and frosty and started the car. It started right up.

While I was awaiting the arrival of my replacement aftermarket box, I ran out of spray coolant. Shortly after this, the car died in front of a 7-11. I just went inside, got a handfull of ice and iced the distributor down. Worked great and I was on my way. I started carrying an ice chest to take care of my problem. The next time it died, it was at a stop light. I just got out of my car, opened the bonnet, iced the unit down, closed the bonnet and waited for the light to change. When it changed, I started the car and drove off. You should have seen the look on the guy next to me!

McGyver got schmatz.

I mean he once made a jetski out of wood? All the prop department did was put wood grain stickers over, you know, a REAL jetski??? I digress.......

Once the planets were aligned and I drove a Toyota. No need to MG anything. For like 20 years. But once a Porsche was in the stable it was "torpedos los." I simply adjusted the valves and repaired all the vacuum leaks on mine and it would not start. Again, no need to MG as all the info I needed was provided me online from, *gasp,* those pesky folks who once built the dang thing. Albeit through kindhearted pelicans and the like.

Best MG? There are many. For me, it always involves wooden pegs and sudden ship sinking level leaks. Think 'Das Boot.'

Nothing like stopping a 180F degree gusher with a peg and a couple of whacks. All in front of onlookers. Throwing the tools down as one walks away lends an air of drama.