What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

Quickstop [UK]

Quickstop [UK]

Combating adversyty.
I just dropped an alt nut (8mm) into the lifter valley and it fell into the cam valley and the crank case.

Going to flush the block with oil and hope it winds up in the pan and then maybe get a scope and see if I can find it. Tips appreciated..

I don't want to pull the engine although right now it might not be too hard.

Godverdommuh!
 
TNPhoon

TNPhoon

1of28
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

Quickstop [UK] said:
Godverdommuh!
Click to expand...

Uh...huh?

EDIT: Nope...I did something dumber than that...I changed the oil once and didn't realize that I forgot to put the drain plug back in until I had put 4 quarts of oil in and then wondered wtf I just stepped in.

Oh...and one time when I was a kid I was having problems with my bike gears...so I put my bike upside down and was checking the gears when my dumbass put my finger on the chain and the chain sent it through the gear sprocket. That was fun. Still not sure how I managed to not lose a finger.
 
BMFB

BMFB

Not to scale
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

TNPhoon said:
Uh...huh?

EDIT: Nope...I did something dumber than that...I changed the oil once and didn't realize that I forgot to put the drain plug back in until I had put 4 quarts of oil in and then wondered wtf I just stepped in.

Oh...and one time when I was a kid I was having problems with my bike gears...so I put my bike upside down and was checking the gears when my dumbass put my finger on the chain and the chain sent it through the gear sprocket. That was fun. Still not sure how I managed to not lose a finger.
Click to expand...

I did that once to a belt driven lathe, also not sure how my finger survived, the some of my nail even stayed on!
 
sytyguy

sytyguy

Moderated User
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

Injector clip flung off the injector, bounced off my chest, and went into the upper intake (tb was off), right down on top of a piston. Not too tragic.....pulled plug, rotated crank, and pulled out with magnet.
 
Icarus-54

Icarus-54

Donating Old Member
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

I can top that--I bought a syclone and two typhoons.
 
Chest Rockwell

Chest Rockwell

Active member
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

I learned the hard way what the "L" means on the head of the ring-gear bolts. Used an impact gun to bust all ten loose, and by loose I mean busted the heads off all ten. Simple project of upgrading to a better posi in my full-size truck ended up with rebuilding the whole thing before I was done. Whoops.
 
BoostedSUV

BoostedSUV

Active member
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

NJ93TY said:
Bought a typhoon!
Click to expand...

Agreed.... That was the first thought that came to mind when I saw the title!


Dumbest thing I ever did (years ago) was fight for 2 hours to get the trans into my el camino and when I finally did I slid out from under the car and tripped over the torque converter...
 
J

jpalmer

New member
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

Similar to yours, dropped a push rod into the valley when changing my rockers, fun...
 
Jimmy

Jimmy

Banned
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

Aboot 19 years ago,I failed to tighten the oil drain plug after changing the oil in my ole ladys 86 Isuzu I-Mark.

She made it aboot a mile down the road.Plug fell out,oil lost,and it blew up.

I ended up buying a junkyard motor for like tree-fitty, and swapped it out in the trailer park using a come-along hooked to a tree.


Funny part is,it wouldn't start after the swap.Finally figured out that water got in the gas tank.

Cranked it to drain all the fuel,thenn it ran like a champ for a few years until the timing belt broke and pushed a valve through a piston.
 
blazinmt

blazinmt

New member
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

After a long day on a John Deere loader (first time) I hopped out (still had the headphones and iPod going) and absolutely filled the hydraulic tank with diesel. I didn't realize what I was doing until I had it almost completely topped off cause I was still jamming out with the headphones in. Saved it though, just drained the tank where it sat and brought out a drum of hydraulic fluid and filled it back up! Good as new.
 
sycho

sycho

New member
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

sytyguy said:
Injector clip flung off the injector, bounced off my chest, and went into the upper intake (tb was off), right down on top of a piston. Not too tragic.....pulled plug, rotated crank, and pulled out with magnet.
Click to expand...

well michael, if your chest wasnt so big... lol
 
Foot Performance

Foot Performance

Donating Member
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

Pulled a Envoy around into someone else's stall got out of the car to open up the overhead door and I left it in drive so the car opened the over head door for me

One of my emplyees dropped and injector clip into the intake of a 3.4 while doing intake gaskets that one sucked too
 
djsy934

djsy934

Active member
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

Many years ago, had to of been about 18, I put a re-built motor in my 76 Ford truck and forgot the eccentric cam that bolts to the timing gear and runs the mechanical fuel pump. Took me along time to fiquire what was wrong. Simple fix, just added an electric fuel pump. Another dumb one was I was even younger I put my driveshaft in with only three bolts, couldn't find the other one and was in to much of a hurry to test drive my new mods and thought It would be fine...Wrong... driveshaft came loose and smashed the bell housing of my 727 torqueflight. Welded it all back together like humpty dumpty and ran it like that for years. Alot of self taught mistakes..Those are the ones you never forget.
 
Norm

Norm

Donating Member
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

I had a small block Vega and ran straight water in it all summer. It froze one night and I went to start it up the next day. Cracked the block on the lifter valley side all the coolant drained into the engine,it didn't run for very long.
 
B

bonesdmz

In Mother Russia Typhoon drives You!
Re: What's your biggest mechanical mistake?

Ha, I did that thing with oil change twice :)
But my biggest mistake was breaking the bolt from one of camshaft caps on my Honda. My torque wrench decided to play stupid games with me (some more, and more, yep, here we go). Its very hard to find these in our local stores, and I didn't have any time to wait for it, so I just said f@#k it and put everything together without that bolt. Stupid Honda didn't even notice :)
 
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