Finished installing the Accel High voltage coil on the fenderwell. so I lean over the fender to short the starter to crank the engine, not realizing that my chest was resting on the coil tower. 60,000 volts seem to give quite a root. jumped back and knocked my head off the hood. I'm much more careful of what i lean on now

about 15 years ago Iwas working at a GM dealer, I had long hair at the time. I decided to try to isolate a bearing noise in an alternator by getting my ear closer to it. some of my hair got caught in the pulley and pulled it out. Had short hair ever since..

 

Hmmm....where to start, in my relatively few years compared to most of you guys, I already have countless bonehead things I've done, as well as my co-workers, and my friends. Some would call this dumb, some would call this fun, but putting a snowmobile engine that was out of a racing sled, into a golf cart, I think had we not rolled it before we got to the highway, we could've run some pretty good MPHs. Also, jumping on the cheater bar to break the bolt loose, needless to say, it wasn't the bolt that got hurt. Bbbbuuuutttttt, go the bolt loose and finished the job on my buddy's dune buggy.

(Side note: make sure you have enough weight to balance it front to back, doesn't steer too well w/out doing that.Also, don't jump onto the cheater bar no matter how frustrated/tired you are, leave at about midnight, not 4 AM)

 

I got one.. When I was in the Army in Louisiana I was out working on my Ch*&^'s when I started to get bit by ants. I crawl out from under the truck and find a trail leading to a crack in the ground.
hmmmmm, fire will kill ants and I have some gas in this here can. After pouring the gas in there I lit a match and tossed it in the gas. Well, as soon as the fire came racing towards me and went between my feet I noticed that the crack went from the ants to about 25 foot behind me...


too close for comfort....

 

i asked my mom if i could move her car one day (back in 1999, i was 12), drove it 5 feet and into a flowerbed with a brick border (bricks used to make houses, stacked to a foot tall) and almost ripped the front-end off of it, to this day I drive a truck, and i'm 19 now...

 

While working at the local quick lube, I watched a guy reach in through the window of a standard truck to start it. He thought he would save himself a few seconds instead of hopping in like he should have.

You guessed it......it started up while in gear and drove right through the garage door while the monkey was hanging out the side of it screaming for all he was worth.

Once outside with broken, twisted sheet metal clanging all about, he finally was able to get the truck stopped just before it slammed into a few parked cars.

All to save a few seconds...................

 

the best one i can think of on myself (fortunatly i have been pretty lucky and had my witts about me for the most part. so far) i was working on my 86 bronco 2 (don't remember what i was doing to it) well got her all done fired her up listend (btw just rememberd i was taking my exhaust off at the cat since i crushed a pipe lol) the open manifolds roar. i was quite pleased with the fact that it could run half descent again and was going just head to the parts store for some pipe, hangers and a muffler so i could just pipe it out behind the door. well i learned that rolling over a small carry tool box made of plastic filled full of pm and craftsman don't make much when you crush it with your big ole four by four with open manifolds. well made it to the store got my parts and put em on (i loaded the tools i needed for it before i left) and upon returning when i came through the front yard to see a flattend box and a spread of tools i ask mom what happend. her words "your dumb *** ran it over when you backed out." thankfully my dremmel (had to cut the pipe with something) got put back in it's case and taken in. no tools broke. no tools lost. got a nicer box out of it to lol.

the other day at work i watch a 40 year expierenced tech drive a van out (he's pretty sick so he's kinda not all there that day lol) with the exhaust hose and drop light attacthed to it. he couldn't hear me (everyone else was on vacation). well when he got back i could hear was a few words. he came in laughing. the hose stayed in the parking lot. the light had a 1 foot cord left. i had 3 feet of it. it used to be a 25 foot cord. i imagine it looked funny on the interstate.

 

Today I was backing a 500 gal tank FULL of fresh biodiesel into the shop to blend with dino-diesel and was in a hurry.............oops forgot to put the nut on the bolt that was holding the trailer to the bucket of my tractor! It went over backwards,bolt came out, and over backwards it went!!!!! broke off the 1 1/2" valve and out comes the oil!! now the trailer is sitting on its back and pouring out all my hard earned bio!!! Had to use the bucket to force the tongue down while oil is POURING out, then it was bucket and barrel time.managed to lose only about 25 gallons. Made a HUGE mess. FABMANDELUX.

 

ouch, but hey, could have been alot worse.

 

i'll start with this didn't happen to me but

a couple of buddies of mine were working on a 69 bronco, getting ready for a mud run, they had just got engine running and another guy showed up, so they decided to show him how it was running , my bud that owns the truck is leaned underhood whilr the other guy is in truck turning key over. bud 1(guy under hood) is pouring gas down carb while bud 2 is turning key. yup, thing backfires through carb, catches bud 1 arm on fire with burning bottle of gas, he panics decides to throw bottle out garage door opened half way just as he throws bottle bud 2 in truck leans out side of cab to see what commotion is all about and get squared in face with bottle of burning gas. jumps out of truck runs right into half open garage door, knocks glasses of face, bud 1 picks him up drags him outside to roll around to put fire out.(on side of garage where dog liked to do his buisness) they got him out, drag him to hospital, with burnt face, reaking of beer and dog s**t, has bad burns all over face. etc. kind of hard to explain to nurses that you just threw a bottle of burning gas at your pal.
the good news is he came out fine, cant notice scars at all, he laughs and jokes about it, plus he actually went on the mud run, with face covered in vasaline.
when i heard this the first thing i gave bud1 was a large fire ext. from a fuel tanker.
bud 2 earned himself the nickname sparky and it aint from his red hair.
lesson learned for these guys anyway
dont mix beer with gas after hrs of wrenching.

 

Here is a stupid but fun one.

I was working at a Buick dealer (1980), in conversation I mentioned to another mechanic that you can make a cannon with acetylene (true). Little do I know but he tries it.
There was a complete engine on a stand, upside down. He calls me over and says he put the acetylene gas in the exhaust manifold, pulls out his lighter and says let's see...

He lights it and it just burns on top kinda slow. He says that don't work, that's a bunch of crap. Then he takes a big breath, (looks like he is about to blow out the candles on his cake). I said NO and ducked, when he blew he added O2 to the deal and pushed the fire down in the manifold.

It was deafening....I mean like a cannon (indoors too). Our ears were ringing, the black exhaust soot was in the air, it scared the snot out of us but we had a good laugh afterward. A classic "Hey, watch this" moment.

I am still amazed it didn't crack the manifold, cast iron is tough.

 

My son Harley was trying to get his 900 kowi started a couple of years ago, and was merrily spraying starting fluid into the air box under the seat. Of course it backfired through the carb's [all 4!]. There was a POOL of starting fluid in the air box about a 1/4" deep and yep it was burning, but very low. Before I could drop the lid back on the air box to smother out the flames the dumb kid leans over and tries to BLOW out the fire!! You got it, flame SHOOT's up about 2 feet, burn't off ALL of his eyebrows,eye lashes, and the front of his hair!!! Had a pink face and no hair from his ears forward!!! Every time my wife and I looked at him we would crack up!!.........His girlfrend however was NOT happy! FABMANDELUX.

 

I had to think on this for a while ... the last two are funny, the first is not.

Not really in my shop, but carrying a 20' aluminum extension ladder around the side of the garage from one spot to another ... kept it straight up so I didn't have to lower and raise it again. Something made me stop and look up ... about 2 feet from a transformer. *whew* Might have caught my hat on fire.

Next is the day I bought my Porsche, a 15 year old 911 cab with 54K on it. It holds 12 qts, has level and temp gauges in addition to pressure. I noticed the level gauge was bottomed out, so, knowing it held 20W-50, I dumped in another quart. This pegged the gauge hard immediately. Sensing I was doing something wrong I dug out the manual (I know, I know, but I had to play hands on first. Turns out the level gauge only registers the last quart, and only pumps additional oil in after the thermostat opens, so I'd overfilled it. So I try to drain 'just about a quart' out in the garage, drop the plug, and end up dumping about 3 quarts on the garage floor before I get the plug back in.

Lastly, this fall I'd been fighting lean burn codes on both banks of the '98 Explorer. Cleaned the egr, changed the o2 sensors, checked for manifold leaks, finally took it to the mechanic, informing him I measured 19" of vacuum at idle and shouldn't that be OK at 4000' elevation? He concurred and said they'd take a look at it. .... 'turns out I'd been cross threading the oil cap on the valve cover, which screwed up the vacuum system which triggered the engine codes. DOH! At least it wasn't a sock.

 

I was by my sisters house, with my g/f at the time... and my brotherinlaw asked me to help put together this 4 foot trampoline... So I did put it together, and I tried it out... I bounced once, I bounced twice, third time I hit my head on the rafters in the garage, and fell on my butt on the trampoline... did it all without spilling a drop of beer... not sure how I did that part.. But it was soooo freakin funny!

Another time, not too funny, I was under a 70 chevy pickup, taking out the motor, and I was cutting the exhaust with torches, meanwhile... my dad, decided to unhook the fuel lines from the fuel pump... needless to say, on a 95 degree day, I got all the hair on my arms burned off, and red skin from this huge fireball coming at me from down below... Horrible. then the dog gone wiring harness caught on fire, and it took 2 extinguishers to put it out.. thankgoodness the truck was just a parts car for a motor and trans!

One other funny story that comes to mind is when I was back in highschool. I was adjusting timing on my nova in front of my house, and instead of standing on the side of the car, and moving the distributor, and playing with the throttle, I was in the front, being my head directly over that small block we took out of that truck. So all I have to say is thank goodness for bandanas, otherwise I would have burned all my hair off... I lost my eyebrows. So for a few weeks, I looked like I was a freak at school.

 

me and a buddy was working on a 87 Tbird, with tricked out 302 and BW t5 .. anyway we had it on car ramps and the rear wheels chocked. (it was time for a new clutch) i was undoing the drive shaft while he undid the exhaust. i was pulling out the last bolt and notice the drive shaft was in a bad bind.. and grabed a rubber mallet and started hitting on it.. when it broke free the car rolled down the ramps and on top of us before we could even think about moving.. so when you have something in the air and something is in a bind.. see was it is before employing the convincer!

 

hence the reason i always make sure i have darn good parking brakes first. and why freinds don't me much lol. last clutch i did i set the front end up on jackstand about 3 foot in the air with the rear bumper almost on the ground. couldn't chalk the rears so i set the parking brake hard as i could and blocked the brake pedal down.went so far on one vehicle that i tied it off to trees so it couldn't move. that one didn't have a parking brake and brakes were next on the list. hey you do what you gotta but safety first. lol.

the brakes didn't get done first cause i was waiting for parts and i already had the clutch in hand so i figured why not lol. so far my over carefulness has payed off but every one has that one time. either that or im lucky lol.