Topic: Shop stories!

[Bootlegger56]

I really have enjoyed reading all the posts.  Although its not directly a shop story it was definitely a humorous one.  In the 80's while working as a QE for a large tier one supplier to the auto companies we were facing an extremely tough three day on-site quality audit due to our lack of compliance to statistical requirements demanded by the Ford Q-1 program.  At best we hoped to receive a minimum score with corrective requirements that would allow us to continue to do business with FMC.  The audit did not go well for us and on the last day before receiving the bad news our plant manager took the auditors to lunch in his almost new Ford Taurus station wagon.  They were suitably impressed by the fact that after multiple repair trips to the dealership the transmission shifted directly from first to third gear, the AC and radio did not work and the front passenger door could not be opened from the inside of the vehicle.  Upon a return to the plant after lunch the auditors contacted the local dealership, had the car picked up on a rollback.  The plant manager got a new car out of the deal and we passed the audit with flying colors.     

[72 yellow]

Same landscaping and excavating that I worked for in the mid-70's.  After the owners dad managed to nearly kill himself by being run over by a bulldozer he was fueling up(his fault), I had to take his place driving the fuel truck.  One day I got a late start out to a job site to service the equipment there.  I fueled everything up and one of the operators wanted me to leave a grease gun along with a couple of spare tubes of grease.  He said he would grease the machine in the morning.   This is a big no-no due to kids playing on the equipment after everyone has left.  Sure enough I got a call in the morning from him  saying some kids found the grease and had lubricated the seat, windows and all the controls.  The owner told me to just drop off a 5 gallon can of diesel fuel and a couple of rolls of paper towels and let him clean up the mess as I had warned him about what would happen. 

[750cafe]

In the shop we had this insurance job, PT Cruiser got hit - I am not making it up - by a firehose.  The hose fell of a firetruck and the nozzle ended up on the rear axle and banged the body on the way.

The fix was not difficult, and we had it done in few days, but the owner insisted that the damage included some other things - like steering joints and whatever else was wrong with the car including some body panels that could never be touched by that nozzle.  Obviously he wanted to milk the county that was paying for the damage done by the firetruck.  Anyway, we fixed all those other problems, but the owner did not get the car back.  The extra time in the shop was enough for the collecting agency to find this PT Cruiser and since the owner was like a year behind on car payments, they repossessed the car.

AMEN!!!
The cheating bastid got EXACTLY what he deserved!
LMAO!!!!

Eric

[Grnrngr]

Just after graduating high school I was working the closing shift at a gas station, occasionally, one of the daytime employees would come to do this or that. One night one of the guys brought in his bedless 56 ford pickup and said he needed to put it up on the lift. About ten minutes later, I hear yelling and screaming in the service bay, I run in, the lift is all the way up, and he's standing under the front, arms over his head holding his truck up on the lift. He had set the pads like normal, but with no bed, the truck was seriously front heavy and it was ass in the air balancing right on the front edge of the lift arms. I ran over, lowered the lift and laughed a lot. That was a fun job, and learned a lot too. U-joint went bad, the boss says "it's easy, put it on the lift, drop the drive line, hammer out the old ones, tap the new ones in gently and put it back together". Easy enough, got it on the lift, undid the back clamps and gently pulled the yoke out and got a face full of ATF. Managed to get the yoke back in before I lost very much, but I was sorta hippified back then, long hair, beard, and such..and the boss says "oh yeah, when you pull the yoke, we have this cap you slide into the hole so the oil doesn't leak out.."

[Don R]

 This one some of you might remember, it happened in my shop and played out here. My brother got a nastygram from the city about his collection of cb's in his yard. I went over to help him straighten things up and he mentioned one bike had a sweet 836, one had a nice frame and if I took them home I could build a nice bike almost for free.
 In the meantime I found a K0 with an 836 (812) Lester mags and priced about what the mags were selling for then. I bought it and rushed home to get it running. Using parts from all of them I had it starting in no time, but it would only run for a few seconds and then die. I hooked up an IV bottle for fuel, cleaned the carbs, same thing. I changed the coils, Same thing, I temp wired the entire ignition, same thing ran the valves twice same thing, different set of carbs, same thing.
 My brother said lets just swap the engine from the other bike so we can ride this year. I said OK, we each pulled an engine.  The next day I put in the other engine. Cranked it up, it started ran 5 seconds and died.  This had gone on for two weeks and no relief in sight!

 I decided to start drinking. I got a beer, sat down and called my brother. I told him I had swapped everything twice except the frame and the exhaust.  EXHAUST! That's when the light bulb lit up, I hung up, pulled the baffle out of the muffler and the PO had wrapped new pink fiberglass over the baffle. He had covered the inside of the outlet and the exhaust pressure had pushed the insulation up inside, plugging the muffler. Yep, fired right up and ran great.
 The PO had lied about it running good when parked, surprise! The engine that came in it was filled with carbon from being plugged up. When the newer engine started, the carbon came out of the muffler so bad I had to leave the shop, it was like a steam locomotive was running in there.

 Since then I got curious and pulled the head for gaskets, it was stone stock! The guy that owned that engine always swore it was an 836 after a few beers it was a 900, then a 936. Now it really is an 836, I made it one.

[trueblue]

A few years back we had an EF Falcon come in the shop.  It came in for a service, I drove it onto the hoist, set up the pads and began to lift it.  The wheels got about a foot off the ground when I started to hear some creaking.  Just as I stopped lifting the hoist, there was a horrible crunch and the wheels hit the ground.  The car had fallen in half only held together by the roof.  The floor and sills of the car were rotten.  It was a little hard to explain to the customer because from the outside the car looked mint, he was the original owner and the car was only 10 years old.  I'm just bloody glad it didn't wait till I was underneath to break in half. 

[70CB750]

Thats like this custom build Corvette we had in our shop.  It was build for a financier/developer with total cost $300,000 or so.  The builder used DOM tubing to make the frame, but instead of going 3 tubes in triangular configuration under the door, he used only two.  And on the lift it would bend enough to see and on speed bumps you could feel it flex.

It was a nice looking car and smelled like a suitcase from the 30 grand upholstery job, but when you looked closer it was like WTF?  lap seat belts only and anchored on the same bolt as the seat in fiberglass floor? If you knew a thing or two about mechanical design, you would not drive it around.

[rtbmrgl]

Working at a Volkswagen deal quite awhile back a fellow tech was hunting down an electrical problem on a VW Rabbit. In short he traced to a break in the loom. He pulled up the carpet and found a large bulge covered with electrical tape in the wire loom. The loom had been cut in half and butt connector together, around thirty plus wires. Apparently a body shop cut off the front clip and replaced with another from a wrecking yard. I guess they decided it was cheaper and easier the cut the loom. A real hack job, the weld connecting the two halves together was horrible also.

[750cafe]

Working at a Volkswagen deal quite awhile back a fellow tech was hunting down an electrical problem on a VW Rabbit. In short he traced to a break in the loom. He pulled up the carpet and found a large bulge covered with electrical tape in the wire loom. The loom had been cut in half and butt connector together, around thirty plus wires. Apparently a body shop cut off the front clip and replaced with another from a wrecking yard. I guess they decided it was cheaper and easier the cut the loom. A real hack job, the weld connecting the two halves together was horrible also.

Wonderful. Did the cars owner know about it?

Eric

[bjbuchanan]

Working at a Volkswagen deal quite awhile back a fellow tech was hunting down an electrical problem on a VW Rabbit. In short he traced to a break in the loom. He pulled up the carpet and found a large bulge covered with electrical tape in the wire loom. The loom had been cut in half and butt connector together, around thirty plus wires. Apparently a body shop cut off the front clip and replaced with another from a wrecking yard. I guess they decided it was cheaper and easier the cut the loom. A real hack job, the weld connecting the two halves together was horrible also.

Wonderful. Did the cars owner know about it?

Eric

I bet the owner ok'd the welding. Most people just want it done as cheaply as possible. If it was a better shop it would have been alright

[70CB750]

I remember a car that got rear ended and the owner enclosed the trunk with duct tape and also taped turn signals on top of the trunk - the type people use for cars behind motor homes.  He drove it through the winter and sold it for scrap in spring.

I respect that, redneck or not, he played it safe and squezed from the car the time he needed.

If ladies do not find you handsome, they should at least find you handy 

[Pecantree]

Working at a Volkswagen deal quite awhile back a fellow tech was hunting down an electrical problem on a VW Rabbit. In short he traced to a break in the loom. He pulled up the carpet and found a large bulge covered with electrical tape in the wire loom. The loom had been cut in half and butt connector together, around thirty plus wires. Apparently a body shop cut off the front clip and replaced with another from a wrecking yard. I guess they decided it was cheaper and easier the cut the loom. A real hack job, the weld connecting the two halves together was horrible also.

There was a local car guy, Artie, here in Austin. His business model was to buy wrecked small cars like the GEO metro. He and his guys would cut the good front end off and the good back end off and weld them together. There was/is a big market for student cars here. Some were better than others.
Artie retired, I think he's down in Central America now. His former car lot is now a an indian restaurant called G'Raj Mahal.
Fun times
Steve

[bikebodger]

i work in a small bike breakers & repair shop,took in a 99 yamaha r6 that had an engine problem ,down on power not running well.sold it as is as a fixer upper to a young lad who seemed incapable of riding a bike.a week later he booked it in as a repair unable to sort it out.cleaned the carbs & found a restrictor kit fitted,in the uk younger riders are restricted to 33bhp.anyway removed it as lad had a full licence.new plugs fitted & sorted.the funniest thing i have ever seen is him setting off first wheelspinning then monster wheelie .his legs where all over the place .thought he was going to be a statistic .next week it came in swap against an enduro bike ,we collected that from his house with the rear subframe snapped off .its now fixed ,cannot wait to see what he does to it next time

[rtbmrgl]

Wonderful. Did the cars owner know about it?

Eric
[/quote]

I dont remember, but Im sure the tech made good notes on the R.O., I'll bet the customer wasn't happy

[lucky]

I was working on something....don't remember.,anyway I could not get the car to have lights. Several other shops had looked at the vehicle.
Checked everything ,you name it. Bulbs, wires, switches, ohmmeter connections etc.,.

Then I thought to myself what do you do when you cannot find the problem?
I was taught to go back to the beginning.

So I started by checking bulbs then the the fuses. This machine had glass tubular type fuses.
They all looked good. Still no visual faults found.

But then while I was looking at the fuses in the panel which all looked perfect
I also checked the fuse with an ohmmeter and got no connection even though the fuse looked good. My brother had taught me that you cannot see electrons ,you can only measure them.

I turned on the headlights and got no lights but then saw that when the current was ON, the flat strip of metal in the fuse would bend and open up a gap of a crack in the metal strip!

So it looked good when cold, but when a load was placed on it ,it would heat up and get a larger gap in it.

New fuse, job done!

[750cafe]

In glass fuses just look for any amber discoloration on either end of the fuse.
Often, it can only be seen hiding under an end cap.
Test light will show it very easily as no power on one side with power ON.

Eric

[DH]

A co worker of mine told me a friend of his once had an old truck that had a habit of blowing a certain fuse, which was a glass tube type. It escapes me what circuit it was, but it was a fairly important one.
One day the fuse blows, and the guy was on his last spare. Looking around, Einstien in his infinate wisdom, decides to stick a live .22
long rifle in there..........worked well for a good while, before making an escape hole in the left kick panel.

[rtbmrgl]

I turned on the headlights and got no lights but then saw that when the current was ON, the flat strip of metal in the fuse would bend and open up a gap of a crack in the metal strip!

So it looked good when cold, but when a load was placed on it ,it would heat up and get a larger gap in it.

New fuse, job done!

Interesting, Ill have to remember that one. 

[ofreen]

A co worker of mine told me a friend of his once had an old truck that had a habit of blowing a certain fuse, which was a glass tube type. It escapes me what circuit it was, but it was a fairly important one.
One day the fuse blows, and the guy was on his last spare. Looking around, Einstien in his infinate wisdom, decides to stick a live .22
long rifle in there..........worked well for a good while, before making an escape hole in the left kick panel.

a·poc·ry·phal
əˈpäkrəfəl/Submit
adjective
1.
(of a story or statement) of doubtful authenticity, although widely circulated as being true.
"an apocryphal story about a former president"
synonyms:   fictitious, made-up, untrue, fabricated, false, spurious; More

http://www.snopes.com/autos/techno/fuse.asp

[Bailgang]

Working at a Volkswagen deal quite awhile back a fellow tech was hunting down an electrical problem on a VW Rabbit. In short he traced to a break in the loom. He pulled up the carpet and found a large bulge covered with electrical tape in the wire loom. The loom had been cut in half and butt connector together, around thirty plus wires. Apparently a body shop cut off the front clip and replaced with another from a wrecking yard. I guess they decided it was cheaper and easier the cut the loom. A real hack job, the weld connecting the two halves together was horrible also.

I can relate to that a bit. Years ago I had a 78 Trans Am that I was installing new rear quarter panels on and was doing some welding down around the bottom rear corner of the drivers side door. After I got done and lifted my helmet I noticed the garage was all smokey and the smoke was coming from the inside of the car near where I had been welding. It was the wiring harness that provided all the power for the tail lights, brake lights and so on that was burning up from the heat from my welding. The car was already stripped down and gutted so no battery was hooked up but that area of the harness still was toast. Luckily the local salvage yards had an abundance of 2nd gen F bodies (camaro/firebirds) so finding another harness wasn't an issue but splicing it in was a bear. A whole bunch of soldering and heat shrink wrap took car of it.

[jonda500]

Years ago my valiant needed some floorpan patching done. I oxy welded some pieces cut from an old bootlid over the hole areas. When finished I reversed out the driveway - and found the car would not go forwards at all! Turned out the weld went a little close to the hand brake cable where it passed under the foot well making a tight spot. I soon realised I could yank on the cable under the drivers seat to release the handbrake without getting out of the car- spent the next year or so doing this every time I pulled up at a red light and forgot to NOT use the handbrake!

[bjbuchanan]

I was working on something....don't remember.,anyway I could not get the car to have lights. Several other shops had looked at the vehicle.
Checked everything ,you name it. Bulbs, wires, switches, ohmmeter connections etc.,.

Then I thought to myself what do you do when you cannot find the problem?
I was taught to go back to the beginning.

So I started by checking bulbs then the the fuses. This machine had glass tubular type fuses.
They all looked good. Still no visual faults found.

But then while I was looking at the fuses in the panel which all looked perfect
I also checked the fuse with an ohmmeter and got no connection even though the fuse looked good. My brother had taught me that you cannot see electrons ,you can only measure them.

I turned on the headlights and got no lights but then saw that when the current was ON, the flat strip of metal in the fuse would bend and open up a gap of a crack in the metal strip!

So it looked good when cold, but when a load was placed on it ,it would heat up and get a larger gap in it.

New fuse, job done!

I learned very early on to always check fuses with a meter as the first thing I do. I drove myself nuts to find out a glass tube fuse was doing exactly what you described.

[bjbuchanan]

I have my own welding story.

I was welding in floor pans on my corvair and noticed a weird dull glow a little away from where I was welding. I flipped up the mask and sure enough the floor was on fire from underneath.

I had moved/removed everything from under the floor except for the heater duct I had left propped there. I forgot to slide it totally out and the heat caught it on fire. Only thing handy to extinguish it was my Arizona iced tea can. The interior smelled like iced tea for about a month

[jonda500]

I was working on something....don't remember.,anyway I could not get the car to have lights. Several other shops had looked at the vehicle.
Checked everything ,you name it. Bulbs, wires, switches, ohmmeter connections etc.,.

Then I thought to myself what do you do when you cannot find the problem?
I was taught to go back to the beginning.

So I started by checking bulbs then the the fuses. This machine had glass tubular type fuses.
They all looked good. Still no visual faults found.

But then while I was looking at the fuses in the panel which all looked perfect
I also checked the fuse with an ohmmeter and got no connection even though the fuse looked good. My brother had taught me that you cannot see electrons ,you can only measure them.

I turned on the headlights and got no lights but then saw that when the current was ON, the flat strip of metal in the fuse would bend and open up a gap of a crack in the metal strip!

So it looked good when cold, but when a load was placed on it ,it would heat up and get a larger gap in it.

New fuse, job done!

I learned very early on to always check fuses with a meter as the first thing I do. I drove myself nuts to find out a glass tube fuse was doing exactly what you described.

I always gently tug on the ends before using these fuses (shouldn't pull off!)- even when they look new I often find one end is just pushed on and not joined to the metal strip.

[HondaMan]

I have my own welding story.

I was welding in floor pans on my corvair and noticed a weird dull glow a little away from where I was welding. I flipped up the mask and sure enough the floor was on fire from underneath.

I had moved/removed everything from under the floor except for the heater duct I had left propped there. I forgot to slide it totally out and the heat caught it on fire. Only thing handy to extinguish it was my Arizona iced tea can. The interior smelled like iced tea for about a month

My brother has a great (and recent!) one: he went to welding school to learn how. Then he bought a welder to take home and practice, along with one of those "automatic" welding hoods that black out the arcs automatically when welding, but go clear when not (very handy!).

Well, he was practicing welding bigger and thicker pieces on his garage workbench, to get better at it. When he started welding something 1/8" thick, he got about 3" along and decided to stop and see how it looked. But, he couldn't see: the hood would not go clear. So, he flipped up his hood, to discover the whole (wooden) workbench top was on fire!

Yikes!

Luckily, he had a fire extinguisher close by that a vendor to his workplace had dropped off for his evaluation. He evaluated it right there, and later told the vendor it worked great.