According To You: Least Favorite Automotive Projects
There are some tasks that we just need to get done, without joy or relish in any moment of the activity. Last week we asked what automotive projects meet this criteria, and the good people in the Hagerty Community rose to the occasion. Perhaps while making a grunt, sigh, or groan with the thought of each dreaded task. These restorative efforts are not for everyone, and those who tackle them earn a well-deserved break after their completion.
So let’s see what made the cut—you will likely be surprised by some of the winners!
Anything on Anyone Else’s Car
Jeepcj5: Anything on another person’s vehicle.
ParaboTech: Definitely! Anything regarding working on another person’s vehicle. I try to be nice and helpful, but sometimes I really dread this.
Disdain for Electronics
hyperv6: I agree with Sajeev’s comment from last week, because electrical is the bane of the auto repair or restoration process.
With mechanical bits you can often look and find a worn or broken part. It is clear when you find the problem as you hold the part or pieces of the problem.
With electrical, you may have things like a broken wire if lucky but often it is a bad ground that looks good or is one ground of 10 in the car in various spots that can make things work or not work randomly.
Worse yet are the sealed units that you can not see or find damage. The Service book will say replace with known good unit as the test to see if it was bad. In other words, throw parts at it.
Don: My brother and I have 5 VW Beetles and we have fought more with the carburetors than anything else except for figuring out the wiring that previous owners worked on.
TG: Black boxes… the worst part of electrical. A bunch of stuff goes in, a bunch of stuff goes out, but only a handful of people know what goes on inside.
Roberto: Yeah, under-dash wiring is the worst! Except maybe for trying to get the windows to work smoothly and seal properly on my ’65 Impala.
Mark: Check engine lights. Not the idiot lights, but ones on cars with a low-speed canbus, a high-speed canbus and a diagnostic bus. You get the code, then the description, and then have to “figure out what the code means.” Then replace what you think caused the ‘puter to be unhappy and then wait for the light to come back!
Trekker: Yes, anything electrical can be a challenge. Plus, trying to find good replacement parts for a 47-year-old Datsun can be next to impossible!
Steve: Working behind the dashboard, and inscrutable computerized “black boxes” have been a personal Hell for me. I think the bane of many projects is parts support, with faulty replacement parts a close second.
DBDixon: As long as I had access to electrical schematics diagnosing electrical issues were not an issue. Sealing electrical fixtures like headlights on a truck and finding out OEM replacements were $1000+ versus replacing a bulb did give me a pain in the back pocket. Integration of electronics and electrics are also a challenge now.
Or Electrical Is Okay?
ParaboTech: Actually, I kinda like the challenge of electrical. Admittedly, OEM schematics make the project much, much easier. The real anxiety comes into play when you decide that an expensive component needs to be replaced and you really hope that your diagnosis is correct before spending money on a non-refundable purchase.
Of Dashboards And Sandpaper
DUB6: Oh man, Sajeev, under-dash wiring is indeed a nightmare to me, too. I’m a fairly large person, and in most cases, I need to remove front seats to just get in there to begin with. That gets me there, but then there is a) little maneuvering room, b) difficulty seeing, and c) the need to climb back out to get the one thing I forgot to place within reach.
But as much as I hate the above, post-body-work-and-pre-paint-prep is worse for me. Specifically: SANDING. GAWD how I hate sanding. And it seems to be a never-ending process. Work the metal, apply some filler, sand, sand, and sand some more. Put on a little primer and feel the surface. Then sand, sand, sand some more. I’m not really a big fan of the “applied patina” look, but I’m tempted every time I need to sand some bodywork to prep it for painting!
ParaboTech: Yes, this! I never knew I could experience claustrophobia until once time working under a dash in my twenties. I absolutely had to get outta there!
TG: I’m with DUB on dashes and post-metal bodywork. I’ll add doors and brake hydraulics
Anything Needing A Lift
Kevin: I don’t own a lift, I never have, so for me it is exhaust, drive shaft, clutch. . .anything that can involve significant time lying on the floor under the car on jack stands. Brakes, suspension, steering, etc typically can be done NEXT to the car on jack stands rather than UNDER it.
DUB6: Amen, Kevin. I’ve told this story before, but when I was about 16, a ’55 Chevy dropped on me and the lower A-arm—thock!—put a dent/cut in the area of my right eyebrow. Had it not been for the 14″ steelie rim I’d placed under the K-frame crossmember—well, Gallagher and his melon-smashing act comes to mind. Since then, I’ve never been totally comfortable lying under a vehicle—so I tend to over-support it with all sorts of “anti-dropping devices”!
TG: My neighbor has a lift which I use frequently. Even with the lift available, I find there are certain jobs (anything that involves transmission removal) on the ground. Lifts are extremely dangerous if there is anything in contact with the car and ground other than the lift itself. Also, you generally cannot get the car doors all the way open with cars on lifts, and any job that requires getting in and out of the car frequently are lift no-gos for me.
The Need To Improvise
Lewis: My least faves have changed as I’ve gotten older. Working under the dash of my ’63 Pontiac wasn’t a big deal at 18. I’d just position myself upside down, with my feet up on the seat and my head down on the floor, looking up. At 64, I can’t contort myself like that anymore. So, this kind of work has dropped from my “I don’t really mind” list to “oh, g-d, why me?” list.
Likewise, things that require more finger dexterity have fallen from the “that might not be so bad” list. I had carpal tunnel release surgery on both hands a few years ago. The pain relief was amazing, but so has been my loss of ability to pick up small things with my fingertips or manipulate small connectors in tight spaces (where I can’t resort to needle nose pliers).
In general, though, my least favorite thing to do is anything requiring some tool that I don’t have, forcing me to improvise. I don’t mind the improvisation itself; it’s the time and attention lost in the process, whereas having the right tool for the job in the first place just gets it done.
It’s Exhausting
Scott: Exhaust systems. Big. Heavy. Dirty. You assume every fastener is seized, or about to break off. You get to find out that the last guy saved by welding it all into one piece. You get a cat back only to find that the 1500$ cats are junk. I hate anything with a tailpipe.
ParaboTech: Exhaust systems for sure. Exhaust manifolds are the worst. Cramped work areas, special or customized wrenches and tools, penetrating lubes, waiting times, broken bolts in the worst places, and the ongoing threat that you will probably have to pull the engine to fix something that you broke while trying to fix something.
Bryan P: Any exhaust system work for sure. It’s the one thing I will gladly pay to have fixed.
Conversions/Restomods
Andy: Although I have not started it yet (I have the parts), switching from an FMX auto tranny to a five-speed. The clutch pedal assembly will require taking half the dash apart and removing the steering column and brake/clutch support. The actual tranny install looks straightforward.
Not old not grumpy: I inherited my brother’s 1967 Mustang convertible “restomod”. It has been cut up and abused by so many different people not least of all him that doing anything requires reinventing the wheel. It’s an adventure! I’m currently attempting to finish installing the aftermarket air conditioning he started. Finding room for those hoses and the fuel injection harness and the auto meter gauges and the aftermarket stereo is a bit of a challenge.
cdlamb: I have a ’31 Model A Ford Tudor and electrical was somewhat of a problem since I converted to LED lights, 12 volts (which required total rewiring), plus some added accessories too. My biggest problem has been the fuel system, and a trashy gas tank. I refuse to remove the tank since the car has a relatively new paint job and that would destroy a good portion of the front-end paint. being a gravity-fed system, the slightest particle will plug the carburetor. At 79, climbing under the dash to change the tank filter and address any wiring issues is all but impossible. Almost to the stage of hiring to get it done.
About Overengineering…
Binksman: Working on my wife’s 2001 CLK320. Best I can figure is that Mercedes hires engineers with sadistic bracket fetishes intended to cause harm and suffering to anyone who ever might need to service the car. My Dodge Magnum has the same NAG1 transmission, and both had a leak from the transmission plug port: a 10-minute job in the Dodge, two-hour job in the Merc. Layers of brackets, many unnecessary, all leading to me use up all of my known list swear words while wondering how Dante could have missed the “engineers who never turned a wrench” level in hell.
Organizational Issues
norm1200: keeping my shop organized and uncluttered. Yes, this to me is a project, and one that sometimes gets a really good sigh outta me. Getting organized is an ongoing project that’ll probably take me into the next century, maybe millennium: I still have glimpses of my first house—900 sq ft, 1-car garage w/ port, all dialed in after four years of weekend work, and working on my cars at the dealer.
I’ve been kinda lucky not mixing up metric & SAE fasteners. It’s something that, if let go for too long, can be a one-way trip down that rabbit hole. Fortunately, I can tell the difference between Nissan, Toyota, and other foreign hardware, let alone 60s-80s SAE bits. Staying uncluttered? It’s been a long while since it’s been that way, but I keep chipping away at it. I just bought $400 worth of plastic containers for my pic-a-part treasures, etc. and at that cost, I’d like to think it’s enough.
Everything But Driving?
Ben: I gotta say that at 75 years old, I love to drive cars but I hate working on them or cleaning and polishing them.
wiring is the worst worked on fords all my life many of the dealer techs were lost i got stuck with them 31 1/2 years i retired the newer cars are worst just took my car in they said it had to have sync be down loaded from there place got it back dont know whats wrong with it finally fixed it myself it was a 1000.00 part
Replacing rusted-through brake hard lines knowing the whole time the rest of the car probably won’t make it through another winter
Anything on a Mercedes. From when I purchased a 2020 GLC 300, from the showroom when they said I needed an appointment to talk to a salesman to changing the freaking in-the-cabin filter, everything is torture. I sincerely believe it is German engineering that drives the lousy serviceability. Japanese cars are not perfect by any stretch but occasionally you can spot a bit of human consideration in a design. On an MB? almost never.
I enjoyed the “dreaded electrical” comments. I’m a retired “electrical guy”. I saw it all from vacuum tubes to microprocessor equipped equipment. I am the only person in my old car group that has any success with “electrical” problems. Even the 60’s cars are a challenge since most are “modified” and NOBODY ever documents the changes (except me it seems). The number one issue I fix on 60’s cars is incorrectly installed or mismatch aftermarket “electronic ignitions”. I won’t mention product names or this would not get posted. A lovely young woman had NOT DRIVEN her Corvair for TWO YEARS because the “experts” could not get it to run well. It took me 20 minutes to fix the wiring and ballast, install a proper STOCK ignition coil, and then it ran GREAT. I don’t charge most folks. Now that I’m retired finding electrical problems keeps me active.
I have a Pipistrel motor glider, which is a bit like a flying Miata. All the electronics are behind the instrument panel, which is a few inches ahead of the firewall and beneath a very steeply sloped windscreen. With the glareshield removed, I can stand outside to see behind the panel, and even get one hand behind it. Unfortunately there’s not much one can do with a single hand. Anyone know a mechanically adept, sub five foot midget?
Agree with HyperV6. Electrical on any cat is a royal pain in the butt.
Should read “car” fat finger error.
Yes, I have idiot lights on the dash of my 74 Grand Prix that don’t work. I’ve taken it apart and realize the printed circuit is faulty or not making contact. I am currently installing voltage, oil pressure and engine temperature gauges in a small pocket under the radio on the dash which are more reliable than idiot lights. I wanted to keep the car original but this is safer. At least the dash lights, signal indicators and fuel gauge still work. I plan on also adding a tach somewhere not to conspicuous but where I can see it.
The problem isn’t getting under the car or the dash-it’s getting up. “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up” I used to make fun of those commercials.
At 74, I completely concur.
After reading the responses, I feel as though I have wandered into a Senior Auto Repair Club meeting. I’m 75 with 14 surgeries in my medical history including two back surgeries. Excessive anesthesia perhaps now affecting my brain but I enjoy working on my cars as much as I do driving them. Two of my latest projects were getting a Series 3 Jag E-Type 12 cyl. running. Purchased from a Florida based crook dressed in car dealers clothing who sold me a non-running “Good One”. Viola: A Crusted fuel system by Ethanol and a non-operative ignition by Lucas were the Oscar winners for best NON-performance in an English sports car category. I replaced most of what was the fuel system, rebuilt all four Stromberg carbs, bench synchronized them, synchronized the jungle gym throttle linkage then tuned each one to achieve a smoothed idle. Removed the original football sized Jag-You-Are fuel pump in favor of a Carter electric pump. After a few days rest I attacked the ignition system and installed a Pertronix reluctor, pickup and matching coil. Out the door went the factory amp and resistor pack. It (My mother, the car) fired right up and has been running great ever since. The car even sprays generously for mosquitos upon start-up. All of this for only one car-I had better not lose my affinity for working on the rest of them or it will be “For Sale” time for me. Now, about that ’29 Model A….
At 69, I agree with Ben!
Frozen nuts and bolts
Replaceing an ignition switch on a 3rd gen Camero a pain in the neck and back coupled with swearing in two languages at the engineers so what else is new!!!!!
I don’t see my least favorite job here. Gas gauge repair. Under dash, dropping the fuel tank or tracing the wire in the body harness just doesn’t seem to be a non tedious part of the job
Right now. I’m stumped, trying to figure out why my ’86 T.P.I. Camaro runs rich, lots of hi-po info out there, but hardly any good diagnostic info.
Getting ready to fire the parts cannon / replace stuff under the plenum ‘while you’re in there’ syndrome.
As Grandpa use to say: ‘If it’s got teats or tires, you’re bound to have trouble with it !’ (snicker)
In my 20, I did just about everything, but now in my later years, one thing I would hate to do would be to pull the engine out. I’m hoping I’ll never have to do that. But for general maintenance, I hate doing anything that requires lifting the car on jack-stands using a floor jack. Just the motion of bending down, squatting, stand back up and repeat, would be very tiring. I become winded and fatigued easily. After setting up on jack stands, I’d have to take a long break before getting started on whatever work that’s needed. I have no problem working on electricals on non computer cars. If the electronic modules go bad, the only option might be is to just replace them. If I can open them up, I may take a looksee.