5 Common DIY Misadventures
With tools in hand, we venture out into the garage to resurrect, or at least maintain, the vintage cars and trucks we love so dearly. Unfortunately, the intentions of our actions are not always reflected in the reality of the situations we find ourselves in. Tools slip, parts break, and suddenly the afternoon of relaxing work has turned into a misadventure that will make just even non-smokers seek a cigarette break.
It’s just a side effect of working on cars. The parts and pieces that make up our rides are subject to all kinds of situations and materials that are trying to take that functional part and turn it into junk. Aging cars are at the mercy of their owners to keep the nightmares at bay, and sometimes the only way to make sure it doesn’t happen is to face the challenge headfirst. We can’t guarantee you’ll experience these five side quests and distractions that add time and frustration to our projects—but we certainly can’t say you won’t either.
Broken hardware
The old joke about “every 20 minute project is one broken bolt from a four-day ordeal” is only funny to those who can walk over the coals of extracting the hardware and completing the repair. Everyone who has attempted automotive repairs knows how fragile some hardware can be, and just how much time it can take to deal with a single momentary inattentive slip of the wrench.
Shipping delays
Some of us have righteous parts stashes. Most of us don’t, and are left to source at least a few bits and bobs from a catalog or online vendor for each project. This means being beholden to not only the vendor’s timeline, but also the shipping company. These companies handle millions of parcels a day and do impressive numbers for keeping everything on track, but just like my email outbox, there are occasional items that never reach their intended addresses.
Add in that it is often best to wait to order parts until your project is apart just in case you discover unexpected wear or damage that wasn’t visible when assembled. Having to make a second order, and pay a second shipping charge, for a single gasket or small piece is annoying, and you end up waiting a few days anyway. One order placed at the right time is great—but all those eggs are now in one basket and that basket can disappear without a trace surprisingly easily.
“Fixing” things that are not broken
This one is a misadventure from the start, rather than something that pops up in the middle of a project. Well-meaning “repairs” are often an invitation for little gremlins to enter the various systems of your car. I think it might have been the second time my mother and teenage me picked up my mountain bike from a bike repair shop when I heard “don’t fix what isn’t broken.” It’s stuck with me ever since. That bike shifted fine for years once I stopped trying to tune the drivetrain for better performance.
Cars are no different. If there is an actual failure or broken part, it’s time to get to work. But diving into the engine compartment to fiddle with something that is currently perfectly functional is asking for trouble.
Opting for the parts cannon over proper diagnosis
Want to have a bad time working on cars? Ride the roller coaster of having an issue, buying parts and taking the time to install only to still have the issue when everything is back together. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and the same is true for diagnostics. Taking the time to troubleshoot and accurately identify what is actually wrong—especially if all signs point to a common or known issue—will save the time, money, and frustration of having to do the work twice.
Trying to make the wrong parts work
The sneaky folly of attempting to use the wrong part is not to be underestimated. It’s the lure of making a square peg fit the round hole simple to save the cost or frustration of acquiring the round peg. Phrases like “if I just drill the holes out a little” or “if we use RTV instead of the gasket” should be bright red flags to give you pause to ask if that is the route you really want to go. It’s rarely as easy as it seems in your head.
Many of these can be avoided with planning.
Too many rush in and don’t plan ahead. Yes things still happen.
I like to call it mechanical intelligence.
You see this in racing often as they have no time for mistakes or a mistake could hurt the team.
There is only so far you can go with planning. I recently upgraded the steering box in my C3 to a Borgeson integral unit. The new box is longer, so you have to shorten the collapsible steering column to accommodate. In a perfect world unaffected by the ravages of time, this amounts to a few light taps on the end of the shaft. After many not so light taps, I ended up removing the steering column to investigate – which turned into replacement of the lower column bearing which was seized on the shaft (parts hold 1). To facilitate removal of the steering column, I removed the steering wheel, and the little plastic washer clip doofidget that separates the live horn components from the general metal of the steering column assembly disintegrated (parts hold 2)
Now I could have potentially resolved parts hold 1 with some research, but the C3 Borgeson swap community is not aligned on the cause and solution for a non-collapsing steering column. I was able to determine the cause via reading some of the posts and comparing it to the as-found condition of my removed steering column. Parts hold 2 was just ‘stuff’ happens
Nothing is perfect but most problems can be avoided with some fore thought.
Like traveling. Look up where you are going before you leave. It will save you trouble from getting lost. But that does not mean you may get caught by a traffic ac iden blocking the road.
I have suffered from all of these from time to time- other than the “part cannon”- never saw the sense in simply throwing parts at a problem. This has forced a refinement of my diagnostic skills. Is there spark? Is there fuel? Is there a signal to the injectors? Etc, etc- until usually you get the solution. Living in a non-rust belt state I have to say my sympathies to all you northern state guys- seems like working on old rusty cars has to be a really big pain. As to hyperv6’s comments- yes invariably when you start getting into 40 or 50 year old parts stuff sometimes falls apart- comes with the territory.
Patience is the key in my opinion. Most people know when they are pushing the limit on a bolt, nut or other troublesome task. Instead of backing off and analyzing the problem logically looking for a viable solution, they push through impatiently and sometimes ending up with more problems than when they started. This has happened so many times to me I wonder if I am stupid.
Agreed! In my youth, I’ve been so impatient that I screw up something else, and then the frustration compounds into less-patience and worse problem-solving ability, which leads to more screw ups.
I have learned though…last time I had a major set back on a project, I just decided to stop right there and sleep on it…during that break, a new idea came to me that worked great, but that never would have occurred to me in real-time if I didn’t take the break.
Obviously patience is much easier when the car you’re working on isn’t your only transportation…a key difference now vs my youth…
Lastly, it also greatly helps to be able to invest in the proper tool, esp. when it’s a one-time need, as opposed to trying to improvise with the wrong tools…
How true , I have been a victim to ALL these mistakes. The problem is that we DYIers feel we can solve the issue ourselves. Tougher as we age! I’m starting to listen to my wife once I became an octogenarian!
I always enjoy seeing Kyle Smith’s Corvair, because I grew up in a Corvair family. One of my first mistakes was to snap off a bolt for the rear engine mount on a Corvair at age 16. It was a result of impatience, like most of my mistakes. I eventually learned to leave all the bolts loose until they’re all started by hand. Trying to “make parts work” only works for emergencies, otherwise, it’s what we called “Mickey Mouse.” Shipping is a gamble either way, because no one has anything in stock any more, so I’m always buying parts online. I don’t have a problem with the parts cannon, if the car is old like my tri-five, and the previous owner’s only real talent was sheet metal work. I’ve spent four years sorting out his mishmash of swap meet parts. So I’m looking at replacing my 4-5 psi fuel pump and filter for a drivability issue. Time is valuable, so a gamble to spend 30 minutes replacing a $35 part might save me 2 or 3 hours diagnosing the problem. If it doesn’t work, at least those are two small parts that I don’t have to worry about any more.
50 years ago, the first “furrin car” parts store in town had a sign: “If you bought the wrong part, you now have a spare”
“Don’t fix what isn’t broken” is a wonderful theory – but in real life, I find that the sticker in my rear window fits me better. It says, “If it’s not broken, fix it until it is”!
🤣
Outstanding!!! 😂
Kyle;
You can come and visit, and, fix my 66 Monza any time you would like….Simi Vly, CA. is close to you…….🚁
Broken hardware is too often self-induced. The bolts that hold an air bag sensor on a Trailblazer are left hand thread. Ask me how I know….
As are the wheel lugs on a ’70 Dart Swinger as a 16 year old very strong (back then) person I might know found out……
Dodge used to have left-hand threads for the lugs on one side and right-hand threads for the lugs on the other. The normal rotation of the wheels kept all of them tight that way. The left-hand lugs were stamped with an “L”. Not sure about the nuts.
I remember Chrysler had bolts on the wheels left hand thread on the left side and right hand threads on the right. I don’t remember left hand nuts on their wheels.. I could be wrong. This was back in the 60’s.
LOL—as a teen I told a freind I’d paint his rims on his late 60s Dart–(I was good with paint) Got to the last wheel -broke 3 studs before figuring out it was threaded opposite the other wheels–It ended up I brought it to a shop & they put new ones on -it cost me money & I was too embarrassed to ever tell him my mistake-
It’s been a long while, but I seem to remember that the wheel lugs on one side of my dad’s ’56 Olds had RH threads, and on the other side they were LH. Can anyone confirm this? If so which side had which?
Can’t say I have ever experienced any of those five things in 55 years. I with hyperv6 in that first having a working plan before any job is worthwhile if the job looks like trouble.
Some of these items can be avoided by admitting to your skill level. The delay in shipping is in a class all by itself – regardless of your skill level.
Nothing worse than intermittent problems with more than one symptom…. I retired from being a toolmaker and oftenhelped repair the machines… Off topic but my American Standard toilet worked perfectly for 48 years since moving in. It began to leak through the flapper valve.. OK that’s easy… I also flat filed with 320 paper the mating plastic surface. Now it leaks intermittently… at 2 different rates. … new flush valve…. still leaks intermittently.. it held for a week and after the first flush back to intermittently….. Still fighting it… Buying a new toilet is not gonna happen… but friends tell me to…
Your “friends” are wrong and possibly jealous that you still have a toilet with a 4 or 5 gallon tank. The new commodes are EPA junk that often have to be flushed multiple times to move waste down the drain and into the sewage system. Anything the government bureaucrats touch turns to garbage within seconds. Keep your American Standard until you have to leave it in your Last Will & Testament. Your heirs will thank you.
An assisted-flush toilet will help solve the “too little water” problem.
Had that toilet problem a few times. Tracked it down not to the flapper, but to the small hose/tube at the top of the valve which flows into the overflow hole. That should flow only when flushed, but if the tank slightly overfills to cover the tube nipple on the valve (even if the fill level is still below overflow) a small siphon action seems to happen so that the tube constantly dribbles into the overflow hole. Try lowering the fill level in the tank, just slightly, to below the tube nipple… Now back to cars😄
It honestly wouldn’t surprise me if sanding the mating surface made it too perfect for the system to seal. That flapper valve is not a precision part or system and it is possible to “over restore.”
I’ve caught myself in similar situations. It’s really frustrating.
Reminds me of the time I had a stalling issue with 83 Dodge mirada. Would run for 30 minutes and die and wouldn’t restart until you waited at least 30 minutes. I threw tons of parts at the vehicle and found out all it was was the sock in the gas tank was dirty. It would collapse after driving and no gas would get through. I spent hundreds trying to fix a problem that was fixed with a $5 gas filter sock
Tlm, my neighbor had the same problem with his Mercruiser powered boat (350 Chevy). He replacd several engine parts before he found the problem. Jim piloted the boat while I held the fuel line in a gas can. It ran like a charm.
Never throw anything, *anything* away until the job is finished. I worked for a racing shop in Miami years and years ago, and they took in some “outside” work to make ends meet. I was told to rebuild the front brakes on a DS-19 (inboard calipers). No big deal, remove calipers, strip and discard all the rubber seals, bead blast the parts, go visit the Citroen dealer (yes, there actually WAS one!) and get told “Oh, m’seur, we haven’t had those seals in ten years.”
Next thing you see is me disappearing into a dumpster behind the shop to locate the discarded rubber seals so they could be re-used – yuck – old burger wrappers, stale fries, garbage, utterly disgusting – but I found them, and I had to be hosed off before they’d let me back into the shop.
You never know what you might have to re-use because a new one is simply unobtanium anywhere in the known universe.
If you’re not breaking something in the middle of fixing something then you’re doing it wrong ! (sarc)
I never buy parts that I cannot take/send back.
The “don’t fix it if it’s not broke” theory has a certain charm if you have AAA towing and are out driving to coffee on a Saturday morning.
I notice that aircraft mechanics and serious racers believe in something called “preventive maintenance” which happens on a schedule by the hour meter. “When it absolutely, positively has to be there.”
It’s called “crash and burn” if the preventative maintenance isn’t done.
Indeed, I too have experienced “misadventures”, and they certainly can stir one’s patience and temperament, but alas…it comes with the territory!