5 scary scenarios DIYers face
Halloween is right around the corner, and any number of scary ghouls and goblins will soon be at your door asking for sweet treats. The holiday got us thinking about DIY experiences that don’t leave our minds so easily. A few projects still keep us up at night, and the thought of repeating certain procedures can provoke a cold sweat. We aren’t saying cars are cursed or possessed—we’ll leave that to the movies—but we all know at least a few vehicles for which it was hard to prove otherwise.
From losing tools to stripping threads, here are the scariest scenarios we’ve encountered in the garage.
Using a spring compressor
The McPherson-strut front suspension design has a lot going for it, like easy installation and cost-effectiveness. Sadly, changing springs or dampers in McPherson struts can be a terror. A spring this powerful is essentially a pipe bomb, and cheap or home-fabricated spring compressors that underestimate the spring’s stored tension are legitimately dangerous. Just the thought of hearing a creak from the spring compressor and seeing a spring shoot off at full force gives us nightmares that would make most horror flicks look tame.
Discovering rust under a paint bubble
You would never pick at a scab, but sometimes you can’t help but give a light poke at that discolored spot on the quarter panel of your classic. Next thing you know, your finger has promoted inner fender to the prestigious status of outer fender. The damage only gets worse from that moment: Iron oxide takes over, a pestilence that no spooky campfire story could ever conjure. Rust is a threat that hangs over everything in your garage. You’ll start seeing the brown-ish red everywhere, until even your mixed drink seems to include red rum. It can drive a man insane, that rust.
Losing a bolt
We all know what it’s like when the bolt or tool that you just had in your hand is—poof—gone. A portal to the fifth dimension opened, swallowing that one small but critical piece of your project. The thought of where that piece of hardware went will haunt you. I’m not scared of Casper, but I am terrified of where that piston pin circlip might have gone.
Stripping a bolt
At last, final assembly. Your workbench is covered in perfectly clean, ready-to-assemble parts. You painstakingly kept all the threads of all your fasteners clean, but somehow a hard-to-reach bolt that only requires 35 foot-pounds of torque just … won’t … tighten. All of a sudden, “righty-tighty, left-loosey” becomes “righty loosey, lefty also loosey.” The split second your wrench meets no resistance, the horrors of dealing with the consequences come into sharp focus.
Burning through paint
The paint on a vehicle can get really shiny if you remove enough of it to eliminate scratches, scrapes, and other imperfections. However, the mere thought of burning through the paint of their beloved classics has kept thousands of owners from so much as looking at an electric polisher. Thanks to modern compounds, this automotive horror story no longer needs to strike fear in your heart. Random-orbit polishers and diminishing-grit compounds allow you to be gentler with paint than ever before, even if the process requires a certain touch and understanding, and the fear of burn-through lingers in the room like a ghost.
What would you add to this list? Let us know in the comments below.
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Driving a nice classic car or truck in Massachusetts. FRIGHTENING …
Being raised with Michigan snow and salt in the 70’s and 80’s my hobby was buying, doing a little body work, repainting 2 or 3 old cars a year and then making a little money. I bought Bondo by the gallon! GM’s had the worst rust, fenders, rocker panels, under all the trim fasteners, around the vinyl tops. YIKES!
It’s a known cosmic phenomonem that any small object that falls in a shop will magically change color to exactly match the color of the floor and then seek the most covered spot on that floor.
The power of prayer! All glory goes to God!
Walking halfway to the garage for a floor-jack only to realize you forgot the e-brake when you see you car rolling down the driveway
Will your prayer work for lost granddaughter’s bike part?
The words ‘Assembly is just the reverse of disassembly’ in any manual I’m using… as it never is that easy!
When changing engine oil using an extractor hand pump through the oil dip stick and the extractor tube gets stuck around an internal engine part and breaks when trying to pull it out. Have to remove the oil pan to retrieve it. Quick job turns into a big job.
Rebuilding or repairing my American made muscle and can only find parts made in china.
When I dropped a bolt when working on an engine in the car and could not find it talking classic cars here, I would take a second bolt of no importance, hold my hand where I had it was when the first bolt dropped, then drop the second bolt only carefully observing where it ended up. Worked more times than not to find the first bolt.
Trust your troubleshooting!
I did a valve grind on a 1956 Buick only to find white smoke from the tailpipe after buttoning everything up. Hmm…I must have made a mistake somewhere. . . Pulled the heads off, had them pressure tested, checked manifold gaskets for leaks, etc, etc. After much head scratching, removed the oil pan, pressurized the cooling system and looked. . . coolant dripping from the front timing cover. . . Hmm. Removed the water pump and found that there had been much abrasive action causing a hole in the water pump housing and coolant dripping into the front timing cover and to the oil pan. If I had troubleshooted the symptoms correctly instead of ASSSUMING I’d made a mistake in doing my work, I’d have found the problem much sooner! So, again. . . Think and troubleshoot without assuming you’ve made a mistake!
Red Barn
A couple of these are challenges certainly, and I’m pretty careful with spring compressors (I’ve done enough to be ‘experienced’)… but I’ve NEVER touched a power polisher to my good cars – even though I have a couple. FEAR!
the scary factor diminishes as you read through the article except i’d swap the lost bolt fot eh stripped bolt – usually a lost bolt is eventually found or easily replaced
The rust bubbles under the paint will be the most difficult and expensive scenario – if you want to repair it correctly. Fiberglass and bondo will work, but is not structurally sound nor will it last without the spot rusting again. All the other scenarios are repairable/resolved without much effort.
My three rules for working with tiny parts:
– sweep the floor spotlessly clean before you start ( you may be laying on it if you drop something so why not clean it first)
– tape a large towel along the near edge of the table and place the other side on your lap (if a part slips between you and the table it will lodge in the towel and is easy to retrieve)
– looking for that tiny part? Get your eyeball as close to the floor as you can and look sideways at the floor. (loose items will stand out above the background of the floor and are easier to see. Note tip #1)