Dumbest thing you've done in a shop

[Michael]

Was doing a oil change on my wife's BMW. Drained the oil, Got the filter changed out and got up and went and got the oil and poured it in and heard a funny splashing noise, look under the car and the new oil was pouring out the drain hole into the catch basin, seems I forgot something, I think I had to screw in and tighten the damned oil drain plug.

 

[LRP]

think of this thread when u go for an operation or go see a doctor.
LRP

 

[the mean fish]

I tried to drain the used oil out of my Cummins engine into a drain pan with the screw in plug still in it, the oil was hot so when I realized what was going on I tried to stick the plug back in causing a hot shower of nasty black motor oil into my face, eyes and mouth. I dumped about 6 quarts of it into my driveway, burned my hand with the oil.

 

[hodge]

Bought a new radial arm saw years ago and was using it without first reading all of the instructions. Fed a piece of wood through the wrong direction which it grabbed and shot out at a very high rate of speed. The projectile was traveling fast enough to go through the new ping pong table folded up in the corner of the garage. Fortunately, no injuries. The Lord looks after poor dumb fools.

Here is another one that wasn't done in a garage but is typical for me. We had a bathroom door which when opened would drag across the carpet. My wife and I took the door off the hinges so I could cut approximately an inch off the bottom of the door. I marked it with a pencil and plugged in my circular saw. Just before cutting my wife said "are you sure you are cutting off the right end?" Sarcastically, I said "yes I'm cutting off the right end." After cutting we started to hang the door and noticed we had a 1 inch gap at the top and the door still dragged on the carpet. That was about 40 years ago and I still get reminded about it.

Ha! Be comforted! You aren't the only one- I am a flooring installer, and have taken a bazillion doors off in my career. I have seen MANY doors with a piece glued/nailed back on and painted over.

I like posts like this- not because it is funny to laugh at others, but because it shows that we are all human, all imperfect, and it is a sign of maturity when you can laugh at yourself, and be comfortable with people laughing at you.

I don't work in a shop, so I don't have any stories. But, as soon as someone starts a "what's the dumbest thing you have ever done?" post, I'll be there.

 

[gktilton]

My most recent I posted on another forum here. Needed to weld a mount onto the frame of my loader, about 10 inches away from the fuel filter. OOOOPS, should have taken the piece off the tractor. Had a good fire extiguisher 10 feet away, the tractor no longer has any oil/diesel accumulated under the filter and all it well.

I do need to get a new extinguisher though.

 

[meanjean]

My latest addition as of this past Friday.
Buddy figured he would teach me to weld.
I welded my new rims wearing short sleeved shirt.
Forearms are still beet red and tender to the touch.
Maybe it will turn into a nice tan.
Won't be doing that again.

 

[vaskeet]

I was teaching a friend to reload shotgun shells he he asked if he could smoke I said sure but I was leaving first
got off a 12 hour night shift and went to change oil on wifes avalon pulled plug and noticed "oil" was very red (toyota has drain plug on transmission) had to go to advance auto to get atf
Threw away oil drain plug on truck while doing oil change
Lots of stupid stuff working the flight deck of aircraft carriers for 20 years Randy

 

[tk1469]

Here's another bonehead move -

I washed the interior of an engine compartment and engine with a hose and degreaser and had left the dipstick / plug out of the FWD transmission unit !!

 

[cabu]

I was using an angle grinder with a steel brush to remove some rust from the bonnet of a car. I pressed really hard and slipped of the bonnet and the highly rotating steel brush caught my trousers next to my zipper. It was blocked by the fabric and made snarl noises. I felt nothing but was affried a shock cover the pain and that my manhood was brush away. I open my trousers, lower it und was so happy that the brush had only caught the fabric...

Never felt so affried before!

carl

 

[Hue]

Was filling up may newish sthil ms461 chainsaw (I like orange), and had some fuel spill onto the garage floor. My wife doesn't like the smell of fuel, so once I set the saw aside I decided to light the puddle on fire to get rid of it quicker. No sooner than it was lit, a big gust of wind fanned the flames towards the saw. Oh no! Chainsaw's on fire! I grabbed the saw ran outside and proceeded to spin in tight circles, so the flame didn't make too much contact with the saw. It's a heavy saw, and to put it into perspective I probably looked like an Olympic hammer thrower. My kids start to scream "Mommy, dad's gone crazy and he's spinning in circles with his chainsaw on fire!". My wife's reaction "ya right". Chainsaw is fine, my pride took a beating.

 

[dlsmith]

Was replacing the driver's seat in one of my Peterbilts, and I was hanging over the seat taking out the bolts that attach the seat belts. The bolts have a thin head and were really tight. The ratchet slipped off and hit me in the mouth, breaking both upper front teeth and put a hole clean through my upper lip.
Damn, those Snap-On ratchet handles are hard!

Should have let the Pete dealer install the seat, it would have been a lot cheaper than fixing my teeth.

The there was the time a couple of years ago when I was taking the headache tack loose from the frame on one of the trucks and had to heat the nuts on the u-bolts that hold it to the frame to get them loose. All the nuts came off pretty easily, but when the last one came off and I was going to put the impact wrench down, a nearly red hot 3/4" lock washer fell off the u-bolt and down into the cuff of my right glove. Of course that was a new pair that fit pretty snugly and took a few seconds to get off. Still have a nice scar about the size of a silver dollar on my wrist.

 

[johnjk]

Where do I start? Personal pain or just embarrassment? The most shocking thing I've done and walked away from was helping out to deinstall an old DEC computer. Power feed was 240V/50A run in to the cabinet on a nice thick four conductor cable. I believe the conductors were at least #6. Anyway being young and eager, the cable went under this rack, looped around and plugged in to a power distribution unit in the front of the rack. Big twist lock connector. Unplugged from the rack. in my mind, power is disconnected. Can't pull the cable free, no room to slide plug under rack frame. Easily resolved. I remove the cover and start undoing the set screws. First screw backed out, neutral. Rotate cable, next screw backed out, hot, rotate connector and grab...... BAM I get thrown across the room into another rack of old DEC severs and crash the hard drives. People are really pissed now since systems that should not be down are down and I'm sitting there on the floor with a dazed look. Told me to go home and let someone else finish up. Damn lucky that I was not grounded with any other part of my body and that the cable and I were disconnected in around 3' of travel.

The other involved electricity as well. Working late, trying to get a system back online and had an external hard drive that would not spin up. These had 120V AC running, a power supply to convert to 12 and 5V DC for the drive. System was wedged in a room which meant that I had to climb up and over a desk, insert myself in a small hole to gain access, make an adjustment, climb out and try to restart the system. After doing this six or eight times, I got the bright idea to leave the cover off the drive, open the front panel and reach through a six inch gap to toggle the on/off switch on the drive. Worked great for 3 or four times until I misjudged and tried to toggle the live AC where it connected to the back of the switch. Got bit and pulled back quickly. No harm form the electricity, but the shelf just above this was like a pressed wire screen with a bunch of hooks in it so you could feed through cable ties to secure wiring. Well, I imbedded around 10 of those down the length of my forearm with the natural reaction to pull my arm out of that hole because.... pain. Did that ripping open my arm and driving my funny bone in to a protruding bolt. I was crying at this point. Made it to the bathroom and tried to stem the bloodflow with paper towels. What a mess. Go back to the room and the system is running fine now... Button up, wipe off blood and leave. By now it's around 10:30PM, can't feel my right hand or really control it and I have a 3hr drive back home driving stick, with my left hand.. Not sure how I didn't get busted for DUI or pulled in for murdering anyone that night.

 

[Howling]

Working in a live control cabinet leaned in top of open frame starter. Three legs of 480 on my shoulder while holding on to a ground wire. I was knocked out of the cabinet. Ran around all charged up the rest of the day. Design and spec in all touch safe components these days.

A quick bit sandblasting with short sleeve shirt and light gloves is not a good thing.

Was helping another student use a torch at local craft center. She turned to ask a question and took the hair off my arm. Burning hair smell reminded all there to pay attention to the torch location.

 

[GeoHorn]

As a much younger Toyota Tech I was asked to take on an apprentice by the shop mgr. The apprentice spoke almost no English, he was an immigrant from So. Korea, a former ROK who was in an accelerated-citizenship program in return for his having served our side in Viet Nam on special missions. (This guy was very polite, but I wouldn't want to be on his bad side. He knew how to kill in more ways than the average soldier.)
Anyway, the shop mgr had 10K miles on his own Toyota pickup and wanted a "ring job" done under warranty. (Stupid idea that somehow taking a properly broken-in engine apart and installing new rings and bearings would benefit his truck.)
Anyway, the mgr wanted my apprentice to gain some heavy engine experience so the ROK was to take it apart … "but I want YOU George, to put it back together while showing him how!"
I was off at recurrent rear axle training while ROK took it apart, but I'd given him careful instructions on how to lay out and identify the parts during disassembly. When I returned two days later I reassembled the engine in front of him explaining what I was doing (and having zero confidence he understood any of it... I think the most complicated machinery he'd ever operated was a .50 BMG.)
I decided that when it came to adjusting the valve lash (in 1972 Toyota still had mechanical Ovhd valves) I'd let him do it under my watchful eye.
I handed him my expensive Snap-On 14" long set of individual feeler gauges … and mindlessly watched him lay them down.... across the battery terminals. They went incandescent instantly and before I could think I grabbed them with my bare hands. Ouch.
Next day, with bandaged right hand, we tried to start that truck and it refused to turn-over at all!
ROK had marked the main bearing caps as instructed before I went off to training. He'd removed them, turned around and laid them on the bench, and marked the end of the cap with an elect. engraving pencil... but failed to recognize that by turning around to face the work bench that the end of the cap would now be mirror-imaged... so they were marked exactly backwards!
Because I'd agreed to take on this apprentice... I was the one who had to pay for the complete new engine for the shop mgr's truck even tho' it was the shop mgr who wanted the unnecessary engine work done by the untrained foreigner performed while I was sent off to school by that same shop mgr.
Besides the docked pay-check I had the burned hand and ruined feeler gauges. The next week, ROK started a manual transmission Corolla by reaching thru the drivers window....while it was in-gear … and the only reason it didn't take out the shop-wall... was because my new roller tool-box was between the Corolla and the wall.
I still have that dented roller box in my shop, bearing the scars and dents from that 1972 apprentice. I took the roller box with me when I changed Toyota dealerships to get away from that shop. Dumbest thing I did....? was to not make the shop pay me for the engine work, the medical costs of a burned hand, and a damaged roller box.
Oh yeah,... I did get a little revenge however. When he was overheard bragging about how he could karate' chop bricks in Korea.... I got my revenge by not telling that ROK it wasn't a good idea to demonstrate his karate' chop on the American-ACME kiln-fired bricks the other mechanics set out for him in a beer-bet.

 

[Newlyme]

This isn't the dumbest but it just happened.

So I buy a new MMM for my BX24. Never having a mower on it before and never using the PTO the lever is frozen. After some WD40 and working it I got it freed up and working perfectly.
I mount the deck underneath and start the tractor and raise the deck to start the deck height adjustments. When I go to lower it nothing. It's stuck in the up position.
So I go to the house and start reading through the work shop manual and ponder asking here on OTT for some help. After about a half hour of reading the light bulb went off while looking at the hydraulic system in the book.
Open the flow control for the down speed.
Duh!
I am glad it was that easy. First time I ever needed to use that valve.

 

[Lil Foot]

I didn't do it, but I was the victim. When I was in a 3 month machinist training program back in the mid 70s, our instructor was a huge, powerful guy with a short temper. One knot head in the class constantly left chuck keys in drill & lathe chucks. No matter how many times he got yelled at, he kept doing it. One day the instructor caught him leaving a large (15"x18") tee handle lathe chuck key in the chuck and blew up at him. After a chewing him out for 5 minutes, the instructor picked up the key and threw it the length of the shop. Right where I happened to be standing. It hit me in the right shin, and took me right off my feet. It hurt like the blazes, but I never said a word, not wanting to incur the man's wrath. I can still feel the divot in my shin to this day.

 

[ipz2222]

married the same woman twice!!!!

 

[RCW]

married the same woman twice!!!!

Ha! Had a buddy do the same.

He always said his second wife was just as bad as the first!

He divorced her twice too...[emoji15]


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Howling]

married the same woman twice!!!!

Have you picked a favorite wife?

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[bxray]

Well, when I was a wee lad of 5 my father took me to my grandfathers gas station.
I picked up a set of keys to a customers repair and stuck them in the outlet, one in each side completing the circuit! POW! What a spark!
My grandpa had to call the customer and say the car was ready but you need to bring an extra key.

I still remember that to this day many decades later!


A friend of mine got a call from a neighbor.
Told him to go to his shop and get a work glove and take it to the hospital.
He was working with a chain on the backhoe and bam!


Ray