Hi Gang,
I worked at the local NAPA store this past summer, and we had a couple of guys bring back new batteries that they purchased at our store and said they didn't work - were totally dead. I both cases, they had NOT taken the red plastic post protector off the positive terminal!
Dave
So many cars, so little time!
Picture this:
It's 1975, I'm 17 and have just bought my first muscle car - a 1967 Camaro SS/RS convertible (350, 4 bbl., 4 spd, 3.73 posi, etc.). I think it would look so much better if it were jacked up in the rear, so I hatch a brilliant scheme. I jack it up, drop the rear end out, and take it to the neighborhood welding shop. I have the guy cut the leaf spring mounts off of the bottom of the axle and weld them to the top. This would get me about 6" of lift - cool, right? Well, it was cool, until I tried to lay down some rubber in a parking lot and left the entire axle behind me on the ground! Oops!:embarass:
Doug in AK
Wow!!! This is the best to date!!! I bet it sounded so good at the time!! I have done similar re-engineering thoughts on a much smaller scale. I also found out that those factory boys were not blooming idiots!!
What a story!!!
Rob
Too funny! I hadn't read these before, so thanks for the "bump" Arlie! I'll add a new one of my own.
When we were just stupid teen aged kids (we're stupid adults now!) a friend of mine had a '55 Ford sedan (oh hell, now I'm REALLY dating myself ...). The old stock 272 "Y" block that was in it was getting really tired so we managed to find a bit fresher 312 "Y" block to replace it with. We were out at my buddy's uncle's farm and we had his '55 in the farm shop to do the motor swap. We'd pulled the old motor and were getting ready to re-install the "new" motor. At that point we realized that we didn't know if the "new / used" motor ran OK or not, since we'd only turned it over by hand and so we knew it wasn't seized, but we didn't know how well it ran. We came up with a brilliant idea! The "new / used" 312 was sitting on it's cast iron exhaust manifolds on a couple of blocks and it was hung from a chain block from a rafter in the ceiling of the shop. We decided that we'd put a little bit of gas into the float bowl of the carb and then hot wire the starter with a battery and just "make sure" that the motor ran OK. I mean ... it wouldn't run for very long on just that little bit of gas .... right? We filled the carb float bowl with gas, locked the throttle open, dragged over a charged battery and hot wired it to the starter ... and that motor ran just fine ... it had huge flames roaring out of the bare exhaust manifolds and it leapt off of the blocks and started swinging around the shop in ever widening circles on the chain hoist suspended from the ceiling rafter! Just about then his Dad and his Uncle walked into the shop to find a motor hanging from a chain, running full throttle, with flames roaring out of the bare exhaust manifolds and about four teen aged kids bobbing and weaving trying to stay the hell out of the way of this wild motor with a mind of it's own! They took one look at what was going on and shaking their heads they just turned around and walked back out of the shop again without saying a word ...
You wouldn't think that a motor would operate for THAT long with just the gas in the float bowl to run on, but it seemed like about 10 minutes before it finally ran out of gas and sputtered to a halt. It kept swinging around on the chain hoist for several minutes though and we just stayed the hell out of the way. It's amazing that the chain didn't break and drop the motor onto the shop floor and you wouldn't think that the rafter we had the chain hoist looped around would flex like that ... it must have been flexing up and down about 6 inches or so while that motor danced around on the end of that chain.
After things settled down and we caught our breath we finally installed the 312 in his '55 sedan and it gave him good service for several more years. His Dad and Uncle never did say a word about what complete idiots we'd been to fire that motor up out of the car ...
Too funny! I hadn't read these before, so thanks for the "bump" Arlie! I'll add a new one of my own.
When we were just stupid teen aged kids (we're stupid adults now!) a friend of mine had a '55 Ford sedan (oh hell, now I'm REALLY dating myself ...). The old stock 272 "Y" block that was in it was getting really tired so we managed to find a bit fresher 312 "Y" block to replace it with. We were out at my buddy's uncle's farm and we had his '55 in the farm shop to do the motor swap. We'd pulled the old motor and were getting ready to re-install the "new" motor. At that point we realized that we didn't know if the "new / used" motor ran OK or not, since we'd only turned it over by hand and so we knew it wasn't seized, but we didn't know how well it ran. We came up with a brilliant idea! The "new / used" 312 was sitting on it's cast iron exhaust manifolds on a couple of blocks and it was hung from a chain block from a rafter in the ceiling of the shop. We decided that we'd put a little bit of gas into the float bowl of the carb and then hot wire the starter with a battery and just "make sure" that the motor ran OK. I mean ... it wouldn't run for very long on just that little bit of gas .... right? We filled the carb float bowl with gas, locked the throttle open, dragged over a charged battery and hot wired it to the starter ... and that motor ran just fine ... it had huge flames roaring out of the bare exhaust manifolds and it leapt off of the blocks and started swinging around the shop in ever widening circles on the chain hoist suspended from the ceiling rafter! Just about then his Dad and his Uncle walked into the shop to find a motor hanging from a chain, running full throttle, with flames roaring out of the bare exhaust manifolds and about four teen aged kids bobbing and weaving trying to stay the hell out of the way of this wild motor with a mind of it's own! They took one look at what was going on and shaking their heads they just turned around and walked back out of the shop again without saying a word ...
You wouldn't think that a motor would operate for THAT long with just the gas in the float bowl to run on, but it seemed like about 10 minutes before it finally ran out of gas and sputtered to a halt. It kept swinging around on the chain hoist for several minutes though and we just stayed the hell out of the way. It's amazing that the chain didn't break and drop the motor onto the shop floor and you wouldn't think that the rafter we had the chain hoist looped around would flex like that ... it must have been flexing up and down about 6 inches or so while that motor danced around on the end of that chain.
After things settled down and we caught our breath we finally installed the 312 in his '55 sedan and it gave him good service for several more years. His Dad and Uncle never did say a word about what complete idiots we'd been to fire that motor up out of the car ...