What is the worst mistake you made doing your own wrenching?

I actually did work at a toyota dealership for a couple years

But it was in sales

 

Worst mistake I can make doing my own wrenching...

Is doing my own wrenching...

 

Hah! Exactly what it was like lmfao

 

Decided it was a great time to move the truck forward a foot right after taking off the oil filter during an oil change. No harm done, but quite the mess on the wall.

 

Harbor freight torque wrenches are fine for working on our trucks, such as suspension and whatnot. Obviously not for precision work on an expensive engine.

 

How about spark plugs?

 

I don’t use a torque wrench on spark plugs, I just go by feel. Just snug em up and call it good.

 

Aluminum block though.. I do that on steel.

 

It’s worked well for me. I’ve been wrenching enough I feel comfortable doing that. They always come out with no issues.

 

My contribution:

I put a two tit bulb into a one tit socket on my 97 Tacoma in highschool. In hindsight not sure how it even fit. This caused some crazy electrical gremlins. For instance my radio would cut out when the wipers went up and it would come back on when they went down. It was possessed in more ways during that but I can't remember.

 

Lol 12v dc won’t kill you

 

Only because Volts don't kill you, Amps do (according to my HS science teacher right after he hit me with 9000V to demonstrate how transformers work. Sadistic bastard, great teacher tho)

Too many wrenching mistakes to list here but having a great time reminiscing as I read all yours. Worst and most recent though was looking for the source of a clunking noise I could hear after doing the LCAs on my Matrix. Had the front end jacked up and rotating drivers side tire I thought to myself the gearbox sounds a little grindy I should check the fluid. Never did and it melted a month later.

 

My first car was a 76 Honda cvcc that my sister gave me. 1600 cc if I recall, but it was a tiny car. Wish I still had it. It was actually a cool little ride with a straight body and interior and chicks always told me how cool it was. After driving it for a couple months I got bored with it’s power and clocked the distributor around to give it a little more get up. That really made it fun to drive again. Drove it that way for another two weeks until the timing belt broke.

Not mine but:

 

My worst mistake ever was when I had to take off and replace the front tires on my first vehicle, a 90 Mustang 2.3l. Guess I was about 17, maybe 18. I decided it was a bright idea to use a scissor lift. In the dirt. Well, you can imagine what happened.

 

I’d actually say you’re pretty gifted if that’s your worst-ever tale!

 

Just lucky!

 

I cross threaded one of my seat bolts putting in my under seat powered Sub.

 

Volts play a role. There is more than enough amperage to kill you when it comes to 12v batteries. However there isn’t enough EMF (voltage) to push that current to your heart. At mostly with 12v you get a slight tingle. And a lot of that will depend on the water content of your body. Most of the time you won’t feel anything. Now if he touched the outputs of his amplifier, that’s AC and he would of a good shock if it was turned up depending on how large of course the amp was, among other factors.

 

That was AC.

 

Most recent blunder was with my Subaru. CEL came on, code was "Post Catalyst Fuel Trim System Too Rich, Bank 1". I figured the upstream AF sensor had gone bad so I ordered a new one. Go to install it expecting a fight, to my surprise it had unthreaded itself loose. Spent $130 when I could have fixed it for free, no refunds on electrical parts.