What’s Your “Easy” Project That Went Sideways?

[bigeyedfish]

So many to choose from.

Changing Cummins injectors, I had a rocker bolt break in the head when I was finishing up. I was using a torque wrench, and before it clicked I could feel the bolt soften. Having been through this rodeo before, I stopped and slowly backed the bolt out, ready to kill everybody in the whole world. Somehow, the center of the bolt had broken through, but the thread was still sort of in tact, so I was able to remove it in one piece without pulling the head.

I changed an AC clutch on my truck, and on the last bolt, the bolt broke way before it was tight. I went from having 10 minutes left, to spending two more hours getting that stupid bolt out.

I manual swapped an F250 once, and everything went great but the transmission I put in was noisy. It was dirt cheap, so that's to be expected. I took it out and had it rebuilt. Went to reinstall it after the rebuild, and the input shaft would not go into the pilot bearing. A few days in a row, I would come home from work and spend an hour or so trying to get it to go. Finally, my patience wore down and I just used the bellhousing bolts to draw it up. I got really lucky it didn't break the bellhousing. All at once it just snapped into place.

One time I split a tractor to find a pretty significant hydraulic leak. After building stands and making a couple tools, we got it split and discovered the leak was not coming from there. I put it back together and said to hell with it. Hydraulic oil isn't that expensive. That was several years ago, and that tractor still leaks.

Those are just the ones that come to mind quickly. I try to convince myself that these things happen when you're trying to expand your skillset or push yourself. In reality, they just happen. Sometimes it sucks.

 

[Tilzbow]

Any project I watch a how to YouTube video that shows the project taking more than 15 minutes usually go sideways and takes 4-10 times longer than the video.

 

[dreadi]

Two Savage 110 6.5 PRC rifles I was planning to use for product demos. Both had hard bolt lift after firing Hornady 147gr ELD-X which is what Savage said to use. Distributor sent them both back for me. Sacage told me the chambers were reamed and polished, then test fired. Well, both rifle made it back to me and they still suck. Sending them back AGAIN.

Really disappointing. I have three other Savage rifles. They don't have this issue.

 

[Trr15]

“I’m gonna buy a Jeep wrangler to play around with and just add a few minor mods” what a deep dark hole that has become.

 

[Fred@Exterra]

Having kids… seemed like an easy project when I got started… I even watched videos on how to do it… the first three minutes of the project was pretty fun… the subsequent 25 years have been tougher than I anticipated… the youngest will be graduating high school in seventeen more years


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[*zap*]

Marriage

 

[gwtravis]

I think I told this story on here before.

Cleaned out my garage. Previous owner left about 15 gallon size cans of half used paint of various colors in there; bagged those up and put them on my deck to drop off at hazardous waste over the weekend.

Before the weekend comes my sewer lines gets clogged up so I rent a sewer line power auger after work and get started as the sun goes down.

I had to remove the toilet to feed the auger down the stack into the sewer line. Well that goes fine and I hit an obstruction about 20' down the line. I power up the auger and all hell breaks loose. Something is banging the hell out of the wall next to the bathroom. I mean dust is dropping from the ceiling at each bang. I turn off the auger, turn on the deck light and walk outside to see what happened.

Well the auger didn't go down in to the sewer line. Somehow it went up the stack vent, out over the roof and down onto the bag of paint cans on the deck. When I turned it on it grabbed the bag and beat it against my house splashing paint across 40' of siding and across the deck.

What started as a late night drain blockage turned into a 40'x15' Jackson Pollock painting on the side of my house.

 

[Idaho Brad]

Anytime I try to remove any bolt or nut. It breaks off and I spend hours getting the bolt out.


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[7mm-08]

I think I told this story on here before.

Cleaned out my garage. Previous owner left about 15 gallon size cans of half used paint of various colors in there; bagged those up and put them on my deck to drop off at hazardous waste over the weekend.

Before the weekend comes my sewer lines gets clogged up so I rent a sewer line power auger after work and get started as the sun goes down.

I had to remove the toilet to feed the auger down the stack into the sewer line. Well that goes fine and I hit an obstruction about 20' down the line. I power up the auger and all hell breaks loose. Something is banging the hell out of the wall next to the bathroom. I mean dust is dropping from the ceiling at each bang. I turn off the auger, turn on the deck light and walk outside to see what happened.

Well the auger didn't go down in to the sewer line. Somehow it went up the stack vent, out over the roof and down onto the bag of paint cans on the deck. When I turned it on it grabbed the bag and beat it against my house splashing paint across 40' of siding and across the deck.

What started as a late night drain blockage turned into a 40'x15' Jackson Pollock painting on the side of my house.

Winner!!

 

[Thinkingman]

Hah. Cutting down the dead stuff in the landscaping today. 5 min job. Slashed open my thumb on the hedge trimmers. A trip to UrgiCare and some stiches later, I still feel that 5 mins.

Dying pine tree on the corner of the house. Maybe 12' tall and 10" diameter. Borrow a pruning gas chainsaw from the neighbor, climb the stepladder to top it and the ladder slides out from under me, I'm sliding down the trunk of a pine with a running chainsaw and the insides of both arms scrubbing down the bark...No chainsaw injuries but the insides of both arms were scraped raw with pine sap in the scrapes.
I get the darn thing cut down without much (more) drama and there's still the stump, visible in the landscaping in the front of the house.
That won't do.
I start to dig/chop out the stump and a neighbor says why don't you hook your truck up to it and yank it...Sounds reasonable....
I wrap a tow strap around it, grab 4lo and give it a yank...Hear the neighbor yelling and look in the mirror to see small geysers of water spewing up where the stump was.
Turns out, the root ball had grown around the irrigation valves for the sprinkler system and I took the whole thing out with the rootball.
I find the sprinkler valve shutoff and proceed to piece together the remnants of various sizes of PVC, do a forensic reconstruction of the valve and piping, go to HD for parts and glue and rebuild the darn thing.
It ended up working fine but that tree got what it deserved.

 

[Yoder]

Does anyone notice when your wife asks you to do something it's just one thing. Like, build a new deck. Just build it. No thought to permits, digging footers, material, hour and hours of labor and frustration. Nope, just build a deck honey.

One that comes to mind was just skinning and butchering a deer. I spined it and was trying to cut the vertebrae out with the broadhead stuck in it. My knife slipped and whacked my middle finger on my left hand with a 12 in filet knife. It was to the bone and I was bleeding everywhere. I thought I was going to the ER, I couldn't get it to stop bleeding. It finally stopped and I wrapped it and went back out to finish the deer. My steps were covered with leaves and I slipped. Trying to catch myself I ended up almost dislocating my thumb on my right hand. It immediately turned purple and swelled twice its size. Now I'm really screwed. Both of my hands are messed up, and I still have to butcher this stupid deer. The thumb was the worst. I couldn't grip anything, and it took forever.

Another funny one I was taking my utility trailer off my SUV. I bent down to unhook it, and my super excited Golden Retriever jabbed me in the eye with a stick. This ended up in a 4hr trip to the ER.

 

[NB7]

I 3x the estimate of both the amount of time and money I think it'll cost. That's prevented a lot of sideways projects.

A wise man once told me, as we tried to fix a heater "It only costs a little more to do it yourself"

 

[rookieforever33]

Needed to hook my jetski trailer to my truck. Was in a spot I had to park my truck and pull the trailer to it. Coincidentally the exact spot for setting the hitch on the ball was a 1 inch drop for the tire at the edge of the concrete. Just enough of a surge to pinch my finger between the hitch and ball. Got it on and starting looking for something to soak up the blood. Stiches at the ER came next.

 

[CB4]

Shocks and Struts - replaced all of them on my F150 and wife's Expedition. Got mine done and then went to the wifes. The rear struts on a 2018 expedition are supposed to be easy. Ended up spending 5+ hours trying to remove the last bolt holding on the control arm on the bottom and nothing would budge it. It would turn 1/2 an inch and thats it. On both sides. What should have been 4 hours of total work turned into 12+ over three days and ended up taking to a shop and paying tripple the cost of the shocks just to have them installed. The fronts were easy with no issues.

 

[jcaud]

Does anyone notice when your wife asks you to do something it's just one thing. Like, build a new deck. Just build it. No thought to permits, digging footers, material, hour and hours of labor and frustration. Nope, just build a deck honey.

Not only this, but she also thinks that because I’m proficient in some stuff, I can do all all things proficiently. While flattering, I’ve ended up in a lot of situations where I was a bit over my head

 

[Svivian]

 

[Invisiblecreek]

Does anyone notice when your wife asks you to do something it's just one thing. Like, build a new deck. Just build it. No thought to permits, digging footers, material, hour and hours of labor and frustration. Nope, just build a deck honey.

One that comes to mind was just skinning and butchering a deer. I spined it and was trying to cut the vertebrae out with the broadhead stuck in it. My knife slipped and whacked my middle finger on my left hand with a 12 in filet knife. It was to the bone and I was bleeding everywhere. I thought I was going to the ER, I couldn't get it to stop bleeding. It finally stopped and I wrapped it and went back out to finish the deer. My steps were covered with leaves and I slipped. Trying to catch myself I ended up almost dislocating my thumb on my right hand. It immediately turned purple and swelled twice its size. Now I'm really screwed. Both of my hands are messed up, and I still have to butcher this stupid deer. The thumb was the worst. I couldn't grip anything, and it took forever.

Another funny one I was taking my utility trailer off my SUV. I bent down to unhook it, and my super excited Golden Retriever jabbed me in the eye with a stick. This ended up in a 4hr trip to the ER.

This could be a skit from the stooges


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[Thinkingman]

View attachment 970619

I’m sharing this with my buddies!

 

[arrow179]

Plumbing is also my arch nemesis

A long time ago I was at a tournament down at Lake Mead. As I was pulling my boat out my alternator takes a shit on the boat ramp. No big deal get towed up to the parking lot and hitch a ride to autozone for a new one. I call ahead and they say yep we got one right here for your 5.4 v8.... perfect. I get there and they hand me the box and i ask again this is for the 5.4 and they say yep!

Sweet, get back to the parking lot and with just a few shit tools i get the alternator on no problem. Shame on me for not inspecting and counting the grooves on the pulley.... I get 40 miles outside of Las Vegas on a busy freeway and I hear a loud pop come from the engine. I put it neutral and shut down the truck and let coast to get pulled off to the side of the road.

Those fuggers at autozone gave me the alternator for the 4.6L not the 5.4L and I ate belt and broke the timing arm. At that point it had to go to the shop but it was a sunday. So I ended up in a hotel for two more days until it was fixed.

That’s why I call it “Idontknow Zone”.

 

[Deeker]

Well I have so many of these. I’ll just give you a couple from the last month or so.

Putting a gravel path around my house, told my wife it would be a weekend project. Was going to dig out and build the border on Saturday and would backfill with gravel Sunday. Ended up taking half day Friday and started on border, that went into Saturday. And then Sunday. Then all week after work. Finally got it done after a week. Then came the gravel. Severely under estimated how much I would need, had to go back to get a dump trailer load three times.

Toilet reinstall, done hundred or more at work. Did one at my house to finish up the bathroom in our downstairs. ( house was a full remodel. Down to the studs). Need to replace flange, which is fine until I realize it was poured into the slab. Out comes grinder. Few minutes later it is cut out. Then I gotta grind out concrete to make a flat surface because concrete isn’t flat. 1st trip to store. Get a grinding head . 2nd trip was for concrete bolts to hold flange down. 3rd was for drill bits that would work on concrete. …….. 2 days and 9 trips to the hardware store later I got that damn toilet installed.

Last one was my favorite. I’m not a mechanic. I can change oil and do basic maintenance, but I generally just send my vehicles into the shop. I was working a lot of hours and had put off changing my wife’s oil for a few weeks. She catches me on a Sunday while I have some free time and asks me to change her oil. I want to go shoot, so I am not in a good mood about doing the oil. Got in a rush and crawled under the car to start draining oil, notice that the drain is much further back than normal. Start draining it. Why is the oil red. Then have the realization that I was draining the transmission. Awesome. Now I need to go get transmission fluid. Do that, and then pop the hood to check and fill transmission. No way to check it. No way to fill it. It’s a sealed transmission. Several YouTube videos, a couple hours and 2 more trips to the store later and I have the transmission filled back up. Still don’t have the oil changed.