Stupid Mechanic Tricks

[Jeff_G]

Would love to hear other stupid stories done by "mechanics" and DIY .
Had a guy in here, was teaching him a few things on his own motor. We had to pull the motor. Told him to bolt it to a engine stand. We needed to troubleshoot the starter while the transom was being fixed.
Pulled the motor using a shop hoist, the rolling kind. He hooked the motor up to a battery with jumper cables and jumped the solonoid. I was in the office. Heard a yell and a big thump. ran out to find the motor and hoist laying on the ground.
He tried to turn it over with the motor hanging by the flywheel.
Thank goodness other than a broken lower cowl all was unhurt.
Wish I had a video of that!

[natzx7]

This ones on the lot now - brand new motor. 3 bolts is enough to hold a 225 Zuki to the loose, homeade bracket isnt it ? I'm afraid the motor is going to fall off sitting on the trailer.....:rolleyes:

[Ron V]

Acquired an old 5 hp Sea King some years back for free. The motor had reportedly just been rebuilt, but would only run halfway across the lake and then quit. Halfway across the lake my ass.....probably never even farted. Why? The "mechanic" had put the pistons in backwards.

[heath brinkley]

Jeff, your a lucky dude.
Dingledicks like that are the reason every garage in the world says EMPLOYEE'S ONLY.

Actually LAWYER'S are the reason.

[heath brinkley]

BTW Jeff, I haven't forgot about the pictures. I just got a camera a couple weeks ago. My old camera took a crap. I'll get them to you pretty soon. By my standards though I wouldn't encourage you to hold your breath.:rolleyes:

[Raceman]

Jeff, I hope the guy was a customer and not an employee. If you've got somebody workin' for you that would do something like that he needs to be gone NOW before it gets real expensive.

[Jeff_G]

He was actually a friend. Didn't have much in the way of cash so I was helping him. He bought the beer so he wasn't all bad. He just forgot the part about bolting it to the engine stand first. No we didn't drink until after all work was done and shop closed.

[WATERWINGS]

I had a friend with a motor hanging by the lifting ring, he thought it would be a good idea to turn it over, (wires still hooked up) it didn't take but a second to unscrew the lifting eye, and BLAM, it hit the floor.

Lucky there were several standing around it, and caught it before it fell completely over, just chipped the skeg, and everybody grabbed it in a bear hug to save it!:D

[Winger Ed.]

I'm not sure if this qualifies:

This is my first post here, and I haven't really tested the water yet, but here goes:


Last Summer my Dad asked me how to change the rotten 4" rubber hose (about 2' long') on one exhaust leg on one engine of his 36' Trojan that was blowing exhaust water into the bilge.


I told him, "

1. Take this plumbers pipe cap, and cap the exhaust pipe outside on the transom.

2. Disconnect the lower hose clamp on the flex hose between the manifold, & hard pipe.

3. Jiggle it. Look for seepage.

4. If none ,,, lossen top hose clamp.

5. jiggle hose. Check for water flow.

6. If none, slide hose down, then pull it up & off. Stuff towel inside pipe.

(come back to town, measure and get new flex hose.)
(make sure both automatic bilge pumps work)
(connect shore power to be sure batteries for bilge pumps stay up)
(get new hose measured and sized)

7. Put clamps on new 4 inch hose, slide one end down, pull up, & slide up to top.

8. Feel that hard pipes are equal distance inside hose,

9. Tighten clamps.


10. Live happily ever after.


..........
Sounded pretty simple to me.

............
here's how the repair went:


Dad went to lake, on Sat.


1. Pulled off old hose.

2. Looked inside, saw that lake was 3-4 inches away from lip of exhaust pipe.

3. Came home.

(didn't look at bilge pumps, or shore power)
(didn't think big Texas Summer storms would make boat sway & rock in dock)
(didn't think lake would slosh into bilge during storms through 4 inch exhaust pipe open to sea.)

4. Got new hose on Monday.

5. Planned to go back to lake next Sat & replace hose.

6. After call from Marina manager, Went to lake on Wednsday to view boat submerged in slip, up to Command bridge, hanging by mooring lines.

7. Later, replaced entire interior & electrics due to water, 150 gallons of fuel, and oil floating out of engines (2 big block Chry gasoline V-8s) and fouling all of interior as fuel, 2 gallons or so of oil & water level receded in cabins & decks as boat was raised.

8. (Winter) Interior re-done electrics re-done.

9. One engine OK. Onan generator unknown.

10. (Spring) Port engine being pulled and overhauled due to frozen rings. Will get to generator later.

////////////////////////

Hopefully,

this picture will come through.

It is my 'D' class Aluminum hydro I built a few years ago, and just now got back in the water.

I built it out of Aluminum from a set of set of plans for a 60's era wooden 'cab over'.

As far as I know, a Aluminum 'D' is sort of unique.

I just built it for something to do, with lots of help from my friends, and to hopefully out perform any jet-ski.

It is AL framed, and skinned. The inside is totally foamed, the hull weighs about 150 lbs, and is powered with a '78 Merc. 50 4cyl.

I taught myself how to weld Aluminum as I built it from materials I scrounged at the local scrapyard. (on next one, welds should look better)

I don't race it, its just for fun, but I've had a few problems with props, and set up that I hope to burden you guys with in the future.

(I don't let the wife's pigmy goat drive--- she's just the crew chief).


S/F,
Ed.




l

[Forkin' Crazy]

That's funny Jeff. :)

Ed, cool boat. Is that your test pilot behind the wheel? ;)

:cool:

[Mark75H]

Ed, is that a Ben Hur? Mike Petty in FL has an aluminum B hydro his father built in the '50's

[delawarerick]

Welcome to the board. Try the Y hoses on yamars. We took the Y all the way out and dropped a full size blazer On the hose to install and put the bottom of the Y in the street. Rick

[Winger Ed.]

Mark,

You are correct Sir.

It is a Ben Hur.

A company that advertises in a lot of boating books,
'Clark Craft' sells plans, an partial kits, etc. for a whole bunch of boats.

Canoes, fun boats, 60' yachts, big workboats, everything.

It was built from their Ben Hur plan sheet. All the innards of it that look
like a old style ice cube tray which were called to be plywood have been substituted
for 1/16th or so Aluminum or 1/8" sheet for the deck/floor. And its framed with 3/4"
Alum. angle stock 1/8" or so thick.

At 11' 6 or so, it was big enough I could get in, and seemed like the safest design of the hydros. (I can't make it even think about 'kiting' over, and with 2 turn fins under it, it won't hardly dump its air in a turn, and slids out in a turn about as much as a freight train.)

I knew it wouldn't totally seal, so in all the empty spaces under the outside deck skin
it was poured with that 1:1 foam stuff that grew to fill all the nooks & cranies. Then shaved
with a cheese grader, & the skin was riveted on. But for attaching the 2 outer skin deck pannels, its all welded.


Its a hoot to drive.

The biggest stock prop I could get was a 15" pitch. It screams so hard- it has to be over revving at something in the low 40s mph.

So, the prop doc. has the prop right now.

He's probably hammering it over a curb to put as much more pitch on it as he can.

Thank's for the welcome Yawl!

Ed.