Duct tape and Bailing Wire, Stories of the dangerous and wierd

We were on our way to Sturgis from northern Illinois a few years back. It was a Sunday afternoon and we were in Nowhere, Iowa when we noticed that the air conditioning in our '97 Dodge Dakota wasn't working. We just figured that we had sprung a leak in one of the Freon lines. A few more miles down the road we start smelling hot rubber. Upon further inspection we find that the clutch on the air conditioning pulley is frozen up solid so the pulley no longer is spinning and the serpentine belt is getting HOT. Well, with no repair shops open, we decide to go into the little grocery store and buy a can of WD40. We then spray the pulley with the WD40 so the belt will slide over the pulley. It worked pretty good but we had to stop about every 50 miles to reapply the WD40. We had about 450 miles to go and it really turned into a long trip with no air conditioning in a black truck the first week of August and having to stop every 50 miles but we made it. Now my road side kit contains WD40 along with the duct tape and mechanic's wire.

Doc

 

A buddy bought an old race car out of a junkyard, a '68-ish Dart GT.

I happen to look under it and I don't know if it raced this way but one side of the rear suspension to the early 50s Ford truck rearend, it has a come-along ahead of the axle that obviously had been there a long time. Right side, if I remember right, and ahead of the axle.


It ran a small dirt oval, makes me wonder if they were trying to cock the rearend some the way Nascar did for a few years to make it turn better. But it could be pulled right off and claim to be left on by mistake if someone was inspecting it. Who knows.

 

First story,
Worn out GM ignition cylinder on my 73' Chevelle, so I could pull the keys out with it running.
Till I messed the tumblers up, and the key refused to turn at the mall parking lot.

So 17 year old me stripped a little bit of insulation off each wire coming from the column till I found the start & run wires.
Connected them to the 2 speed rear defroster switch,
low speed would crank the starter, high speed let it run.
It was like that for months till the broken steering wheel lock finally locked on its own.
Had to *fix* that with the tire iron.


Second story a year later
72Javelin on a road trip to see AC/DC,
pushed the clutch in to downshift & get off the highway.
But the pedal was already on the floor.
Engine side Z-bar pivot & bolts had fallen off on the road somewhere.

There was a heavy, 90* bracket with a hole in it, bolted to the top of the engine from when the previous owner swapped the engine.

Push started & powershifted it to Sears,
got the right size bolt,
and the 90* bracket became my clutch pivot,
we made it to the concert & the bracket stayed there for at least the whole next year.

 

I've got a car home by carving the carbon rod out of the middle of a torch battery to fit in the dizzy cap. It lasted a few thousand miles, actually...

 

1992, going to sturgis with the drag bikes in a borrowed 25 foot dodge motor home. Trip out was sort of uneventful but the trip home was far from it.

Somewhere around Murdo, the harmonic balance came off and took out the fan and radiator. Borrowed a kids car at a gas station and drove to a junk yard he had told us about. It was sunday and it was closed, but the ol boy lived there and we might get lucky.

He was home but didn't have anything for big block chryslers. We searched and searched and finally found a gremlin with a 4 blade fan with the right bolt pattern and a a tiny little radiator with the outlets in the right place.

Returned to the gas station, removed the destroyed radiator and then used nylon ties to attach the "new" radiator to the core support. Bolted on the tiny little fan and down the road we went. 220° until the sun went down. Then she ran about 215° the rest of the way home.

Another trip with the dragbikes, hauling them with my ol 64 bel air wagon. Valve seals were shot, guides too, so we had a ton of breather related smoke coming into the interior. Stopped and gassed up, saw a garden hose hanging on the side of an abandoned house. Cut off 30 feet or so, hooked it to the breather and ran it all the way back to the rear of the bike trailer. We looked like one of those skeeter fogging trucks going down the road, but we got there.

Thank god Northland oil was sponsoring us. 2 quarts every fill up or else.

 

Pulled out of a toll booth in my go to work 71 Pinto in 79 and when I pulled it into 2nd the shifter broke off in my hand. {quality is job #57}I pulled over and put a pair of vise grips on it and drove it that way until a new shifter I ordered showed up in 3 weeks

 

My bothers mates were out cruising one nite when the fuel pump died. they ran the fuel lines though the air horns and the air pump did the trick enough to get home.

My bother had a stock 48 Anglia he used to dive to wok and back in the 80's. he blew a water hose one day. he poked a stone in the hole and wrapped string around and around the hose tightly to hold the stone in and the water. I don't know if he eve replaced the hose.

My other bother was diving tourist coaches around Europe. one day the throttle cable came away form the injector pump. he ask the passengers for a hair clip. he hooked it back up. and dove around Europe like that. the passengers were amazed that he could fix the coach with a hair clip.

 

60 Ford F100, night, rural New Mexico. Headlights went out (bad switch), hotwired them straight to the battery to get home. Long thin battery behind the seat. Wire went between hood & fender. Halfway home, the insulation wore thru with a bang, flash, suddenly driving 55 down a narrow 2-lane road, in total darkness. Lived only because the road was straight.

 

My 70 C10 decided to spit the ujoint caps out of the rear driveshaft yoke in the middle of Massachusetts coming home from the Stafford springs swap meet. I pulled over, rummaged through my toolbox and found a couple breather grommets, shoved them in the yoke, supporting the ends of the joint. It was tight fit and worked great. I wrapped it in tape, and it was a good enough repair that I could drive it down the highway to the next exit and find a parts store and repair it proper before I drove the rest of the way home.

 

rusty bolts in head lite buckets not allowing head lites to stay put for nites cruise duck tape lite rings as well as XDN both lites works great 1 year later still ROCK N the duck lots of cool comments from all

 

When the fuel pump quit on an old Subaru we hung the windshield washer reservoir from the rear-view mirror, filled it with gas and blew into it for pressure. Had to blow real hard to get up the hills, but we made it home.

 

We were on a Cummins-powered Blue Bird crew bus in England, heading towards Mildenhall, when a loud FAP-FAP-FAP came from under the doghouse. As we pulled the bus off the motorway, everyone looks at ME to fix this thing! I removed the doghouse to find the serpentine belt had started disintegrating, but there was still about half the width of the belt that was still intact. So, I got my trusty knife out and cut the part of the belt off that was flapping around, had the driver start the engine to make sure things were going to work, and then we were right back on the road again.

The Brit driver originally wanted to wait for a tow, but we were tired and had zero inclination to wait three hours for another crew bus and the wrecker!

 

This is one my dad told me many times....
One summer Sunday about '54 he and my mother are getting ready to leave her parents place in Green Bay to head back to Madison. Well his '46 Ford would not start. Turns out the starter is dead. So dad pulled out the starter and found that the brushes were worn down to far to make contact with the armature. He grabbed a block of wood and cut spacers to make up the distance. Grandpa saw that and said if that worked he would eat his hat. Just then he heard the old '46 start. All in the house ribbed grandpa about that one!

 

Fun thread..

Anybody care to translate what the fuck post #47 says?

 

I think he was with a band and their Hammond B3 organ's spinning resonance speaker wouldn't spin so he wrapped a cord around it like an old lawn mower starter and got it to go .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fk7Xp-JHP0g

Why it's pertinent? I dunno, sorry.

 

I was pulling a Monte Carlo with a impala wagon, I had the tail lights wired together for both cars since we were driving all night.
the alternator went out on the wagon so we started the Monte Carlo and turned on the parking lights . it kept the head lights and ignition going for 500 + miles until we got to Chicago. the mote Carlo used about 8 gallons of gas gust idling for the voltage from it.

My fuel pump went out on a old ford pickup I had, I filled a gallon gas can and tied it to the passenger wiper, fuel was gravity fed for a day until I could fix it.

Had a throttle cable brake on a street bike racing though the north ga mountains, used a small bolt to clamp the end of the cable and drove it 200 miles pulling on the bolt to get it to go.
Even got into a race going down Joe brown hwy out of Murphy NC with it like that , but it was a little tricky , and a lot of scary pucker moments but I won

 

That reminds me, we did that on my Model A on one of the many times, the fuel tank got clogged with crud. No blow job required. Gavity was all it needed. We used a radiator overflow bottle off a freind's Jeep. That made a nurse tank to get us out of the woods. Then I drug it to Dad's house on a trailer, and he modified his engine stand to clean the inside of the tank by sloshing some nuts and bolts around inside.

 

Re: #47 I know 'strawberry alarm clock" is a band and those old hammond (B-3) organs had an air pump. Sounds like they had to spin it by hand to get it started.

 

Once, when I was long-haul trucking, I was
hauling a load of typical, time-sensitive,
"we want it here by yesterday' refrigerated
produce out of Bakersfield California,
headed for Montreal, Quebec.. In the
middle of the night, about 8 hours out
of Bakersfield and about 65 or 70 more
hours before I was supposed to be in
Montreal, the alternator on the tractor
failed, the batteries went dead and I
lost all my lights. To make matters
worse, with the batteries on the tractor
dead and no juice available to keep the
fuel solenoid open, the engine died too.
The engine on the refer unit on the
trailer was was still running ok though,
so I got out my 6-ft-long jumper cables
and ran them from the battery up on
the refer unit, down to the battery box
on the tractor. After about 20 minutes,
I had enough juice in the four batteries
on the tractor to re-start the engine and
to run the light again too. I drove it all
the way to Montreal like that, with the
jumper cables going from the refer unit
down to the batteries on the tractor and
the refer unit alternator providing just
enough juice to keep all my lights
running and the fuel solenoid on the
engine open.
---------------
Mart3406
============

 

Many years ago, I worked at Yunta in South Australia, approx 125 miles out of Broken Hill. The surrounding area was all sheep and cattle country and it is pretty arid and desolate. One of the Stations (Ranch) was a place called "Curnmona" and they had a petrol engined, Bedford truck. On the way in to Yunta, the truck gave a couple of backfires and stopped in the midddle of nowhere. On board were the station manager and his wife and a couple of extremely valuable sheep, which were going to the Adelaide Agricultural show. After some investigation, it was discovered that the eye on the tension spring for the contact points had broken and with no spares on board, they were in a bit of a pickle. The manager pinched a hairclip from his wife and bent it so that wedged between the back side of the movable point and the distributor body. A bit of cardboard acted as an insulator and that got them the last 80 odd miles in to town and a I fitted new set of points. Never forgot that one even after 40 odd years. (Sheep won a prize at the show also)

 

Those speakers were called ""Lesleys"" they have a drum like a hvac blower in a house..

 

This was a 'long term' bodgy repair....

1957 Hillman 4 door sedan, my daily driver in the late 60's, had a long line of rust bubbles running down the back edge of the passenger side front guard. You couldn't get registration renewed for rust, so I caved the bubbles in, filled them with bog, and slapped a coat of paint over the lot. Got my rego renewal for 12 months.

3 months later, the bubbles are back, all along the side of my 'repair' work, so I did the same again, and again 3 months later, and again...
I finally had to stop driving the car after the passenger door started popping open every time I took a corner.

Just inside the back of that front guard was the front main body pillar, the rust was also eating it out from the inside at a rapid rate!

Cheers, Glen.

 

If you toured with STRAWBERRY ALARM CLOCK in the 60's I bet nobody would understand your posts either...

 

A few years ago I was out driving in the Czech countryside with my OT East German Trabant. The rear A-arm on those is attached at two points, one of which broke loose causing the right rear wheel to all but fall off. It happened on a blind curve, at night, and in the rain. I had a $3.00 led light on my key chain, but not much else for tools. Luckily I remembered that earlier in the week the radio antenna had been snapped off in a car wash. Rather than throw it away, I had left it in the back seat. With a lot of muscle, I was able to tie the A-arm back to the frame by using the antenna as a thick coat hanger of sorts. It lasted long enough to get me to a hotel for the night. The next morning the farmer who owned the hotel helped me fix it right. The repair we made is still in place.

 

My exhaust fell off on my old bonneville once. Had to knock on the door of the closest house and ask for a wire coat hanger. I explained why and they had a priceless look of confusion on their face. Needless to say, it worked and I got home

 

A few years ago together with friends we went to Moscow on classic car show on my 81' Volga. (It is about 800km between Minsk and Moscow). When we entered Moscow city limits, very loud knock appeared from engine. Damn, it was similar to connecting rod bearings or something like that. It scared shit out of me knock was going from 4th cylinder.
I removed valve lid, unscrewed rocker arms axle, and removed push rods from 4th cylinder valves. Knock disappeared and we returned to Minsk on 3 cylinders and I drove Volga daily for 2 weeks until i opened engine and found piston rings in 4th cylinder totally disintegrated.

 

I remember I was about 6 yrs old riding in the back of dads 39 chevy coupe with mom in the front. the car boiled over and was out of water...Mom used my rubber boots to gather rain water out of the ditch to refill the rad.

 

Coat hanger tech:

More than a few of my exhausts in my younger years used coat hanger wire to hold them up. At least temporarily

Replaced at least one antenea with coat hanger wire...didn't we all back in the 70's ??

I once used a coat hanger and jumper cables off of the battery to weld up my alternator bracket. We managed to get the car a pretty long way back home. Of course it failed short of the destination. We carried on until it overheated and then we shut if off and coasted into the driveway. Didn't have to push a foot.

Back in the day, a buddy of mine built a 55 delivery. We tooled around the block sitting on coke boxes (Remember those??) and used a hockey stick hooked to the carb with coat hanger wire and duct tape. Not even sure if it had a throttle return spring.

All but melted the fuse box on a 67 Mustang while at the drive-in. (Bad stereo install) Way too scared of the young ladies father to get her home late so I used folded over sections of coat hanger wire to replace the blown and burned fuses. Stole the hanger from the concession, folder it over using the door hinge and 2 big rocks to finish the fold. Cut it to length using the door hinge repeated bending until it broke. Managed to get home her (and myself) without setting the car on fire. The girl's dad was impressed but plenty pissed I put his daughter in harms way with the fix. But the next day he drove me to the wrecking yard to get a new fuse block and spent most of his Sunday helping me make the repairs.

 

My parents and I were at my cousins wedding and they took off in their mini-van earlier than I as they had a 2.5 hour drive home and it was already after 10. About 1/2 hour after they left, they called me and said the alternator had died and were losing lights and power. I was driving my '72 Chevy K-20 at the time and took off to help. After figuring out their battery was ok, we started up my truck, pulled and swapped the batteries so I could charge one as they drained the other. Did this back and forth till we had to split ways to go to our respective homes. Swapped in their charged up battery one last time and they made it home with no problem.

 

my 1st dump truck was rusted out almost all the way around the cab roof at the drip rail. I kept a gallon can of roof patch in it and repaired it as neccessary. It actually did a good job. The passenger seat in that truck was either a milk crate, or sometimes my tool box. I had a guy that I picked up to go to work on a regular basis that probably still has marks on his a#$ from that.
Next truck was a F600 with a 370 motor. One day on highway the truck ran slower and slower with my foot in the floor. I pulled over and found I could spin the rotor 360* Had few tools, so I found TDC and set rotor at that. Pulled rotor, took a 3lb hammer and one good whack on shaft, the motor ran and I made it 10 miles home. Replaced distributor with a new Unilite unit, truck never ran better.
Last one happened to my IH diesel dump. It broke the throttle cable. I took a pair of channel locks, set engine at an rpm that didn't sound too fast, and clamp!! It was about 1500RPM. Drove truck all the way home.