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yes, to the air box. it is just a tube with the sensor embedded between the air box and the intake manifold. I guess it is standard, looks very similar to most MAF sensors on 1.6 to 2.5 L engines in general.
One that sticks in my mind was last year , when fitting a manifold insulator to my old car , I neglected to re-seat one of the injectors correctly , and this caused a fuel leak , so I went start then car thinking all was well , and a spark caused a smallish fire from the plenum region , this was having previously dropped two bolts down into the chamber while re- fitting the plenum to the runners and intake .
I might add that I’m not a mechanic , I’m a Police Officer , so no mean comments . 😛I did a good one today.
While under a cube van I had the pleasure of being caught by the boss asleep with the oil filter wrench in my hand and the wrench on the filter. I have been extremely busy at work and was so tired that I fell asleep on the creeper with the wrench in my hand.70 hours in last week
one of mine was before i went to school and started getting into the field as a profession my dad and i were doing an engine swap in a jeep when i was about 15 walked past the hoist as i we were lining things up and knocked the release causing the motor to drop into the bay luckily i didnt damage anything
i went to change my starter due to a bad coil and it not starting about once every 3 tries till i hit it. got a new one took the old one out. didnt think anything of it, left the battery connected. as im tightening the positive on the starter, it hits the fuel line (didnt know it) gas goes spraying and a small fire starts for a split second. i thought it was the oil catching fire lol. i screamed like a girl for about 3 seconds till the fire extinguished.my brother was helping me with it as well and he was laughing his ass off while i was under my explorer scared shitless for a few seconds. this time we dissconnected the battery. get the starter all set connect the battery go to start it up and we see fuel pouring out. shut it off and found there was a hole about 2-3mm in diameter. had to take the whole fuel hose set out and replace a portion of it. about 2 hours trying to fix it.
i was doing an oil change took the oil out, and oil filter. put new one in and new oil. i go to look at the old oil filter to find that the OLD seal and the NEW seal are both on the same oil filter i just put in, which is now full of oil. i was hoping that it wouldnt spray oil and i would have to take it off and remove one. yep, it did and i had to remove the seal and replace about a quart or two of oil back into it.
lesson learned. remove battery when working on the electrical parts of the vehical, and make sure you take the seal off the oil filter. good times to look back at as well as a good story.
Not to long ago I was swapping the camshaft in my ’64 for something that would give me a bit more top end. I was in a hurry since I was working later that day so I pulled the rocker shaft setups, installed the new moly pushrods I had spec’d for my setup with the new cam and lifters. Apparently though one of the pushrods wasn’t seated properly in the cup end, went to start the engine and heard a loud snap. Broke the pushrod into 3 pieces and shattered the adjuster screw and cup right off the rocker arm. Had to wait 2 weeks for the replacement parts.
I remember one of my first jobs as an apprentice was to R&R an Allison AT545 in a dump truck from a local landfill. This thing stunk like you wouldn’t believe. I was working next to the shop since nobody wanted this thing in the shop so I had parts all over the place under it. Got almost everything buttoned up, went to install the shifter cable only to realize I had put the trans. mounts on the wrong sides! They bolt right up but the one side has a cutout for the cable. An hour and a trans. jack later stinky was up and running. Now I have a box of paint pens.
Best one that wasn’t mine was this guy Billy I used to work with when I was starting out. He was doing head gaskets on an F350 diesel. Towards the end of the job one of the guys sees him grinding on something for quite a while and asks him what he was doing. He answers “making a washer to fit this thing, I lost the original one somewhere.” About an hour later he fires it up only to hear this godawful ticking then knocking sound. Boss tells him to stop, open it back up and see what he F’ed up. A while later he pulls one of the heads to find a seriously banged up head and a piston with a washer stuck in it. Well, at least we found that MISSING WASHER!
When I was first starting out with cars before I had a jack or jack stands I had to borrow my friends ramps. One day I decided to wash my car right before pulling onto the ramps. As I reversed the rear onto the ramps, the wet tires suddenly lost grip and the weight of the car coming down sent the ramps shooting backwards into the wall. Even tho it was my own fault, I will never use a ramp again
Another time I was doing a brake job on my friend’s F100 and I had him pumping the brake pedal while I minded the bottle as it bled the lines out. It was weird because I would put some in and almost nothing would come out after 3 pumps. So I checked the brake master cylinder and it was already completely empty. 2 times I repeated this process, only for a shimmer of brown to catch my eye and cause me to look up and see 2 bottles worth of brake fluid all over the floor. Then I realized I had forgotten to tighten the bleeder nuts on the other calipers I had already done…..still feel stupid just talking about it. Had a great time cleaning that up
I’m sorry I missed this thread. I started one in the technician section about when the car outsmarted me. I had a couple stories like I couldn’t find a belt tensioner once only to find I never took it off. I took all the lug nuts off a wheel once without lifting the car & got away with it. I dropped a starter on my head once as I was complaining about how it was being so tough to get the bolt threads started when I thought I finally did have a thread started. I didn’t.
This is possibly one of the best mistakes I’ve ever made. I was applying for a mechanic job once and I showed up for the interview 22 minutes late. I went to their HR office expecting I was eight minutes early and the HR director said I was late and the shop manager had already left. I said I’d like to go talk to the manager and I was directed to the shop across the lot. I had time to realize that I did remember the wrong time despite writing the right time down the day before. Going in to the shop, I immediately got a healthy ear load to which I essentially replied, “You’re right and I’m sorry for wasting your time. I’ll get out of your hair now.” She gave me the exact same ear load all over again and I gave the exact same apology all over again with an eyebrow up and halfway over the back of my scalp. I went home feeling like my mistake maybe was a blessing in disguise. Anybody that’s going to make the same argument for a second round when I conceded on the first round may not be somebody I want to work for anyway.
The next day, HR called me back up to schedule another interview. Naturally, I’m confused and I tell HR about how I’m pretty sure I burned a bridge, but HR says the manager was impressed. HR gave me two possible times for the next interview. Noon or 2:30. I scream, “NOON! I can’t screw up noon….let’s do noon!” So I make the next interview on time and express my confusion. The manager tells me that she has this chronic problem with applicants showing up late or missing interviews altogeher, making excuses, arguing that she’s wrong, and so on. She just didn’t know how to comprehend somebody actually owning up to their mistakes. So in a way I didn’t expect, it did turn out to be a blessing in disguise. Owning up to my mistake got me the job.
When I worked at honda we had a VW come in, I forget which model but it came in for an oil change and no one there was really to big on answering the news guys questions, so thinking i had everything done and topped off the oil I had made a big mess. The new filter didnt come with an o-ring so me not double checking i forgot about that.
The only other one I can really think of was similar at my new job and didnt check to see if the old gasket came off the filter, luckily people here area little more forgiving and checked me before I started the car.
Here is one I can’t get over. It’s an Integra 5-lug conversion. Can you see something that doesn’t belong on those rotors? LOL
https://philadelphia.craigslist.org/pts/5044468480.html
[IMG]http://i61.tinypic.com/2hhhgdj.jpg[/IMG]
Sure his brakes are ultra quiet as he slides into the car in-front of him…. Unless he is using it to prevent rust for the next guy that buys them… still it’s silly.
Do not get ahead of yourself.I have done this putting one part and realize I forgot to install something first before the part I installed.Installing parts in backwards too doing this too,luckily I never started the bolts when this happened.Some of the Japanese and Korean cars,the electrical plug ins look the same and do plug in.I did this with a Nissan once,plugged in the crank sensor plug in the distributor plug in and the distributor plug in in the crank sensor plug in.Would not start and was an easy fix,look at the color codes of the wires and reconnected them to the right plug in starting up.Forgot to install the 3 rear spark plugs in a 3.5 Chrysler in a Chrysler Pacifica hearing an arcing noise once.
Here’s a two day long fail saga… from a few weeks ago. Lots of fails!
So, I’m out of town visiting inlaws in my 95 ranger and I go to leave with my wife for home, 3 hrs away. I get a few miles away, only for my brakes to lock up hard in a left turn lane by the interstate. I find that I can back up at least… I back the truck up across two lanes the wrong way, so my father in law can tow it to his place…
We get it there, finding the front right wheel locked up. Pulled it, finding out that the caliber and rim are rubbing. We fail to realize that this is a new issue and toss so washers on the studs, thinking that would fix it. Put it together back out, brakes making noise from the back and feeling funny. Knowing the drum brakes have been an issue lately, we park it and call it a night.
The next day, I pull the drums and find the self adjusters arent ratcheting… and that apparently i didnt rebuild it quite right. I go across town to fetch some drum brake tools from harbor freight. Get back, rebuild them, still not ratcheting. Discover the old self adjuster hardware is worn out, and go back across town to the pep boys next to the harbor freight, only to find out when I got back I got the wrong kit. Apparently ford’s 9″ drum brakes care a lot harder to get parts for than the 10″ drums (both are found on rangers).
Disgusted at a wasted day, I throw it back together, somehow making the adjusters ratchet enough to get by. Pull out, front wheel locks up again.
My father in law swears it must be the wheel bearings, which seems odd since I repacked them two weeks prior. I pull off the caliper, only to find something odd… one caliper bracket bolt is missing, and the other is loose, making a pivot… which was why my rim was hitting and my brakes locking up only in one direction. Looks like moron here didn’t get the bolts tight enough during that bearing job… doh!
This required a third trip across town, to auto zone, for a bolt kit (which was a block from the other two stores)… put it together, finally fixed.
I was so glad to make it home that night… and that my father in law has a nice shop, a good heart, and a sense of humor.
Did I mention that my brother in law brought over his mudding buddies to watch me struggle with the drum brakes too? You gotta love inlaws…
Never forget my worst blunder lol. I had been in the business for only a few years and was working at a shop doing mostly maintenance work with a few starters, alternator things like that. This was back in the 90s when it was still ok to learn as you go. Most of new experiences where always on my own vehicles though. Well I had a late 80s Camaro that the clutch went out. So due to not having extra bays I had to attempt this repair in the back parking lot. Of course I jacked the car way up and put it on stands all the way around. It looked like I was trying to build a 4×4 thats how high it was in the air. Anyway mistake number one was putting the stands under the rear axle. As most of you know those year Camaro had the bar running from the end of trans to the rear end. Needless to say when I loosened the last bolt the part at the end of trans slammed into the floor board. That’s when I found out I could pull up and down on it and roll the rear end that happen to be on the stands. Real quick I decided not to do that anymore. Anyway I pull the trans and change out the clutch, pressure plate and throw out bearing. It really seemed to be going smoothly for a first timer. Took my time lining up the clutch and all so that trans sled right in no problems. That is until I was done and tried to drive it. Not matter what it would not go into gear while running. But I could put it in gear, start the car let off the clutch and drive. Problem was when I needed to shift it would not come out of gear unless I shut the engine off with the clutch in and shifted then restarted in the next gear and released the clutch. It was the end of the day, I was tired and said whatever I will drive home this way and figure it out tomorrow. When I got it back to the shop and back up in the air I could not figure out the problem. So my only choice was to tear it all back down. Well I found the problem. In all my concern over making sure the clutch plate was lined perfect for the shaft I had done what has been said is impossible and put the clutch plate in backwards. Some say you can’t but I am proof that yes you can. Needless to say I had to buy all new parts and do it right because that plate didn’t look so good. I’m sure I could think of other mistakes while learning but that one stands out the most.
Just the other day I forgot to drain the fluid before pulling the axle out of the transaxle.
I got an unwanted shower.I was doing a head gasket on a car in the uk. Not only I decided to do it in the cold where I was freezing my nuts off lol, I took off the head, Cleaned everything up, Put the head back together, Did the timing etc, So basically I rebuilt the engine, I went to turn the car over and what did I see on the passenger seat… The head gasket still in its wrapper. What happened was, As I was getting the head all ready, Someone came out with a cup of coffee and disturbed me, As they disturbed me, I went to put the head back on the block so after I had a coffee and smoke, I’m like I think im ready to tighten it down now. So there I go and cracks on with the job.
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