What is the dumbest thing you have done?

[warewolf]

Touching the leads on a Stebel to a battery to hear what it sounds like...

I hear ya, bro!

[slofox]

Touching the leads on a Stebel to a battery to hear what it sounds like...

I did that....what? what? speak up!!!

[slofox]

Two dumb things - first one I actually did. Second one I picked up just before I did it so avoided the disaster...


1. Many years ago, I took a carefully laid out gearbox (so I could put it back in the right order) to a dude to find out what was wrong with it. He grabbed everything, pulled all the bits apart, made some comments and then shoved all the little wheels and gears back into the box, totally mixed up. I spent a week figuring out where everything went after that...


2. Setting up a distribution box for auxiliary power a couple of weeks ago...came very close to making the fatal mistake of putting the positive and negative sides on either side of a single set of connectors, forgetting that they were connected to each other...thereby causing a direct short circuit...looked at it and realised "oh yes...I need separate connectors for positive and negative don't I?"...how dumb is THAT!

[clint640]

I'll just start it up for a minute to get the oil circulating and then top it off.

Ok. Maybe I should have put the oil cap back on the bike...

Heh heh, been there but worse - on the KTM you turn over / run the motor with the top frame bung out to bleed the air out of the oil filled frame section, then stick the bung in when the level gets to the hole - after watching this intently on the rhs of the bike I then went around to the other side to find a nice spray of oil over everything from the engine filler bung that some idiot had left off.

Clint

[3L4NS1R]

Helping a mate who was very new at biking change oil in his FZR. He pointed to what he thought was the sump bolt. I agreed. He took it out and we watched it drain into the pan.

I made a comment saying "that oil is mighty clear..." Bent down for a closer look.

"Hmmm." says I. "We need to get you some more coolant".

[NordieBoy]

i hear ya, bro!

pardon ?

[Skinny_Birdman]

Where to start....?
Riding off down the road with the Dzus fastner undone on the quick access panel on the side fairing. Up to 100km/h and woosh! Off comes the panel bump scrape down the road; bike no longer mint

Checking the timing on an elderly pommy car with a strobe in a darkened garage. Came within a whisker of putting my arm though the rotating steel fan, which appeared to be standing still in the strobe light.

Leaving chuck key in electric drill... repeatedly. They sure do fly out!

Crossing sump plug thread on beemer. Bolt is a bit tight, a bit tight.... oh, now it's really easy. Really easy

[warewolf]

Checking the timing on an elderly pommy car with a strobe in a darkened garage. Came within a whisker of putting my arm though the rotating steel fan, which appeared to be standing still in the strobe light.

After overhauling the distributor/points/advance mechanism on my old ...ahem! Torana... I very carefully set the timing using the strobe... to zero degrees :slap: then set off for a weekend trip out back of beyond. Slow trip that one.

[Moki]

...one Valentines day trying to surprise the old dear with a dozen long-stem roses. Thought I'd pick some up and gently place them in my back pack. Not far to ride home, I thought to myself, I'll just take it steady. Easy....

I handed her a dozen stems

[Waihou Thumper]

...one Valentines day trying to surprise the old dear with a dozen long-stem roses. Thought I'd pick some up and gently place them in my back pack. Not far to ride home, I thought to myself, I'll just take it steady. Easy....

I handed her a dozen stems

That is similar to the time I bought a very nice pie at the Clowns Cafe in Raetehi. It was so good, I bought another to take home. I placed it in my rear box and went home. Got home and it was no longer a pie but a soggy brown bag laced with lumps of steak....
Should have eaten it afterall...

[Rosie]

Leaving chuck key in electric drill... repeatedly. They sure do fly out!

I did that on a lathe once No damage to Rosie/lathe/surrounds, but it's not something you want to repeat

[awayatc]

mate of mine went on overnight trip on sprots bike...improvised/tied everything onto seat on back. wondered why everybody was honking their horns at him......
until he had to stop at a trafficlight to find his sleepingbag was in fllames...
(had touched high slung exhaust...which had gotten hot...)

just a few weeks ago I couldn't start my Pegaso after it had been locked in away for 4 weeks in a container.
I had twisted the throttle to often thus flooding it....battery not quite up to it, so I decided to push start it......2nd gear and building up speed,jumped on it but didn't quite want to go, so hopped off but kept running alongside and keeping throttle wide open.........

Yes it did finally and suddenly and very violently start.......
A 650 single starting on full throttle in second gear does lengthen ones arm by approx 2 inches before ripping em out of your sockets......

Did manage miraclously to hang on and somehow end up in seat while closing throttle....

[NordieBoy]

...one Valentines day trying to surprise the old dear with a dozen long-stem roses. Thought I'd pick some up and gently place them in my back pack. Not far to ride home, I thought to myself, I'll just take it steady. Easy....

I handed her a dozen stems

Gomez? Is that you?

[MXNUT]

At Desert Storm trailride 2 years ago on my RM250.
Woke up on the sunday morning to -4 degrees and bike covered in frost, got all my gear on and went to start the bike to head out on to the trails. Bike would fire up and run for about 3 seconds. It did this for a few minutes, so being a mechanic i thought i know whats wrong ... the carb is icing up.

Took half my gear off and went for a walk to the main sign on tent where they had a large hot water earn for making coffee.
Managed to carry back four cups of boiling water which i then tipped over outside of carby to warm it up. Kicked over bike and it ran for 5 seconds this time. Kept kicking for the next few minutes untill i was buggered.

By this stage the group of riding mates had grown to about 9, all waiting for me and they were just deciding to head out anyway and catch up with me later.

I climbed off the bike and sank down into a camp chair behind it to catch my breath - as i sat down i noticed something orange in the outlet of my rear muffler !!!!!!!

Decision time , do i let them all go and then remove the ORANGE MUFFLER BUNG i had placed there last night ( & tell them that i had fixed the bike ) or do i fess up and look like a total idiot in front of them all.

I fessed up and went riding.

[junkmanjoe]

at least your carb was nice and hot....