Mechanical etc mishaps

[Kansaskart]

Like the time when we were in high school and my brother ran a small diameter powerline to the car trunk to a huge audio amp. He ate at mcdonalds a lot and threw the trash in the backseat. Needless to say the trash went up in flames and he pulled over on a busy interstate and bailed as the car burnt to the ground.

Or the time an alcoholic welder friend of mine tried cutting the lug nuts off a brand new rig with a torch cause he couldnt get them off and caught the tire on fire and burnt the rig up.

Plenty more including mine lol.

 

[Bbqjoe]

I was taking a friend home in my VW bug.
I hadn't driven it in awhile. I went to start it. It wouldn't start, and I smelled gas.
I opened the hatch, and saw the fuel line had rotted, and was leaking.
I pulled the line and replaced it with some I had stored in my shed. We headed on down the road, and after a short while cars were passing me honking their horns and yelling.

I looked in the rear view, and saw smoke and flames coming out the back. Being the highly intelligent person that I am, I quickly pulled into an empty lot vs the gas station.

I grabbed all my important stuff, and hopped out quickly.
There was really nothing I could do, but stand there at a distance and watch it burn.

Most fortunately, a state hwy worker saw the fire, quickly pulled in, and put the fire out with his extinguisher.

It turned out the new hose had popped off.

What genius would put the fuel line right above the exhaust manifold anyway?

Only a small amount of stuff on the engine got toasted, which ended up costing a whole bunch to replace.

This is the same bug I just traded off. I know for a fact that this car has had fires before, and always feared I'd die in the danm thing as it burned.

 

[mckutzy]

As they say.....Good riddance ....

 

[Hellion]

...There was really nothing I could do, but stand there at a distance and watch it burn.

I blame the operator. Those cars have almost zero reputation for catching fire... they're not Ford Pintos for Pete's sake!

 

[anickode]

I watched a 2 stroke Polaris 500 quad drive itself off the back side of a ski hill because the idle was set too high and the torque converter was juuuuuuuust starting to grab. That was the luckiest accident ever. It drove itself across a plateau, down a hill, blew through a fence, flew off the steep, flipped end-to-end 3 times on the way down, bouncing on the wheels each time around, landed on the flat 150 feet down, drove another 100 yards , and buried itself in a snow drift. When we got to it it was still running, wheels happily spinning at about 1mph. Total damage sustained was one cracked headlight lens from when it went through the fence, an the orange safety flag was missing from the fiberglass whip. We later found the flag snagged on one of the bits of fence.

 

[Kansaskart]

Awesome! I feel better already!

Most of us out here are notorious for getting drunk and riding atvs at night. My saving grace is I drive like a grandpa. My other friends not so much. I only had 1 accident in the past 20 years when I did a donut and got thrown off because 1 hand was clutched to a beer. Fuuny thing is when I got thrown i used my other hand to help hold the beer and sacrificed my body as 250lbs bellyflopped on a gravel road. They said I looked like a wide receiver stretched out reaching for the ball. I didnt spill 1 drop and sustained a few minor skin abrasions. I try not to drink so much on them anymore and am down to drinking only once every couple months or so. Prob a good thing.

 

[anickode]

The best part is we never even got in trouble. It was a pretty calm night ( I worked there making snow), so we grabbed a spare fence panel, hauled it up on the Tucker, screwed it in, cleaned up the mess, disappeared the tracks, and burned the old fence boards in the fire pit.

 

[Kansaskart]

Not getting in trouble makes it even better. Getting teady to feed my dogs some gourmet plated chow.