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Can’t Believe I Did That.

Discussion in 'Lounge' started by Alan williams, May 22, 2020.

  1. Having read about @West Cork Paul and his adventure with a left hand thread thought I’d see if anyone else is prepared to admit to a silly mistake.


    Mine was when I was about 18, and I was given a non-running Yamaha Enduro 400. The tank had been brush painted with what looked like bitumen.
    Being an all knowing 18 year old I quickly realised the best way to clean that off was with a blow lamp.
    Luckily a local breakers had one.
     
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  2. Can I just say, there's a reason you toast marshmallows on wooden sticks and not metal forks.

    Learned that one quite young.
     
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  3. Yes, for those that don’t know I spent 4 days attempting to remove the nut that secured the right hand wing mirror to the bars on my Monster. I applied much force, much penetrating fluid, more force, more penetrating fluid, some heat until I realised the mirror is hard plastic :eek:, more force including use of a 2’ breaker bar on the hex socket, all to no avail.

    Utterly desperate and with a head that was now stripped, I asked the question on here, ‘anyone had this problem before?’. Answer ‘no mate, it’s a left hand thread and is barely finger tight’.

    Duhhhhho_O:pensive:
     
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  4. I once offered to buy a round. Doh!
     
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  5. First car, first year apprentice.. Doing spark plug and HT lead change on my 1983 mini Mayfair. Soon learned to make a note of Which HT lead came of which plug. Also learned not to hold HT lead while leaning on the car when it’s running. :joy:
     
    #5 Andy800, May 22, 2020
    Last edited: May 22, 2020
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  6. My first real car, cost me all the notes and coins in my wallet... under £80
    Web pic
    [​IMG]

    The guy let me have it cheap as none of the lights worked... just suddenly stopped working.
    Since I was studying electrickery at tech, I thought no problem...
    Started at the alternator, then battery, then fuse box.. switches .... eventually took all the lenses out...
    NOT A SINGLE BULB in the whole car.
    Went back to him to see if he was having a joke on me.... (as it cost me a fortune in the local equivalent of Halfords).
    Told him "No Bulbs, what gives?"..
    Response "The F***ing **nts.... I'll kill em".. grabbed his coat and pushed past me ... last seen heading in the direction of the local working mans club...
     
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  7. My tank bag tripped my kill switch on the ferry as I was manoeuvring the bike ready to fire her up. I was due to leave the boat for a trip to Ypres - yes, I pushed the bike all the way off the boat rather than hitting the kill switch and starting it o_O
     
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  8. I always wanted the 2 door version of that
     
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  9. The XJ two door Jag was my favourite (never had one).... normally the local bank robbers day car.
    Since I was 17/18 the back seat of the cortina got a lot of use? - abuse? the vinyl seat isn't very grippy, but easy to clean.
    [​IMG]
     
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  10. Yamaha RD250 coffin tank. Problem with points (yes, a long time ago!) and I had to take off the tank for some reason. Put it back on but forgot to reattach the link pipe that you had to remove to take off the tank. Put petrol back in but didn't realise that it was just pissing out all over the engine as I hadn't reattached link pipe in my excitement!. Cover still off points and kicked it over to test if it would start. There must of been a spark at the points and whole bike, that was now covered in petrol, went up in flames!

    Luckily, we used to live in a thatched roof cottage and a condition of house insurance was to have a fire extinguisher in the kitchen. I rushed into the kitchen, where my father was cooking tea, and grabbed an extinguisher to put out fire.

    Only damage was a bit of charring on the white stripes on the tank. Effing lucky....Not only could I have destroyed the bike and burnt down the garage, I could of set the house alight.

    Quite understanding parents, fortunately!
     
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  11. I learned about HT lead connection order with my Kettle, my first multi-cylinder bike.

    I had no idea noises could be that loud.
     
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  12. Changing the oil for my future brother in law on his Escort. On his parents drive.
    All good, drained, filter off, new one on. Fill it up.
    Forgot to put sump plug back in.
    It looked like the Exon Valdez on the drive. Oops.
     
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  13. This is a long one..

    In my early 20’s when grey imports were all the rage I decided to take a 1 way flight to Cologne, buy a CBR600 and ride it back.

    Got there, bought the local version of exchange and mart, made a shortlist and went to bed. Up at the crack of dawn, all over the city by tram, finally ended up buying a VFR750 instead....

    By this time the day was running out - the weather turned and the heavens opened - the dealer took pity on me and threw in a rubberised rain suit several sizes too big for me. So I set off wearing all of the clothes I had with me under the rain suit, getting battered by strong winds and holding on for grim death. At the first fuel stop it was such a hassle getting my card out of my money belt with all of the stuff i was wearing I didn’t put it back on but stuffed it into the top compartment of my rucksack instead.....

    The next time I stopped for fuel was in Belgium, it was here I learned an important lesson, normal rucksacks are not designed to take 155mph winds that occur when some idiot sticks his head down on the autobahn to see how fast his new bike goes - everything that had been in the top compartment was now scattered along the road somewhere between Belgium and Germany!

    After trying to explain to the cashier that I had no money, no ID, no passport, he helpfully called the police, who issued me with a report and then negotiated with the owner of the service station over the phone to spot me a tank of fuel.

    All this took a while, so by the time I arrived in Calais it was late, I had missed the ferry and the next one wasn’t until around 4am.

    I managed to get the port office to let me call my mother - at 1am - to get her to pay for a ticket and finally boarded 2 hours later. I tied the bike down and headed upstairs completely exhausted. It was hot and noisy, I was too tired to fight my way out of my gear so I wandered out into the dark, windy, top deck put my helmet on and laid down in a bench. I have never fallen asleep so quickly and so deeply in my life.

    I awoke - what seemed like a moment later to find myself surrounded by people, on a sunny day, with the white cliffs of Dover in clear view......
    The crowd that surrounded me as I tried to ask a french crew member whether the cliffs were indeed getting further away were very amused at his incredulity that I could have actually been asleep on deck during the previous night’s storm, the unloading and reloading of the ferry and subsequent departure.

    After finally getting back to blighty, explaining my lack of passport or id to the border officials, I headed to the bank to try to get some funds. Luckily at the time my parents lived opposite our bank manager so I talked the bank in Dover into calling my home branch and asking to speak to him. After telling him my predicament he authorised them to give me enough cash from my account to get me enough fuel to get to a friends place where I could shower and sleep the day away.

    I dropped the bike outside his house.

    I slipped in the shower and hit my head. :D
     
    #13 LiveFast......, May 22, 2020
    Last edited: May 22, 2020
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  14. Just the other week was changing disks over from road to track wheels and instead of being diligent and looking down directly at the disk bolt I was sat on my arse, legs crossed doing it from 3 feet away and oblivious to having picked up the wrong size torx bit. Total muppet wrecked it. So I drill a hole and try to get it out with an easy out but that wasn’t working. The torque on the bolt was too much for the handle you use on the easy out to pull it out. In the end a mate came over with his impact driver and that took it out after hammering a hex bolt into the hole I had drilled. I am buying an impact driver
     
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  15. Not bike related, but the first time I worked offshore.
    Having done all the required safety courses and half day induction on the platform went back to my cabin to change. Bent over to tie my laces and whacked my head on the cupboard door I’d left open.
    Bad enough gash to have to go see the medic and stupid enough to tell people how it happened, so had a fun week of piss taking.
     
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  16. That story reminds me of a gruesome incident I had as a 16 year old starting A Level Biology.

    We had been dissecting rats in the lab. I put the various scalpels and tweezers in the canvas roll that they were kept in and stuffed it in my blazer side pocket. I stupidly forgot to remove one of the scalpels blades.
    On the way home with my mates I stuffed my hand in my pocket and felt a little resistance. Then pain.

    The scalpel had gone straight through the canvas and continued its path across the base of my thumb onto my palm.

    I pulled my hand out. Clean cut then lots of blood. I stuck my hand in my trouser pocket until I got home as I felt such a knob.

    a splash of TCP, a plaster or two and job done. Lucky the rats had been preserved in formaldehyde I guess as we never cleaned the blades. Still have a feint scar now.
     
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  17. Poor old John Donnelly at school got a dogfish liver in his blazer pocket. Every week that poor lad ended up with something. Fish liver, broken wrist, broken collarbone. Unluckiest kid I ever knew.
     
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  18. Could you have just stopped putting the fish liver in his pocket and beating him up? :D
     
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  19. Hey, I was guilty of byestanderism, not school atrocities!

    Donnelly was a twat but he did not deserve one tenth of what used to happen to him.
     
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