"Mechanical Genius" comments you've heard?

I was just thinkin...another one I used to get was, "Chevy don't make no 302 son. A 302's a Ford motor."
<!-- / message --><!-- sig -->__________________

 

Funny, I used to ride a lot of two strokes on the street, RD400's and RZ350's. Can't count the number of times I was asked what kind of cam I had in there, or the comments on the lumpy cam idle. ....

 

Actually- it's neither. It's a city in California.

 

well that explains why I didn't like Texas... I was in Cali!

 

the other day a guy told me his buddy was going to bore out his model-a engine 20 thou. with a hone on a drill.

 

Um, no offence intended, but I used to do smog tests at the Ford dealer I work at and have failed cars cause of this. A lean engine has higher combustion temps that create Oxides of Nitrogen, something the machines test for. If its lean enough to cause a misfire your dumping Hydrocarbons out the tailpipe and that will also fail. And if the computer sees the engine running lean it can cause a check engine light, so you fail the test before you even start up the sniffer

 

I want you to make it idiot proof.

 

Worked with a guy who had a 66 barracuda. He was overhauling the engine. I walked up when he was tightening the mains, with a ratchet. I ask if he had a tork wrench, and he replyed, " don't need one. I know how much it took to break them loose so that is how much ya tighten them."

It ran about 3 miles before it locked up.

 

joe fazio of sf flatheads told me i could build up material on a 3 3/4 crank and have it
offset ground to 4" and use his insert bearing rods.

 

I had a '78 Bronco 400 np435, body bad, but not wanting to sell. Friend's dad bought a '79 Bronco Ranger XLT body great, for $300 cuz it didn't move after PO installed a purchased rebuilt C6. He wanted the 400 in it for his truck for better selling potential. Engine ended up smoking a little bit, so he changed his mind, but sold the truck anyway. He wanted to unload the Bronco onto someone else. So a guy he knew wanted a good 400. A 3 way trade ensued: I got the '79 Bronco plus $300 cash. The third guy got my Bronco, and friend's dad got $300 cash for finder's fee. (the guy had $600 to spend) So everyone walked away happy. After they left, I started the '79 Bronco, noticed it didn't shift out of first. So I opened the hood, noticed the vac line from the C6 modulator, and pushed it back onto the vac. tree on the intake. Been running fine ever since. They were mechanics.

Then there's the trucks for cheap where the Tcase was in Neutral.

 

My first job was working the parts counter at a family-owned parts store/machine shop. A guy came in wanting tuneup parts for a 289ci. V8 in a Jeep CJ. I saw the thing parked in front of the store, and innocently asked if he put the engine in himself.
"No, it came from the factory with that engine".

I knew this couldn't be, and should have just looked up the Ford 289 parts without commenting, but I just couldn't let it go; "Sir, Jeeps never came with that motor from the factory..."

A little flame leaped up in his eye. "Yes they did! Why do you guys always have to give me a hard time about this! I bought it this way! YADA! YADA!..."
Fortunately the store owner stepped in and diplomatically asked if he could look under the hood, possibly to check if it was an early or late Jeep 289...

 

My friend's pickup was parked with the wheels cut, his girl looks in and says "Why is the steering wheel upside down?" I said "Well you know, they do rotate" she still didn't understand...

 

They were and he was a true genius.

 

I recently worked with a guy who was a chevy service writer for years. Somehow He got a lead mechanic job in our (fortune 500 co.)fleet dept even though he knows NOTHING about heavy trucks or even the cars that he's supposed to work on.
One day looking in a filter catalog he told me that my 59' chevy came stock with a 350, I told him that it was a 235, he said no, IT CAME WITH A 350! I told him the 350 wasn't invented until sometime around 1969,there was a 265, or a 283, availible, but He showed me in the catalog where it listed a 5.7 motor. So I told him about a truck motor that chevy had (the 348) which later became the fabled 409....Still this guy, (the chevy service writer )told me no...your car came with a 350...
This guy (the chevy service writer) also said that he was gonna buy a chevelle fastback one of these days, I told him none of those g.m.'s were called fastbacks as they only had one body style, and that fastback term was used for mustangs, some cuda's and cars like such. He told me , No....His neighbor had a 69 chevelle fastback....
Also this guy, (the chevy service writer) proved to us on a daily basis how clueless he was;;; One day a lady brought her new pontiac aztek in during sub-zero weather with no heat so I checked it out. The heater hoses were hot and the fan blew plenty of air set on cold but none flowed thru on hot. Clogged (with leaves and crap)heater core.....I offered to take it apart and fix it but he insited on doing it himself. A few days later the girl came back. I asked how she was feeling now? She was pissed, still no heat.windows covered inside with ice. Turns out he told her the same thing that he told me later.....That none of the new g.m.'s would blow hot if you kept them turned all the way hot. that to get heat you had to leave it set 1/2 way between hot and cold... that all g.m.'s were like that and that's just the way it is..... (And people wonder why toyota's are putting America out of business)......I told him if I spent 10, 20, or 30 grand for a car and he told me that I would not hesitate to #&*$# him!!!!Still this guy (the chevy service writer) still has his job, so you all know whats goin on there.........
I could tell you countless stories of how he'd tell us that his "husky tool box was the equivelent or or greater than a snap on unit,
Or how he'd deal with frozen trailor brakes by changeing the gladhands....
or how he'd go out on roadcalls without a single tool in hand.......
We witnessed this guy almost Kill himself twice with stupidity his first week on the job, and he never slowed down since...You can only hope that he never attempts to breed....
It reminds me of something that Abraham Lincoln once said:
It is better to be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and prove it to everybody!

 

Actually some times piston rings will spin. Usually on very worn engines. Many port intake engines mostly 2 cycle types have pins in the ring lands. This keep,s them from spinning and catching in the ports in the cylinder wall. OldWolf

 

The fool didn't know that the performance gain was due to the fact the car was now going down hill! What an idiot!

 

I have tried and tried to figure out how people could possibly think that air in a tire made it heavier, now after all these years I finally figured it out.

 

I got another one, a buddy of mine who is a nice guy, but not the sharpest knife in the drawer, is a wealth of dumb stuff. He has a nice '67 Mustang coupe that he's owned since '79. A while back, he decided to remove the 1" lowering blocks from the rear since the tires hit the fenders when he put his kids in the back. No big deal, right? Well, it nearly killed him dead. He jacked the car up, put the axle stands under the rear AXLE (!) and proceeded to remove the u-bolts. Once he got the nuts off, it (of course) fell nearly to the ground, with him under it. I later asked if he noticed the nuts being a bitch to get off, since all the tension of the car's weight had to make it a bear to even turn. He said, it was a bit tight, but he just got a breaker bar and kept going. A few months later, he wanted to put some milder gears in it, and asked (better sit down for this one) if he had to drain the gear oil from the rear axle first. I told him (with as straight a face as I could muster) that he didn't have to drain the oil, as long as he stood the car on it's rear bumper before he pulled the gears.

 

LOL Was he removing the air cleaner box?

 

No offense taken.

The service manager checked back with the smog guy and he told him it was running rich.

The service manager just grabbed a word he'd heard somewhere along the line.

He was a new guy hired for his people skills and not for his automotive knowledge....

 

Back in high school, a friend of mine was going to change the oil in his shoebox. He called and asked what he needed to do so I told him to drain the old oil into a pan, replace the drain plug and put in the new oil. I figured I better stop by and see how he was doing, he walkde down the driveway all smiles saying he just finished and everything went smooth. He proceeded to start the car and black smoke came pouring out of the exhausts like it was on fire. I told him to turn off the engine and began to check things out. Turns out he drained the transmission and added the oil to the engine so it had about 8-10 quarts in it.

 

That guy doesn't know what the hell he's talking about. Jacking up the rear DOES get you better gas mileage and better times, but it has nothing to do with better gas flow to the carb, that's just stupid.
It's because you're always going down hill!
Ah shit, zzford beat me to it.

 

Had a old guy down here tell me a story he took his tractor in cause it had a knock in the motor.He was told his crank was out of round so he The mechanic. would just put oversize bearings on the bottom to take out the slack! Last i knew main bearings dont move with the crank .needless to say The Knock came to my door Via Chain.It was trashed. I hooked the old boys chain back up & told him to take it down the road.That was over 20 yr ago & its still setting out on his farm. Ps he is a very good customer of mine now we just dont bring up the tractor

 

I cant count the number of geniuses over the years that ive seen look inside a car and upon seeing a B&M shifter, will turn to their buddy and say that cars got a "shift kit" in it!
One guy came up to me after hearing the gear drive in my old '64 Nova, and told me that his friend quieted his Pete Jackson gear drive down by running a timing chain around the outside of the gears.
Yes, its pointless to argue with these people!!

 

Working as I did for many years in the bike shop had a longtime rider argue with me that a staple could not possibly get stuck in his tire as he rode over it. Everyone knows staples lay flat. He said we must have put the staple in his tire!

I am sure tire store folks have all heard something similar over time.

 

At a cruise in one summer evening, a local guy showed up with a car I had not seen before. I wandered over to visit. It was obvious he had nothing to do with the building of the car, he said it had a chev 350 fuel injection engine that really goes because it had a carburetor too! I asked if it had both, he said yes sir, the guy we had build that engine is really good! Never saw the guy at any of the ther cruises, he must have flamed out from to much fuel.

 

Working parts counter at a bike dealership I get all sorts of good ones.
The other day a guy came in and asked for 3010 honda air filter. I tried to find out the make and model of his machine, and he kept telling me the "part number" for the filter because it had that stamped on it. I ran to the back and grabbed 2 of the same air filters that had 2 different batch numbers stamped on them and tried to explain it.
He appeared to grasp the concept, so once again I asked for the model and year of his machine.
He says "Obviously you don't know what you're doing, I'm not getting anywhere here." and walked out of the store.


Had a kid in high school that told me his 65 chev pickup with a 327 (with $2 grand in motor work he claimed) 4x4 and sitting on 44 inch tires would run an 8 second quarter. I laughed and he then started in with the ever so smart "I'll kick your ass if you dont agree" type of crap.
Told him if he really wanted to prove it to take it to the nearest strip (100 miles) and run it. When that was out of the question for gas mileage, I offered to haul it on my trailer and pay all the expenses if it turned that on a time slip.
He went home shortly after that and never talked about his 8 second monster truck again.

 

Reminds me of something that happened to my Grandfather back in the 70's.

My Grandfather was an amazing man. He grew up in Dayton Ohio as neighbors with the Wright family [of airplane fame], and as such, became a pilot. He fought in WWI, and was a naval avation engineer in WWII. He became friends with Charles Lindberg and was insturmental in the development of the modern aircraft carrier. He was an incredibly smart man... Probably a genius.

Back about '78, I was at his house and needed to use a drill for something. He told me to go out to the garage and get one off the shelf, so I did.

Started drilling, and noticed it wasn't cutting, so I investigated for a moment and realized the bit was spinning backwards..... Ooooh, it's a reversable drill, so I flip the switch to forward and drill the hole.

A few minutes later, Gramps comes over and he sees that I had used the reversible drill, and he [surprised] asks how I got it to work.

Turns out, it was the first reversible drill he had ever owned, and he had no clue the switch made the bit spin backwards.

'Said he had spent hours trying to figure out why that damn drill wouldn't cut, and he had given up on it. Even my uncles [his boys] had looked at it. Nobody could figure out why it wouldn't work.

We all had a good laugh over that one.

I guess you had to be there to get the full efect of how funny it really was. That such an incredibly smart man had been confused by a little switch.

 

Understandable. Take a guy used to the foot pedals on a Model T and put him in a newer car. Entertaining.

 

+2.