Whats the worst injury that has happened to you at a junkyard or picking up a car?

Got hit in the head with a half empty beer can after I laughed at my buddy's flaming shirt moments after a carb back-fire. 2 for 1 on that one.

 

Went to brush the snow off a windshield, without a glove, under the snow I didn't see it was shattered in a spot the size of a basketball. I drew back a ****** mess. After I picked the galss out of my hand I finished the morning in the yard with my buddies *****ing about me bleeding on the wrenches.

Another trip I smashed the end of my finger hard enough to peel all the meat off the end of it up past the fingernail. After I sat down (either that or fall) I managed to stretch the skin back over the end and drive to the ER, by the time nurse cratchet got to me the finger was numb. You know they get mad if you drink in the waiting room, the bar around the corner served "to go" cups and I knew I'd have to sit and wait. Ruined a great day off!

 

I was at All American around the end of last summer gettin some parts for work. When I left I noticed what I thought was a mosquito bite on my arm in my ink work. Really didn't think anything of it, but after a couple of days it only was getting bigger in size both in diameter and protrusion. After some investigating I found out that I had been bit by a Hobo spider, which causes similar injuries to a Brown Recluse. After about a week and a half my festering sore finally erupted with a puss ball about the size of a pea coming out of my arm and leaving a wonderful crater in my ink work that is still there to this day...

 

Some of the above injuries are bad ... but how would you like to crawl up under a car to get a part and meet this guy ?? Species is a Canebrake Rattlesnake.



The junk yard I like the BEST has these guys everywhere. A friend of mine has been bitten TWICE ... and lived to go back there again. When HRP and I were there ... I showed him the sandy ground where one had slide accross ... and it looked like someone had drug a firehose accross the ground.

I have seen Rattlesnakes there 6 foot long and longer.

 

Nothing too serious here, bee stings of course (they always guard the best parts), mosquitos by the hundreds, s****es and scratches (lots of torn pants), smashed fingers and feet (none too serious), bonked heads on hood latches (damn THAT hurts)...I did lose the end of my ring finger in a drunken hot tub accident, but thats another story

 

Well I always loved trawling wrecking yards here in the UK and we had a few which were still full of U.S. servicemans vehicles back in the seventies. The good ones were always located near air bases but the worst creatures we had to encounter were the huge rats at one in Newbury which had an abatoir in the middle of it.
I always envied you guys having the chance to explore such 'interesting' yards but this thread has made me realise just how many 'natural' obstacles you have to encounter! I would love to explore but am a real wimp when it comes to creatures! I guess that the Australian members have a pretty scary time as well....

 

hit myself in the thigh with a cut off wheel this winter. shredded my pants and the weird thing was it left a gnarly bruise instead of cutting me. wasn't even much blood.

i say that like i'm complaining... ?

 

Here is one you all can relate to probably, not serious but nver the less very painful. I was looking at a 60 Chevy truck and as I walked around the back of it I hit the m***ive hitch sticking out about a foot and a half. I hit it so hard that it chipped the bone and seveirly bruised my shin. I limped for a week after that and learned to look at where I am going, I think. Rags

 

I had a 4 inch nail jammed through my foot. I was rummaging around the back of a van full of junk at the u-pull-it, and leaned in the side door. What I didn't realize, was that I was putting all my weight on one foot and there was a box of nails that had fallen out of the van under the wood I was standing on. It 'shot' through the sole of my boot, and I had to pull it out with a pair of pliers. My shoe instantly filled with blood.

I had to go with freinds that night to Universal Studios... I probably walked 5 miles that night with a hole in my foot.

By the way...I think 'Powerband' is winning with the "****-tick"!

 

Been there--unlike you, however, I didn't learn a ******* thing and still run into the one on the back of my Jeep about once a month...

 

Opened the trunk of a 37 Chevy coupe in the woods at a yard in central TX. AS I pulled the lid up and my head went under and in the nastiest critter I ever saw was giving me a very toothy grin and hissing like a banshee. I bashed the back of my head on the deck latch as I recoiled out of there, it was big possum.
I'd been pulling some dash trim and wiondow mouldings in the cabin of the coupe and probably woke the little guy up. Scared the bejesus out of me.

 

Ok, I have tried to forget this but here it is. Use to go to a wreckin yard where the owner had two pit bulls. One was always on a chain and the other was in a cage. The one on the chain was pretty friendly and when I came up to it he would run up to me and jump up so i could pet him. I went there one day and was in the middle of greeting the owner and saw the pit bull running up to me out of the corner of my eye, the owner yelled to WATCH OUT and I realized that the one on the chain was the one that is usually in the cage. I jumped back just as the dog reached the end of the chain but not quite far enough. I got bit right on the end of the wanger! Had to go drop my drawers to see the damage and had a small cut on the tendermost part! It hurt but not as bad as it could have if the chain had been a few inches longer or i hadn't jumped back as far as I had. You might be calling me stumpy now instead of Lobucrod.

 

Weird, same exect thing happened to me about 2 weeks ago, exept it went straight through my pants and made a clean cut an inch long and about half an inch deep, lots of blood and s***ches, it was gross, all the fat from my leg was bubbling out, and the worst part was when i watched the nurse jamm a 3 inch long needle down my leg several times and then proceed to cut chunks of dead leg off with scissors

 

All wangs aside,g***er52 wins.

 

This actually happened on the way home from a junkyard back in '82 i was only 18 at the time, i was unfortunate to have a head on collision where the p***enger front took the most impact.....yes i was sat right there but was kinda pushed into the rear as that front space was crushed.
Can't remember a thing about that day but still get trouble from my injuries now & then, broke my left leg in two places & had a foot long plate with 12 screws running down my shin, broke my left hip & had three 4" long screws in there, broke my pelvis in two places, broken left shoulder, broken left wrist, 170 s***ches in my left arm & a pair of very black balls.
Spent three months in hospital & still count my lucky stars i'm alive today, the week before the accident i looked at buying a '58 Ford Zephyr & while i was in hospital my dear mum went & bought it for me.......she knew that was the one thing that would help me recover, & it did.

Kev.

 

All these Texas boys and no one has brought up fire ants!

 

I guess I am one of the fortunate ones. Had a come-along bust and come flying at me while putting a car on a trailer. That same trip, the chain binder came undone, but thankfully it didn't unhook from the chains.

 

I went exploring a pasture full of abandoned cars years ago with my older brother. He was prying open trunklids across the aisle from me when I heard "Oh ****! RUN!!". As I turned I caught sight of a small black cloud descending on me, and boy, did I run!! Screaming, p***ed out. When I came to, my mom told me my head was big as a basketball and not to move. Found out I was allergic to wasp stings and when the swelling finally went down I found I had collected 14 stings in my scalp. Prompted me to get a 'military haircut'. Damn kids!

Dan

 

This happen about 8 years ago. But every time I think about it starts to hurt again. I was in a U-Pull_It yard looking for a steering wheel from an early Bronco. I found one a started to take it off. Then I realized I forgot my steering wheel puller. No problom I will just set in the seat and start hitting the back of the wheel with my hands. There was on thing I forgot to do. It was to put the nut back on the steering shaft. The last hit the steering came off. After about 5 minutes I woke up and was in a lot of pain. I ended up breaking my nose. That was dumb.

 

i went to open a door and the ****on popped in and trapped my thumb with the spring, man i was there for like 10 minutes before i got out... it realy realy ****ed.

 

While picking up a '54 chevy 235 engine once. We were lifting the powerglide into the truck and the torque converter fell out and landed on the top of my foot. It was the same as a 20-30 lb. weight dropping on your foot. I limped for a week or 2.

 

I was at a pick-n-pull looking for parts for my C10 daily driver. I walked up to one that was on a concrete pad. Unfortunately I stepped on the edge of the pad, and twisted my ankle. I heard a POP, and it started swelling. I had to sit down for a few minutes, but was eventually able to walk out.

The swelling never went down, and I would twist it again any time I stepped on something that was not completely flat. Nearly a year later, an ankle spe******t told me I had stretched the tendons so badly that I had lost all the stability in my ankle. The popping sound it made when I twisted it was from bone chipping out of the joint, and the parts were grinding together when I walked.

Almost exactly three years ago today, I had two surgeries. The first ground the broken spot in the joint smooth so that the joint wasn't grinding bone on bone. The second was to cut and shorten the tendons to give me back some stability so I would not be twisting it constantly.

I spent 6 weeks in a cast, and was unable to put any weight whatsoever on my left foot the entire time. I hopped behind a walker on one foot for several weeks until I regained my balance, then graduated to crutches.

Three years later it is still noticeably swollen, but not nearly as much as it was. I don't have the constant pain that I once did, and I don't twist the ankle as often as I used to. The ankle is stiff, and I sometimes linmp for a few minutes until the tendons stretch out enough.

It really ****s that this happened. Who would have thought that a twisted ankle could make such a mess?

Slonaker

 

A buddy of mine was in southern Kentucky way out in the middle of no where and stumbled across this guy that had about 600 old cars back in the hills along a back road. He got out and walked this yard without telling anyone (tressp***ed) and while doing so he found all sorts of tire tracks, some fresh going off a revene into a huge gully full of water in the middle of the yard. It creeped him out and he left, Afterwords he went into the town and had to get gas so he stopped at the gas station, while there he mentioned to the attendent about those cars in the hills. well a few people heard him talking about it and they all told him that they have heard that the guy that owns that property is crazy. And if someone stops at his property that he doesnt like he shoves them in there car and pushes it over a revene back there into a gully. They have said that everyonce and a while someone comes up missing around that area........This could very well be ******** but it makes me wonder. Talk about a really bad occurance at a junkyard!!! Theres alot of creepy hill-jacks that live in southern Ohio and Kentucky with alot of good cars.

 

When I went to pick up my 56 F100 out in the hill country, I discovered that Mother Nature was trying to reclaim it with the wheels buried halfway, which I'm sure we have all run into. Luckily, I had brought 4 rims with 4 tires for just such a situation. Upon pulling off rim #4 with the rear jacked up, I went to spin the rusty-brown drum to make sure the e-brake wasn't locked up and was promptly stung on the hand by a completely invisible rusty-brown scorpion! Hurt like you wouldn't believe. Not really a big deal, but the scary part was the taste that developed in my mouth in the following 30 minutes along with having numb-tongue and the slight buzzing in my head. Boy was I afraid to go to sleep that night! And no, I didn't go to the emergency room, too cheap and stubborn for that. Taste in my mouth lasted for 3 days. Got my truck though!!!

 

seriously, that's revolting.

 

Same yard in Central Texas, spent the day pulling parts from the great variety of cars there. Went to the front and paid our bill then headed down the road for home. About 20 miles down the road we both were bothered by a creepy crawly feeling. Stopped the truck, got out to see what it was, and YEOW! two guys stripping to their shorts on the freeway freaking out!! We were beating our clothes on the truck, then gave up and threw them in the bed.
The problem, were were covered with seed ticks, I mean COVERED, everywhere like freckles on a red-headed girl!
Spent the night in a bath of bleach and the wife didn't like picking those ****ers off all "those" places for two hours.

 

Back in 1970, I went over the Georgia from my duty station in Eufaula AL to look for old cars. Outside a little town called Sewing Circle I came upon a farmhouse. In the field about 2 or 300 yards away from the house was a 1935 Chevrolet Master Coupe, you know, the ones with suicide doors. I walked up to the old man in the rocker on the porch and asked if the car was for sale. Naw, he said, but you can go look at it if ya want. Of course, I took off across the muddy field to check it out. It was a really nice car with agood original interior and no wreck or rust damage. I reached down, unlatched the hood on the driver's side and opened it up. Hanging on the radiator support rods and aircleaner was a colony of yellow jackets that had to have growing year after year for a decade or more! The entire area above the engine was a series of nests covered, I mean covered, with yellow jackets.
They didn't move at first, then a couple started flying...I was still frozen in my tracks. Then a few more got interested, I pulled the hood down and latched and ran like hell as the jackets came pouring out of the hood louvers in a huge cloud. As I zig-zagged back and forth to the truck being nailed every now and then I started wondering if I'd make it. Got to the truck jumped in, my wife was freaking out cause she said she couldn't believe the size of the cloud following me across that field. A couple got in the truck with me and, thank God, stung me not my wife before we killed them. The rest of the group flew around the truck for about 10 minutes until they were satisfied I wasn't a threat anymore, HA!
Looked up on the porch and there was the oldman sitting in his rocker, smoking hi spipe, and lauging his *** off! How many car guys had he watched running across that field over the years!! He'd never sell that car 'cause he wouldn't have any entertainment any more.

 

I've shown this pic before...I had taken the fan shroud off a buddies car to top off the radiator,the cap was under the shroud.Anyway I had the engine running to purge the air out of the radiator.the wrench I had been using slipped off the rad support towards the spinning fan ...so I try and catch the wrench putting my hand thru the spinning fan.My fingers stayed on but the little one got it quite bad.

 

Fish hooks...lots of them...lots of little fish hooks.
I saw a small cardboard box almost out of reach in a large pile of junk...it had a wad of nylon string up top, but the hardware in the bottom of the box looked interesting. I leaned way over to reach and stuck my hand in to pull out the wad of string, which turned out to be a wad of fishing line with numerous tiny hooks, all tangled together and firmly hooked somehow to the pile of junk. My hand was at maximum reach, firmly anchored to a huge pile of s**** by lots of hooks and lots of strings...a wonderful trap mechanism, by the way. If you have people pilfering stuff remember the hook box trap.
I had to throw myself into the pile to get my left hand in there and slowly, slowly remove hooks from bleeding flesh and untangle things I couldn't see. Couldn't reach any cutting tools, knife was in right pocket and unreachable too...
It was a long half hour to disengage. If it had been any more complicated, I probably would have starved to death right there...

 

Please excuse my ignorance ....could somebody please tell me what yellow jackets and fire ants are? I'm guessing that yellow jackets may be what we call hornets?