Crazy/Insane Shop Accidents

Back when I was 15, changing truck tires with my dad, I had just jacked up a 5 ton truck that had a crane on it (used in the sign industry) with a 12 ton jack, my dad had already got one of the duals loose and was pulling it off, when he got it off, the jack slipped and luckily the other tire was still on or I would have been a pancake.......

Working on my brothers Coupe when I was 18, we had a 3 ton chain hoist holding up the trans while I was underneath lining up the bolts....somehow the damn thing slipped and I pulled my hand out only to have the tip of my middle finger crushed into hamburger.....7 stitches.....I gave everyone the finger for 2 weeks.

Changing a front tire on a cement mixer (lots of fun).....my brothers foot slipped off one of the tire irons, it flung up and gave him a nice black eye...

How many 15 yr old kids today play around with airing up split rim truck tires at 120 psi???

 

Wearing dirty greasy insulated coveralls I backed up to a propane heater and when i smelt smoke it was tolate I was in a blaze. Fastest I have ever got out of coveralls in my life . Had a nice burn the size of a dime on my ass is all i GOT

 

A long time ago when they first came out with smog check machines, I was at a local tune-up/engine overhaul shop and was asking the owner if I could buy just one valve lifter off him to replace the one I'd pulled from my '61 T-Bird that was sticking all the time. They were doing a smog check with their brand new smog check machine on somebody's '72 Cadillac when I first got there. The owner was training some new guy how to do the smog check and he was just about done. So he told the new guy to go park the Caddy and we headed back into the shop so he could get me a new lifter out of a box in the back of the shop. Then you see the new guy taking off really fast in reverse with the brand new smog check machine still attached to the car by a long hose stuck in the exhaust pipe and the whole big smog check machine starts rolling away really fast. Everybody's screaming at the new guy "STOP! STOP YOU IDIOT!!!" and he's got the windows rolled up and he's just looking in the rearview mirror cruising backwards in luxury across the big parking lot with the new machine zooming along in tow. They're all chasing after him, but he's going too fast, and then the smog check machine goes WHAM right on its face and the front shatters all over the pavement. The owner looked devastated and had tears in his eyes. He put the lifter in my hand and just pointed for me to leave. I felt bad for the guy.

 

i got a job at a bodyshop fresh out of highschool. my first assignment was welding in a new trunk and making new rear rails on a 73 duster. thing had a built 318 and would do donuts REAL easy. well we re-paint the whole back half and the customer is real happy with it. he comes to pick it up and asks if i can check out the front motor mounts for him. i tell the shop clean up kid to put it on the wheel dolleys so i can roll it on the lift, he gets the bright idea to drive it onto the wheels dolleys. well im standing there with the customer in the office and we walk out just in time to watch the kid drive up and over the first one and watch it roll into the inner fender behind the front wheel ripping the front passenger fender completely off. customer just laughed and said "good thing it happened at a body shop".

another time the same kid decided to use the old air hose to sandblast. while plugging it into the air outlet in the wall it got blasted out when he hit the trigger and hit him square inbetweens the eyes. his parents made him quit a week later.

my uncle told me some kid in autoshop in his highschool had a big four door seventies dodge fury. kid drives it onto the lift and secures the front but not the back and start lifting. gets it about shoulder high and it rolls backwards off the lift and the bumper lands right in front of the teachers feet. my uncle said once the teacher came out of shock he walked to his car and never came back.

JACK: after hearing your septum story i might flip mine up when i do anything car related now.

 

Tried to find a link to this one, but couldn't....

Bloke parked his friend's Maserati coupe in a Sydney street one night and left it there. Next morning, it's blocking access to a building site. The owner's nowhere to be seen, so one of the builders grabs a forklift and picks up the $150,000 car with it, only needing to move it a couple of feet to clear the driveway. As he shifts it, the car slips off the forklift tangs and drops to the roadway.... On its roof! Scratch one very expensive motor car...

And I went to the doctor today and got a specialist referral to a surgeon to finally repair the umbilical hernia I gave myself almost 40 years ago while trying to pick up a sidevalve short block and cranhkshaft assembly on my own. I managed to lift it into the car boot (trunk) alright, but I sure busted a gut doing it!

Cheers, Glen.

 

Let me just say power tools and fingers do not get along!
If you have not eaten for a while go ahead and click the link below!
Warning do not click the link with a weak stomach!
http://www.roadkillontheweb.com/images/finger4.jpg

It still don't work right!

 

I guess getting sprayed in the eyes with 90psi of gas would be my worst so far.The mazda I was working on kept stumblin,so my fuel pressure was down,I go back to the fuel filter and put the gauge in there and plow high pressure blow off,and I'm 6" away from it, goes right into my eyes,safety glasses from here on out,It burned like hell and I looked like an elbino zombie for hours.I thought I was gonna be Ray Charles.

 

There is a little town not far from me that has a reputation for many things. It was home to the largest motorcycle club in Indiana (who informed me at gunpoint that they are NOT a gang) . It was also the home of the guy who murdered my next door neighbor. And most importantly, this town is where I went to grade school so that I could get my well rounded education. There isn’t much in the town really. There are a bunch of houses, a post office, a gun shop, two auto body shops, a small grocery, the school, a cemetery to bury us all when we did stupid things, and the great hill were the fabulous Ruth Jones jumped the railroad tracks in her boyfriends showroom new 1978 Smokey and the Bandit edition Trans Am for me.

I learned two important things in this town from other people’s near-death accidents.
One of those things is that if you shoot a .357 caliber revolver into an empty refrigerator at the body shop as a joke, the bullet actually can ricochet back and hit you in the testicles causing major injury. I think you’ll agree that this is funny unless you were that guy.

The other thing is that if you are loading your motorcycle into the back of your Chevy El Camino by using a board as a ramp, you will likely get dared to try something else by the locals who are hanging out in the street watching you. I was there for this one. It was an easy task. All the guy had to do was roll a motorcycle up a big board from the street into the back of his truck, strap it down, and drive away. That’s how it would have happened in any other town. But in this town, we have locals watching. Those locals have ideas, and most of them aren’t good. This town has a really big cemetery because of these guys and there ain’t a lot of unused space in that cemetery. It wasn’t long before someone looked at the wooden ramp and casually suggested “With that ramp there, I’ll bet you could jump over your truck with that motorcycle.” That’s all it took.

Within minutes, the motorcycle was down the street revving up with the helmet-less rider eyeballing the flimsy ramp that was hanging on the back of the truck. You don’t get this kind of education in school. I’d guess that the motorcycle and its fearless pilot were doing about 40 or 50 miles per hour when the front wheel of the bike reached the bottom of the ramp. The front wheel of the motorcycle grabbed the board and pulled it off of the tailgate of the truck, leaving the board just lying on the ground. The motorcycle plowed into the bed of the truck at full speed sending the rider through the back window of the truck and a few inches into the dashboard, where he remained until the paramedics came to retrieve him. I’m pretty sure that the only reason that this man didn’t die, is because even God was amused by his raw stupidity. He did get VERY close to actually dying though. If you turn on the air conditioner in the El Camino now, I'm pretty sure you could smell his brain.

 

Things like overhead welding under a car with a t-shirt on, burning hole in nipple, slipping while working with sheetmetal, slicing fingers. Guess the scariest one was many years ago I was welding on something and there was a loud explosion. I through off the hood and ran out the nearest door. Looked back inside and saw a circle of fire burning on the floor right beside the welding table. Seems the "Boss" had left a round 5 gallon can with a little gas in it by the welding table with the cap off. Blew the can apart and left the bottom of the can on the floor with the rest of the liquid burning. I learned from that to look around and see with trap myself and others have left for me. SO far I still have both eyes and 10 fingers. Many scars though.

 

Watch your Surroundings!! My dad was interviewing a guy one time who had massive burns over most of his face and arms. When dad asked him about it, he told him about how he was standing at his workbench drilling a piece of sheetmetal when the bit caught and spun the sheet. There was a can of WD40 or Carburater Cleaner on the bench next to where he was working. The sheetmetal spun, pierced the can and the spark apparently exploded the can in his face. Talk about not seeing that one coming.
Pays to think about possibilities around you.

 

Oh yeah, back in the 60's (sorry takes me a while) we were working on one of my buddys 57 chevy gasser. We had it jacked up with a floor jack under the straight axle, Wayne was under it doing something, and I was standing on a milk crate leaning over the fender doing something else. Wayne told his brother to jack it up some more. His dip shit brother ( the one that left the screwdriver in the valley of the 327 that we found about a year later when we took the intake back off) turns the handle on the jack droping it to the ground. I pull my head out from under the hood and lean down to see if Wayne got smushed and when I do the hood comes down and latches pinning my left forearm. Wayne slides out from under the car (luckly the straight axle has it jacked up enough nothing touched him) and released the hood latch so I can get my arm out. We ran the dip shit off and went back to work on the car.

 

God where do I start, saw a 2000cu.ft. oxy bottle rocket tear through a wall and across the basketball courts and end up buried in the side wall of the school cafeteira. Had to help a kid retreive his teeth from the floor after catching a chuck key in his mouth while operating a lathe.
While at work I was useing a wire wheel on the bench grinder to clean off some bolts one of the wires comes loose and lodges itself in the end of my dick. Boys ley me teel you about a new deffenition of the word PAIN! While trying to extract said wire from myself I dropped trough and was useing needle nose pliers to pull the wire out, a coworker comes over to see what all the comotion is all about, and makes the classic comment" well if you need needle nose to find it you don't get mutch pussy then huh". After he saw what I was doing he turned green and fled, coward.
Finnally had to go to the company nurse to get medical aid. The only good thing that came of this whole fiasco was I ended up marrying the nurse, but when people ask how did you two meet, I always say" well sit down and let me tell you one you ain't heard before" in my best Larry the cable guy voice.

 

Geez... growing up in a the son-of-a-mechanic, I was witness to several great incidents.

First one I'll tell you about is the one about the '81 Ford truck used by the local Ford garage to deliver parts. Guy pulls up and leaves the truck running as he goes in and drops off the parts. Well, as most of you know, Fords have a tendency to drop into reverse on their own and take off. Well, this one did just that. It backed out of the driveway (about 70 feet) made a turn to my right (driver's side) and then entered the driveway again on the other side of the culvert/ditch and then proceeded to back into my dad's 'new' '79 Corvette. The rear bumper of the truck impacted just in front of the driver's door of the vette, then bouncily backed down the driver's door, quarter panel, and then came to a rest where it broke a section out over the rear wheel well.

Another is when dad had a kid working for him. I was about 12 or so, and this guy was in his early 20s, and basically looking to trade work on his car for doing labor in the shop. Well, dad tells him to 'go rotate the tires on that car.' This idiot jacks up EACH individual tire, grabs it, spins it, and then lets the car down. He then asks what dad wants him to do next. Not too tragic, but a dumbass just the same.

We were building corrall fence once and dad was fish-mouthing the pipe overhead for a better hold. I was holding the vertical pipe steady while he used the torch to cut it. Well, I had a piece of hot slag about the size of a nickel drop down and hit my arm, go through my shirt, and follow its way all the way down until it landed inside my boots.

Dad's got a '37 Ford Pickup that had the battery located on the firewall in the stock location, and eventually, the Oklahoma backroads we lived on caused it to sling acid out onto the fender and damage the paint. Well, he managed to talk a battery dealer out of one his dummy display batteries so he could move the battery to the bed, but keep one in the stock place for looks. Anyway, it was break time in the shop, and we're all sitting around drinking Pepsi and eating peanuts, and her comes the old man carrying what looks like this heavy battery. He decides to 'trip' and toss it at one of the guys he works with. I've never seen that guy move so fast in my life, and I'll bet he coulda picked up pennies with his ass cheeks after that! He got my dad back later when the old man was chasing an oil leak on a car. Ever time dad would leave the car alone to see if it was going to drip, this guy would pour some used oil under it. Went on that way for over 2 hours. Was funny as hell.

Kind of off topic, but funny just the same. I was in the USAF doing air drop training recovery. See, our aircrews used stacks of railroad ties to simulate loads to drop out of planes for practice, and we were always out to recover them. Anyway, we're out on the drop zone one afternoon waiting for our loads while the Army was doing their drops. Well, this aircrew out of Dyess AFB, Tx flew over with a 40,000 pound Sheridan tank on an airdrop platform. Seems they were supposed to give approximately 1300' for the chutes to open, PLUS 800' for the chutes to actually slow the tank down before impact. Well, long story short, they dropped the tank at 1350'. The chutes were streamered out and getting ready to 'pop' open when the tank hit the ground. Left a 4' deep dent in the ground and took 3 40' flatbeds to haul the pieces off the drop zone.

Personally, I've been pretty lucky with only minor bumps and bruises. I'm of the type where something simple often takes 3 times as long and costs a minimum of twice as much because of that fucker Murphy. As soon as I can get him a SS#, I'm going to claim him as a dependent and charge the fucker rent!

 

Just finished my 46 suburban and was doing some touch ups. Was never on the road even. Leaned over from the passenger side to bump the starter and it was in gear. Guess it was running good cause it started up and drove into the back wall of the garage. Moved the wall 6 inches and damaged the grill and bumper on the 46.
The best part was that my wife was on the other side of the wall doing some gardening. She thought she was going to buy the farm.
Signed
Well I guess I won't sign it.

 

It was back in 69 in the body shop of the first vocational school in our part of the state.
We would get 'tours' of students from time to time going through the school to see if it was for them. Of course we had a 'code' word if there were any attractive young ones in the tour group.
Big Mack was crouched down using a big size grinder on a rocker panel when somebody yelled 'the word'. Mack turned around & sliced his knee cap clean off. Never saw him again.
Another guy thought it was cool to light a cutting torch with his Zippo. That got him a nice case of the black thumb real quick. Didn't see him again.
Third kid was trying to change oxy bottles on a welding cart & dropped the fresh one removing the valve. It went in the drivers door of a 49 Chevy & out the pass. door (neither were open at the time). Struck the floor, angled up & left the shop thru the block wall about 2 rows from the ceiling. Never saw that tank again either.
AAAAHHHHH Youth.
Al

 

Long time ago was in a mate shop and one of his guys was removing some front coils from an MGBGT...tightens down the spring clamps all OK but he sorta got bored with the whole 3 turns each side shit....it was just about tightened up enough to calmly pull out the spring but not quite ....so he got a hammer..
can you see where this is going???
he smacks the spring 3 or 4 times before it launches it's self out of the wheel arch, hitting the roof before hitting 2 or 3 customers cars.....
See you mate....

Chain saws.....Ohhhhhh they really are dangerous......the week before I got mine a guy in our village, who obviously had used a chainsaw many times with out any probs so was invincible..slipped and cut his arm off at the shoulder.....Apparently he was using it one handed while holding the branch with the other!!

 

Although I dont work in the shop, I do have a (kinda girly) shop related accident.
GOt a shard of metal imbedded in the cornea of my eye years ago from CLEANING CHOPSHOP'S DAMN CLOTHES in the WASHING MACHINE. Damn thing jumped up and sliced the hell out of my eye.
They had to pick it out with a scalpel. Sucked.

Two weeks later, CHOPSHOP(Lenny) did the same friggin thing.
A total match made in heaven huh. LOL

 

Had a Ford stationwagon take off with the head mechanic setting it up on the engine analizer,The hood slams down on the guy catching him from just below arms so his entire upper body is in the engine compartment ! It did the self reverse thing backing across the garage and partly through the big glass bay door. The bottom most panels were metal with the exhaust tube ports in them the rear tires couldn't get a bite to climb over the panel but they were trying real hard when the owner jumped in and shut it down.it dragged the big ananizer with it ofcourse!this was before Ford admitted there was a problem with their cars doing this so no-one would believe the car shifted out of park on its own!

same mechanic specialized in VW repair and engine rebuilding ,Has a VW bug up on the lift at a nice height for him to work on the engine he turns to get a tool from his bench with the engine running at idle we hear a pop and the rear of the car becomes a fireball !The coil which is mounted upside down on the fan shroud overheated and blew off the top taking the fuel line out when it blows spraying gas on the hot engine quick action by 3 of us with fire extinguishers saved the car and the shop luckily he was away from the engine when this happened or his face would have been in the fireball

 

hahahahaha. ditto, but it was my left pec that got owned instead.

 

Man, this is an old thread but a good one! Always a good read to remind you how dangerous (and hilarious) things can get.
I have a scar shaped like a big fat smile to remind me of the "drill incident".

 

When I was a youngster I was helping my friend move some stuff and went to get parts out of the garage. It had two little handles and you had to lift real hard. I pulled up and about half way up the spring takes over and it hauls ass up. Well the handles were STOPS and all 8 of my fingers were on top of them. Splat right into the wood header ,I could see dents in the wood. All my fingers swell up like a blood blister and pop! I thought I broke my hands. My buddy laughs and says " I did that ONE time too!"

 

I pulled my thum into a grinder on friday...The glove helped, but didn't save it. Hed it sewn back on at the emergency room, surgeon told me today i will get to keep it. I might even get a thumb nail back.

Thank god for vicoden.....

 

I was soldering a pipe in my celler with a "B" tank the hose was loose at the tank and I started it on fire. I grabbed the tank and ran up the steps and threw it in a snow bank. All the time I was thinking it would explode any second. I was so upset that I quit work on the plumbing job and had to lay down.

 

I’ve got a lot of these stories.
/><o> </o>
I&#8217;ve seen a guy who used to work with my dad adjusting the valves on a bobcat/pinto when it started &#8230; and it was in gear so the next thing I saw was a pinto rolling through the shop with two legs sticking out from under the hood. No one got hurt and nothing got torn up too bad.
<o> </o>
My brother and I were swapping engines in a 69 chevelle and as soon as we cleared the car the homemade cherry picker collapsed and the engine hit the floor snapping the end off a cast iron crank. Nothing on the picker was broken, the bottle jack had just popped out somehow. My dad was pissed and figured that we just screwed up somehow. Two weeks later he&#8217;s dropping a fresh engine into his racecar and the same thing happened to him, but it only dropped a few inches and landed on the mounts. That night he picked up a store bought picker.

 

Now that's funny!

Tim

 

The guy who taught my welding class told us to crack any gas bottle valve open and turn them about half a turn when using them--if the gauges read enough flow/pressure (which they will), there's no need to turn the knob any more. His reason was that if it ever catches fire (like yours did), you can quickly reach thru the flames and shut the valve without burning your hands toooo bad. Welding gloves, of course, will help save the skin.

-Brad

 

Although I've had my fair share of runs to the ER This is the one that stands out most. happened 2 weeks ago:

my buddy's building a 34 dodge p\u I have been helping here and there mostly locating parts. so anyway i stoped at this old friend of mines house never been there before he thought he might have a pair of cheeter slicks for my buds p\u so we get to talking and rumigin through the sheds anyway i leave with 2 slicks,set of 14in bias ply WWW's and a pair of 36 ford headlights i run them over to my buddy. well that night he takes the headlights apart to clean um up starts polishin the rings on buffin wheel it catchs and cuts him from his chin to his eye brow 4 stichis in the lip and 4 in the eye brow also bruised his eye he has been out of work for 2 weeks to watch the pressure on his eye. he's going stir crazy cant do nothing.

 

Everyone laughs at their mistakes. But Dont take safety too lightly. A mentor and good friend of mind died last year due to an automotive mishap. Working on an old truck and something exploded. Fuel line, auxilary tank.. not really sure what happened. But he was working on the engine and was severely burned. Was hospitalized and doing well until 4 weeks later still in the hospital. The worst part of it all was having to go with his family and clean up his farm and move the truck.

Even if you only working on something and want to see how it works. Take the precautions you would if you were going to take the car out on its first ride.

 

Two years ago I had an exhaust leak on the manifold of my 57 Chevy, and decided it would be a good idea to snug the bolts with the engine running so I could hear when the leak went away. So the socket slips on one of the rusty bolts and my hand goes straight into the fan blade. (it was one of those aftermarket aluminum flex fans) Lucky for me it caught me on the side of my knuckle instead of the fingers...it did split the flesh all the way to the bone though. And then there's that pause that seems to last forever where you realize what you just did, then instant panic, followed by "Crap, Will a bandaid hold that together?" And to this day I still have no feeling in my index finger.

 

So I happen to be walking by the open shop bay door of my local Community college auto shop just in time to look in as a kid removes the rear wheel from his pickup that he's doing the brakes on for a class. As he removes the wheel (more importantly the WEIGHT of the wheel) the pickup starts this slow motion nose dive off of the in ground lift that it's sitting on. The whole time it's happening the kid is just standing there, wheel in hand and really stupid look on his face like "please, Somebody Help". Luckly he was starting early and there was no one else in the shop for the truck to fall on, it didn't hurt him either and when I realized there was no one hurt I couldn't stop laughing. Too bad the community college doesn't have a body shop class. Later Jaysin