Stories of knucklehead mistakes, Make me feel better about the scratches in my new paint Options

[stevegm]

I got my car out of storage to finish putting it back together. What started as a 3-month quick paint job, turned into a 5-year project. Anyway, I tried to keep the paint job from getting scratched while I pushed the car around the garage over the past couple of years. Everyone in my family knows - Rule #1 of the garage is don’t scratch the silver car. But, I failed. When I pulled it out to start finishing it this weekend, I noticed a few scratches in the paint. I sure would have liked to have driven it before scratching it. How I managed to scratch it, I have no idea. I guess the rule is - whatever you are trying to avoid scratching, will, in fact, get a scratched.

Anybody else scratch their new paint before finishing reassembly? I figured I’d start a knucklehead move thread. A form of group therapy I guess.

[ClayPerrine]

When I got Igor painted years ago, I had the top painted to match the rest of the car.

I brought the car home, and I put a different top on it so I could put the hardware back on the painted one. I promptly dropped the freshly painted top about 2 inches to a carpeted floor. Of course it chipped on the edge above the passenger window. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/headbang.gif)

[Literati914]

Yes Sir, I feel your pain.. I recently moved my '71 Volvo 1800E from off-site storage to my new house. In doing so, I bumped the rear quarter with a seat rail trying to get the seat into and past the driver's door - for the journey. I was in a hurry and added a nice little scratch to my fresh single stage paint. I wanted to puke considering how much time it had taken me to get the car to that point and how careful I'd been up til then. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/headbang.gif)

[oakdalecurtis]

A few winters back I had just gotten some new steel ramps to use instead of jacking up the car to work under it. I had my 914 in my cement floor garage. I put the two ramps behind the rear wheels, got in the car and started her up. I slowly started to back up the ramps. All went well until I got to the top flat part of both ramps. As I came to a stop, the passenger side ramp apparently didn’t have enough “bite” on the concrete floor. It shot forward under the floorpan in an instant and the right rear wheel dropped. The ramp came to a stop under the middle of the passenger seat pan, bending the floor pan upward as the now trapped ramp took half the weight of the car on it!
I had to jack the car off the ramp and repair the floorpan dent with a sledge hammer. Now I use rubber matting under the ramps. Doh!
(IMG:style_emoticons/default/chair.gif)

[bbrock]

Ha! Yeah, this one happened just a few hours ago. I was sanding the orange peel out of my nice new paint in prep for buffing. Working on the roll bar top and the wife walks in and we started talking. Like an idiot, I kept sanding while we chatted. Next thing I know, there a little spot of primer popping up at the edge. 2-stage paint so now I get to sand the whole panel down and respray. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/headbang.gif)

[Tdskip]

I had my 1972 GTV up on a lift while I was replacing the clutch slave cylinder hose and I had open the door to make sure it was actuating properly. Yep, when the job was done, I proceeded to lower the car with the door open and it caught on a nearby welding table and tweaked the door hinge.

Ouch.

[porschetub]

Did some garage roof repairs ,overnight freak wind storm blows the alloy ladder over and dents my car,was a totally straight car before (IMG:style_emoticons/default/headbang.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/headbang.gif) .

[Minerva's 914]

Oh yeah!

A could years ago I filled up the side of the garage where I park my Boxster with what probably amounted to $200 worth of stuff to finish off our guest bathroom. Time drug on for months and the Boxster continued to sit outside. We had several very tall pine trees next to the driveway which are constantly dropping needles. Late one very stormy and windy evening the Boxster alarm starts going off. I run out in the storm to find the lights flashing, horn blowing and the convertible top clam shell flapping up and down as IF opening the top but of course the top is securely latched and therefore can not move, breaking several parts that operate the top, bending and badly damaging the clam shell. Over the several months that the Boxster sat out under the trees, pine needles had clogged the drains under the top so the rain spilled into the passenger compartment flooding the carpet and collected at the lowest part of the interior right where the Porsche engineers thought would be a good place to put the computer that controls the top operation, anti-theft mobilizer, etc. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/confused24.gif)

$3200 later, (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sheeplove.gif) new computer, new top operation parts, straighten and paint clam shell.

Good news was, the $200 worth of stuff for the bathroom was safe and dry.

And so was the 914.

[Minerva's 914]

Oh yeah!

A could years ago I filled up the side of the garage where I park my Boxster with what probably amounted to $200 worth of stuff to finish off our guest bathroom. Time drug on for months and the Boxster continued to sit outside. We had several very tall pine trees next to the driveway which are constantly dropping needles. Late one very stormy and windy evening the Boxster alarm starts going off. I run out in the storm to find the lights flashing, horn blowing and the convertible top clam shell flapping up and down as IF opening the top but of course the top is securely latched and therefore can not move, breaking several parts that operate the top, bending and badly damaging the clam shell. Over the several months that the Boxster sat out under the trees, pine needles had clogged the drains under the top so the rain spilled into the passenger compartment flooding the carpet and collected at the lowest part of the interior right where the Porsche engineers thought would be a good place to put the computer that controls the top operation, anti-theft mobilizer, etc. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/confused24.gif)

$3200 later, (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sheeplove.gif) new computer, new top operation parts, straighten and paint clam shell.

Good news was, the $200 worth of stuff for the bathroom was safe and dry.

And so as the 914.

Oh, I might add that those damed pine trees are history (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sawzall-smiley.gif)

[falcor75]

When I carefully lifted my freshly painted GT racing rear trunklid over the freshly painted car body I smacked the edge into the rail for the garagedoor in the ceiling... I cleared the car body by a wide margin tho..... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)

[rgalla9146]

In the early eighties I stored my freshly painted orange car in my in-laws garage.
They needed only one bay for their car.
They asked if I would look at the door opener of the bay my car occupied.
Of course I would. The storage was free.
That's when the drive chain fell on my fresh paint.
Probably a good idea to put the car outside for garage door repairs, right ?

[Mark Henry]

My wife likes it when I put a scratch on a car, because as she says "It takes the pressure off of me!"

[Rotary'14]

Here's my bone head story,,,

Came back to my 914 with a dead battery after a long rest. put the battery charger/jump starter on the targa top to charge my puppy up. After a few hours of sitting, the battery was charged, so I started her up and let her idle. Well my car had a 1.7 with carbs back then and the idle was a bit high as I let her warm up. The vibration from the car idleing caused the charger to slide off the top and put a nice dent/gouge right next to the sail panel as it bounced off my car and hit the floor. DOH!!

Don't rest your charger on the targa top,,, put it on the trunk lid,,,, ALWAYS!!

If you run into me with my 914,,I'll show you the mark of shame as I still haven't painted her yet,,, but soon I will. Then I can worry about scratches again. 8-)

-Rotary Rob

[GaroldShaffer]

After a day of autocrossing I swapped back to my street tries, hooked up my AX trailer and started to drive home. About 6 miles into the drive in slow traffic I started hearing a "rubbing" sound. Thinking I might have a bad wheel bearing I pulled in to a K-mart parking lot. Just as the car was coming to a stop the drivers front dropped down, WTH?

Yep, in a hurry to get home and forgot to torque the lugs after the tire swap. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/slap.gif)
Wheels were real minilites with special lugs. I could only find two lugs on the ground. I found one more a few days later while driving that same stretch of road. The minilites were drilled for a cone seat, so I had a few spare alloy lugs for my racing fuchs so use two ball seat lugs until I got home. Bartlett914 (Mark Kinaman) was kind enough to turn a few extra alloy lugs into the proper cone seat for me.

Damage was minor, but still not happy.

[pploco]

I was just finished building and restoring a '73 baja bug with a professional paint job. I hadn't put everything back together, but was too excited to see how it drove. I was taking it to the gas station for its first full tank of gas, and decided to see how the new turbo motor handled a few hot shifts. At about 75, I realized that I had forgotten to put the hood pins on and watched as my MarkV fiberglass hood flipped open, smacked the windshield, broke one of the hinge mounts and dragged down the asphalt until I could stop. The hood was toast and the hinge ripped the quarterpanel just under the A pillar. That was almost 12 years ago, but I still get pissed when I think about it.

[pt_700]

there's storage in my garage rafters courtesy some old closet doors. being too lazy to move the car out while retrieving an item, i knocked my flashlight off the closet doors and onto the fender of my mercedes, leaving a nice ding i see every time i get into the car...

another good one was when i removed 1 too many links from a new chain on my honda blackbird after a sprocket change. thankfully, i had a smaller rear sprocket that allowed things to fit...

[Dion]

A few years back, while organizing the garage cabinets I managed to bump a small box out from the cabinet. No big deal right?
Well having the luck I have, the box lands on a hammer that was resting on the workbench below the cabinet. Thus launching the hammer in the direction of my
‘92 GTi . Which up to that point was pretty pristine. No more.
The “claw” portion managed to not only scratch but dent as well the perfect front edge of
the hood. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/hissyfit.gif)

[Garland]

Parked the 914 at moms house, off to the side, what I thought would be a safe spot.
Except when a tree trimmer canvases the neighborhood, and offers mom a deal!
Trimmed that tree up the 914 was parked near. Numerous branches fell on the car, and a nice gouging dent when he dropped is trimming tool on the right front fender.
She’d paid them, they left.

[Jamie]

I was lowering my Cayman down from the upper lift position, and was distracted by talking to another person in my garage. Not watching the lift, I didn't notice the L rear latch had not disengaged, and nearly dumped the Cayman off sideways as the lift descended! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/w00t.gif)

[Spoke]

Too many idiot mistakes to list them all.

I dented the door on my '86 930 with a bungy cord. I used the cord to hold up the discharge guard on my lawn tractor as I stored it in the garage. I was backing the lawn tractor in the garage one time and as I attempted to put the bungy on the guard, it got away from me and hit the door putting the only ding in the car. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/headbang.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/poke.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/chair.gif)