Ahh yes. When someone tells you it takes three hours to install a CAI, or only 15 minutes to adjust your rear sway bar, they never happen to calculate the oh **** factor. which will take your estimated time, multiplied by 1.25, added to the squareroot of 13 and thats your total time to do whatever in hours.

my favorite times were
1. Installing my stillen 2nd gen ypipe. What no 6inch extension? doh. run to home depot and come back. That Third bolt? how? Multi-angle elbow attachment? Run to home depot. What the second piece doesnt fit into the other piece? Dremel it for 20 minutes. What? the cat wont come off? spray wd40. Break bolt. run to home depot. What? no outside light because its 6 hours after you started and its now dark? Run inside to get 100 foot exension cord that is 10 feet too short.

2. Installing BL97SC's valve body. (my first time). 28 bolts for the pan...30 minutes. 13 bolts for the vb. going VERY slowly to make sure its the right one + having weak arms trying to raise the vb over my head while stuck under the car..20 minutes fine. thats cool. removing the damn clip for the VB harness to give it some room to come down? 1 hour. spilling tranny fluid all over my head and huh? What spring? looking for the spring in the parking garage.. 30 minutes. (it was in the fluid catch-can... installing the new VB, putting everything back together. and then starting to car only to notice the wheels dont move? and THEN going back the next day to take it ALL apart and noticing the drive pin was not attached to the gear rod? total time for install: 18. Est time don said it would take: 5

3. SC pulley swap at Keving's house.. " Oh i can do it in three hours" says keving... ends up we had to dremel into the pulley to remove a stripped bolt and have the alternator not line up on the reinstall.. total time?? like 9 hours for a 3 hour job...


aiya.

but i'm sure im not the only one to have these.. lets hear some funny ones..

 

Hahahaha I've got a similar one for the VB.

Started it, took me 4 hours, first time ever opening up the transmission like that. Put it all back together, checked under the car one last time, and a big spring is sitting right under it.

I just thought "aaaahhhhhhhhh crap I know where that goes."

Had to redrain it, open it up again, replace it, and seal it up again. After the 2nd time, the gasket broke and it leaked all over the place. I had to do it a 3rd time, so it was around 15-18 hours like the experience you listed as well

 

I've had that same experience working on my Harley a time or two ... My best (worst?) experience was putting an aftermarket manifold on a GM van I used to have. I spent 2 days working on the thing, outdoors in a driveway, and I'm just torquing down the LAST bolt when it snaps. Always the !#$% bolts! Those are the things that turn a simple 30 minute job into a 10 hour nightmare ... and I wonder why I hate working on cars! I went inside, poured myself an 8 oz. glass of straight whisky, chugged it and didn't feel a thing, I was so mad! Then I went back outside to start tearing down again ... The upside it you get really good at teardown and rebuilding with all the extra experience, and the second time in is usually easier because all the old frozen bolts have been loosened already.

 

OH CRAPPP! SPRING COMPRESSOR BUSTED!!! its scary unbolting the top nut without the help of the compressor.

 

My worst is when I was putting my lowering springs on my car. I started in the rear. left side went perfectly. got to the right side and when I got to the main bolt at the bottom of the strut I ended up torquing it the wrong way (turned it the same way as the right side, Im soo dumb) I ended up torqing it to about 120 pounds in the wrong direction. to make things worse the socket I was using was about 1 size too big so I ended up stripping it to hell. I had to drive my car all over town with only the left rear lowered to every shop in town to hear every dumb s**t grease tell me "Uhhh theres nothing I can do, youll hafta take it to a machine shop". so finally after stressin for about 5 hours my brother came home on told me he has a friend whos famoily owns a meineke so theuy took care of it. they welded a socket to the stripped bolt.

 

thats kinda what happened when I was working with Iilac's suspension- stripped a 17mm bolt, my solution- dremel that 17mm bolt down to a 16mm. Worked perfect

 

Putting my stock springs back in at my shop..1hr right?
broke 3 spring compressors, my mechanic nearly died. total time 5 hours.

changing my fog light bulbs for the first time (5th gen)
Hoon says: it takes about 30 minutes
Total time: 3 hours.
Hint: used a hammer

 

#1 and add a parking fine sounds like what happened to me. For some reason I alway choice to start working on my max at night.

 

You too, huh? A pain when something goes wrong. Nothing open but Denny's and the Cop Shop.

 

thats a good idea. That never even crossed my mind. Ill have to try that if Im ever in the same situation...

 

thats one funny a$$ story. LMAO.

 

last friday, i left school early to goto a friends house to finally install my new springs and struts.
we started with the right rear. about 20 minutes was spent on that big long bolt that holds the parallel links to the strut assembly. duh! you gotta hold both ends!
next, spent 25 minutes (maybe it was 30) on the bottom bolts, torqued one the wrong way, after both of us pushing with our feet, WD-40, rubber mallet, pretty much everything short of an impact wrench. ryan goes "we're idiots" turned the socket around, gave it a small pull and we thought it loosened. the socket drops and the bolt snapped off! no fears, theres another bolt.
after that, we took the whole thing apart, couldnt seem to get the old cartridge out. ok,keep trying, and finally get it.
look at the manual, it says "use nissan approved strut fluid". well, time for a trip to the $tealer. didnt goto the $tealer, its 30-45 minutes away. used the old fluid that was in there. whatever.

next, we put that strut back in (or tried). the mount only goes in 1 way, no problem, the spring is short enough so it doesnt need to be compressed, loosened the bolt, put it on....backwards.
ok, we got that strut done after about..oh, i dont know...3 hours!
next was the left rear. came off easily, put it on easily. what strut boot?
go into the back seat, pull out the new strut boots, put one on each rear (had to take the right rear off AGAIN..about the 4th time).
fronts. ok no big deal, 5 bolts and a clip and its out right? right.
took the fronts out, my friend (ryan) is stupid and lined the mount bolts up backwards, i was putting the strut on and noticed the brake line hose clip was on the wrong side. f'in A!!!!! find another jack and stand, jack up the right front, line up the bolts on the assembled strut/spring, install it on the right front, no problem. oh yeah, bump stop. took both fronts off, put on the boots and bumpstops.
i start the car while we're cleaning up to let it warm up. i pick up a pile of tools from the front of the car and find two metal discs..strut bearings. ok, no big deal, maybe i dont need them, didnt see 'em come off, so ya know, whatever.
get in the car, turn the wheel while the car isnt moving, from a 750rpm idle, it jumps to 2000rpm to turn the wheel maybe 1/8th turn. i also hear a loud bang.
finish cleaning up, leave the car overnight, go back the next day, banged out the strut bearings in about 45 minutes. also, noticed that the springs werent seated correctly in the front.
oh yeah, it was about 40 degrees, misting/raining and dark by the time we got the first strut and all the trips to the shops over with.
all in all, about a 13 hour job not including two trips to the import shop, autozone and napa..or lunch, not bad huh?


another story:
went to install my short shifter. pulled the shift boot, **** and center console out of the car, jacked it up, read the directions, took one look at the cat and flanges, they're all rusted together.
put it all back together, went home and took a nap.
that was about a 35 minute ordeal.

one more that i can think of:
went to a friends house to put on his n/a 300zx rims.
put the front two on, put the rears on, took it for a drive. BANG BANG BANG BANG. turned around, went back, jacked up the car. wheel was rubbing in the back. no big deal.
installed springs and struts, got spacers, went to andys house again, put a rear rim on, its just barely rubbing WHATS WRONG!? still cant figure it out.

 

Blame it on your reject supercharger. Stupid bolt....... stupid alternator.

STUPID OIL COOLER HOSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Did two SC uninstall/install that night!!!!!!!

 

I had a new clutch put in last Wednesday. Everything went fine except I was sent the wrong drivers side driveaxle seal. I called up Courtesy and they said they would rush deliver me a new seal that was supposed to be here last friday. So I told the transmission place to reuse the old seal so I could atleast get my max back. I knew that it was going to leak but not this badly!

Last thursday night I put the car up on jackstands and start removing the driveaxle in anticipation of recieving the driveshaft seal on Friday. I had a difficult time getting the steering knuckle to detach off of the driveaxle. The abs wheel speed sensor wire was holding things up. So I soaked it with penetrating oil and let it sit for awhile. I put a socket on the abs sensor bolt and started to remove it when it made the magical "pop" noise. Broken bolt. Fine F*#% the bolt I'm going to bed. It takes me all of friday night to get that broken bolt out and I still don't have my seal.

Then I made an absolutey stunning discovery. Both of my wheels are turned to the right and the steering wheel is still centered ! I don't have a freaking clue how that happened but now I have to to turn my steering wheel a half turn to the left to get the wheels straight. Oh and still no driveshat seal .

Now I am stuck driving a 1988 Horizon with a "no" cat-back system. Will some one wake me up from this nightmare?!?!?!?

 

This is kind of embarassing, but when I went to replace my headlight bulb I kept trying to turn the actual bulb instead of the black release cap. What makes it worse was that my wife was standing with the falsh light asking if she could help.

 

Last time my spark plugs were changed I had the help of an over eager friend. Well he tightened one the screws for the coil pack too tightly. So after reaching my 30000 mile limit on my Denso Iridiums I figure I'd go back to stock NGK Platinums. Well Just as I'm changing the last plug (the one closest to the driver side on the front bank of cylinders) I begin to unscrew the bolt and its rather tight. Nonetheless I got if off. So I change the spark plug and I'm ready to tighten the bolt for the coil pack. One, two, three turns and snap the head of the bolt just just broke. No real resistance just snapped. Oh well I've got another 40K miles to drill and extract the broken bolt.
Has anyone ever have to drill and extract a broken bolt? It looks like its going to be kind of tough considering the bolt was rather thin. I have to run to Sears and get a set of carbide metal drill bits and a really small extractor to try and get this out. Oh boy!

 

After getting your head back from the machine shop and reinstalling the engine. Trying to get the ***** to turn the ignition on after thinking "hmm did I put the timing chains on right?" "Did I torque the cam bearing towers down right?" etc...

 

It took me 2 hours to install my tranny cooler. I know, I'm an idiot. Could not figure out for the life of me how to get the damn stock hose clamps off. Also didn't think about tranny fluid draining out when I Finally mangled the hose off, needless to say it was all over me. The box says 30 minutes, WTF?!

 

Transmission experience for me. I dropped my tranny to do a clutch job and I put a Quaife differential in my transmission, first time I kept forgetting to put the reverse idler gear in the right spot, so I had to break the seal and open the tranny 3 or 4 times. I forget to drive the axle seals on the tranny while its off the car, so I did a half ased job trying to pound the seals in while on the car. As soon as I poured the oil in, it came GUSHING out. I almost cried.

Then 2 weeks later 2nd gear decides to blow up. I drive 250 miles one way to buy a used broken cased transmission for its useable parts. Drop the transmission again, open it up, must reinstall the Quaife diffy to make one good transmission. Put the transmission back on the car, only to realize, hey 3rd and 4th gear don't "click" into place. Realizing what I probably did I drop the tranny again, open it up, correct the problem (shift fork rod was put in reversed, it wouldnt hurt anything, just wouldnt click) finally put the car back together, and now I'm still knocking on wood. This time I did everything right, and it doesnt even leak a drip or a drop. although the car is once again on jackstands in the garage for a different reason. Total time on jack stands, probably 2 months + and counting. Its fortunate I have other vehicles to drive.

 

I bought a used max last summer, and after I had had it for a couple oil changes, I figured I might as well rotate the tires and get it in my record book. I pull out the wrench from the trunk, and try to loosen the first bolt, but there's no way it's gonna go. So I go downstairs, get my dad's 1/2" breaker bar, a 1/2"-3/8" socket converter, and a socket from my socket set. It was a little tough, but that seemed to work. I got the 2 drivers side wheels off and put the front wheel on the back. Then I go to the passenger side to take off the front wheel so I can put the other wheel I've got on. First bolt I try I'm having trouble, so I call my brother out. We both try to loosen the thing, and the 1/2-3/8" adapter just breaks off. Trip to Home Depot, get a free replacement, then back to that nut. Second adapter breaks. Now I go get the 1/2" socket set. The right socket wasn't fitting on, so I hammered it on to the lug nut. Get my brother out there to help me with the breaker bar. Finally the nut starts moving. We here some cracking-type noises, and then all of a sudden the lug nut breaks right off the wheel with the end of the bolt still in it
I go inside and call around and find a place in town that will sell me a new hub bolt to put in the wheel, so I go get one of those and a new lug nut. I called the guy that runs a shop down the street for me, and he said he'd take the rest of the lug nuts off for me with their impact sockets (something I was really wishing I had at this poing) at no charge, and re-tighten them to spec. He told me that had to put their impact wrenches to one of the highest setting to get the nuts off! Something like 200 or 300 ft-lbs (spec is 72-87). I don't know where the car last was, but there would have been no way for me to change a tire if I got a flat with the nuts that tight. I got that done, went back home, and pull out my factory service manual. I start taking the wheel apart, and then get to this big nut that I don't have any sockets for. I check the manual, and it's supposed to be torqued to 174-231 ft. pounds, and I only have a 150 ft-lb tourqe arm. I figured I might be able to get aorund that, so I measure the nut and go to Home Depot to buy a socket for it -- they don't have one big enough. Then I head over to Sears, and was able to find a couple around what I measured, but they were 3/4" drive, so I picked up a 1/2"-3/4" adapter while I was there. I get home, think about it a little more, and realize it's probably not going to work.
At this point I called the shop that's conveniently located right down the street from my. The owner told me he could ge my car in that afternoon and change the bug bolt for me and finish rotation the tires. All said and done, it took me more than half a day to get 4 tires rotated.
Now if I ever have to get my tires taken off at a shop, I'm going to make sure they don't over-tighten the lug nuts.

 

Trying to help out TJ2000 who drove a long way for me to have him get his y-pipe installed...dang auto hobby shop wouldn't let us in cause the car was not registered to me and I tried it in my driveway and I broke a bolt off by the cat trying to remove it...felt real bad cause I could not help him out and he had to drive home with a leaky exhaust.

 

Yeah, I've had that happen a few times and I make them write on the work order "don't overtighten lug nuts"

 

Installing STS.

Unbolt everything fairly easily, go to put the shifter back in tighten everything back up, go to look at the shifter and the shiet is on backwards. Go back under unbolt everything again turn the shifter around. Little did i know that the throw on the shortest setting is ridiculously small, tighten everything again go to shift. The throw is so short that I can barely get it into gear. Go back under again unbolt everything and fix the throw. It then begins to rain, put everything back the right way. It sucked.

Installing Intake manifold.

Took 6 hours to take off and put new one on. Start car CEL comes on and i have a coolant leak. if any of you have ever done this, you know what I am talking about. there are these 2 coolant hoses on the back right of the manifold that are nearly impossible to reach and you can barely see them. Well that is where the coolant was coming from. tried to fix it while the manifold was on did not work. So i had to take the damn thing off again and fix the leak. Total time: 10 hrs and 1 aching back

 

Installed the rear springs upside down.

 

Haha, the worst by far was installing the SC. Stillen say's it's a 8 hour job, well, add in a blizzard, no garage, 25 degree weather and it ended up taking 40 hours of work! Those were quite possibly the worst few days of my life, cut's, bruses, sleep depravation, you name it! Then to top it all off after I finished bolting the SC on I noticed the damn oil feed back line was kinked! It was impossible to get the line on preoperly with out removing the whole damn SC!


Another good one was(just like you) when I decided to put my dwarf pulley on(3.48), I had the same damn stripped bolt as you! HAha now you know how that happened . I ended modifying a wrench to fit onto the bolt properly and I wacked it with a hamer and it came off! Joy, then I installed the pulley and went out. Little did I know that the damn V1 pulley I put on needed to be modified for the belts to line up! So the belt snaped in half about 30 miles away form home. I drove it home with half a belt and then I did it all over again + machining down my V1 pulley. Total time: 12+ hours.

Hmm theres been other things too..

 

SO IT WAS YOUR FAULT!!!

 

Sorry.



Stillen is ultimatly to blame, those bolts are to weak to unscrew when you use the recommended lock tight. The only way to get them off is with a bang!

 

No...... you stripped it so a 10mm wouldn't work, and a 9mm was too small. We had to get a standard wrench from HD (I don't have a standard set).

Bastard!!!!

I noticed your ghetto mill down job on the pulley.

 

I thought I did a good job

 

Thats better than not knowing you need a spring compressor until you realize you cant sqeeze the spring later. Also don't mind the bolt, wrench, and spring flying off a few feet almost breaking my jaw. But yo, its ok. At least when i did this, i did it on a rear spring, not front.

 

Something similar happened to me. I was removing my old rims to get the new Revos back on when the fronts simply would not come off. Two off us had to stand on the wrench to simply make it turn. I'm talking about a good 350 pounds of weight . It was pretty funny when I was standing on the damn thing and it wouldn't go down.

 

Mine would definantly be on my Underdrive Pulleys. Here we go...

Me and Vinipux are doing this job. We remove the stock pulley after about a good 2 hours or so of trying between my air tools and hand tools. Neither would move it. Finally that thing comes off with a lot of time lost already. For anyone who is going to do this thing I had my compressor set for 200 pounds or so and it still would not come off.
So once it comes off I figure now it is about ten minutes left. So we put the new one on but then cant get the smaller belt back on. The pulley would not move up and down for us to put the belt on, after about 30 - 45 minutes we realize that the bolt you unscrew from the bottom is not lined up right. Line that up and it falls right to the bottom.
So we install the belts and are all excited it is done. "Lets try it out" he says. So we check everything and it seems fine so we turn on the car. We get it running for about 3 minutes or so and all of a sudden we here this VERY loud crash and other bad noises. We run over to see what it was. Ready for this... we never put the 19mm bolts back on. The one holding in the main pulley we just replaced.
So when it came off it decided it would be funny to shred the belts with it on the way out. Okay no problem there is a new Nissan dealer up the street. We run up there to find out that the parts shop was closed for the weekend. So we go to AutoZone get the belts and redo it again.
This time it only took maybe 25 minutes (since the pulley and belts were pre taken off for us this time.) Now everything was on and tight and running great. We leave my house and I head towards Boston. On my way back I realize that the belt was not tight enough and got a extremely loud sqeel the whole way back. So the next day I got to take the wheels and cover

Fun stuff.....


SuDZ

 

This is why I have an assortment of rubber and steel mallets and dead weight hammers. Sometimes it takes impact to get that first molecule to move ... Geez, after reading this thread, I may never want to touch a tool again! I loved working on my motorcycle - easier to reach stuff, and it wasn't my primary transportation. I hate to wrench on cars! Stupid bolts ...

 

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

 

4th gen install on a 5th gen.

110 degree texas weather.

Hot garage.
Where are the f*cking power tools.
Ahhh ha! A hacksaw.

Saw saw saw saw saw saw saw saw saw saw saw saw saw/

Wow I got a small indention in.
Screw it its too hot to do this now.


Later that night.
saw saw saw saw saw saw.
Argh!! screw this. Found plyers and grip the crap out of that metal piece.
Only to find that I didn't cut enough into the metal.

FSTB install for 5th gen. 4 hours.

 

Spring/Strut install (SoCal)

Fronts, no problem! Done in no time at all, this is going to be a breeze! OK, time for the rears. (Trip to neighbors house to borrow pipe wrench to remove gland packing nut) When we get both sides part way out, and are putting the left rear Tokico in, we notice the OEM gland packing nut won't fit over the Tok insert. CRAP! Call up Stillen....

(insert hold music)...

Stillen: "Oh yes, you should have new gland packing nuts"
Me: "Well you guys didn't send them"
S: "You must have ordered the wrong part then"
Me: "No, I ordered the correct parts, you guys just didn't send everything I need."
S: "Well if you want to send them back, we can see what is going on"
Me: "MY CAR IS IN A COUPLE HUNDRED PARTS!@@!!"

So off shopping we go. 2 performance shops, and 3 parts places later, we return with a set of rear Monroe Sensa-Tracs that have the gland nut I need. Rest of the install goes OK.

We head off for Pizza, and I have this horrible clunking noise in the rear.... someone forgot to tighten the middle nut on the left rear suspension..... DOH! Remove back seat, tighten nut.

*Time passes*

2 Weeks later, the Tokico gland nuts arrive, so I head to the parts store to return the Monroes.

Parts guy: "Hey man, these nuts don't fit the Monroes"
Me: "Oh crap, I'll be back later"

Several emails back and forth to Monroe, and parent companies, and I have the parts... finally I get my money back for the Monroes.

Moral of the story, don't try to get customer support on the weekend.

 

Back when I was 16 I was anxious to work on my system, so I started (against my dads instructions) without him, being that has helping me install it all.. I got everything done, the last peice was to hook up the 1 faret capicitor.. But I accidently put the Positive and the Negative on one post, and the other Positive on the other.. All seemed well until I told my boy to turn on the system.. ALL OF THE SUDDEN a wierd fluid started to sprey out of the cap, and smoke filled the open trunk.. needless to say, my car smelled like electric and burned fish for about one month.. I learned from my experience, 1)to listen to the old man 2)how to hook up a cap properly

 

1) Back in the days(my early twenties) I owned a Toyota celica GTS. I had the Kit on it and had it looking nice. BAck before my internet days. I had no clue what I was doing but decided to try and isntall an Amp and some Bazooka subs using the instructions that come with the Amp. I wire it all up and leave the wires exposed( I want to make sure it works before I hide the wires). I turn on the Juice and
OH ****, I smell something burning I look in the trunk and I see the wires melting. It looked like a fuse to a bomb burning down. After that episode I took my car to a pro. The guy looked at the wiring and said, Who the F#@K did this. I was so embarassed so I told him that a friend of mine did it.

2) Trying to install a FSTB in my 96 MAx. I went out and rented a Torque wench, because I was told it had to be a certain torQue. I had no clue how to work the huge wrench. As I'm tightening the Strut bolts, SNAP!!!. S#1T pops off.

 

my worst was probably attempting to bench press my tranny to take it out the 3rd time and dropping it on my arm my arm hurt for 2 weeks

 

Well, me and my friend were working on the tranny (putting new synchros on). Anyway my friend decided to start taking off the gears and was using a hammer because we didn't have a pulley puller at the time. While I was at work he got the first bearing of and tried to take of the rest of the gears. He ends up bending the top of the thing that hold the gears...I'm not to technical when comes to the part names. Anyway a one day job turned into a week because we had to find a place that could grind down the lip he created, and it was hard to locate a place that could do it in under 3 days, plus it is a hard metal.

Ok, so after that we get the gears back on and put the tranny back on. We have a hard time getting the case back over the gears. But comes pretty close to touching. We decide to start torquing down all the nuts...excited that we almost got the car back together. All of a sudden we hear a huge pop...we were shocked wonder where that came from. And there is a huge crack in the case. Apparently something wasn't set correctly...What a piece of crap

Accidently submitted it without finishing. So, we had to go buy a new case for the transmission. Get's here in like 3 days. And put it back together...Assemble the car completely...and go for a test drive everything is working great. Well, decide to go into reverse and all of a sudden it won't go out of reverse. So, able to get it home in Second...and take it all apart...to find out that we forgot a barring for reverse.

This time it has to work...get everything back together and rolling and we reverse fine and are driving fine great...able to get it into reverse several times drive it around the loving the acceleration. Decide might as well try reverse again and it wouldn't go. We kept on trying and trying and couldn't get it to go. So, we shut off the car and called it a night.

Frustrated we took the car apart again trying to figure out what is going on...made sure there wasn't anything wrong with the linkage or bent. Nothing going on. So take the tranny apart again. And notice that the synchro for reverse has been welded to the reverse thing it sits on...Something on the gears...what had happened is that it wasn't set down all the way...so another 30 bucks for those pieces, make sure that the gears are all set and down as far as they can go. Put it back together, and drove it. Kinda stiff and reverse still kinda hard to get in. But, it was working...and once it sat for a few days in the tranny fluid everything move great again. Like buying a car brand new from the factory.

Man, a job that should have taken 1-2 days. Ended up take 3-4 weeks to finally do. It was so painful...I should have done the Motor mounts while it was out but never thought of it until after got everything done. I can say now that I know the installion and repair of the tranny by heart...I could probably almost do it blind folded.

-John