other What Bad Decisions Are You Currently Reverting?

[thinksound_mike]

I believe I used SEM color coat. But I have found recently that the Meltonian brand "Color Spray" found at shoe repair shops is probably the best paint for spraying plastics and rubber. The stuff covers anything in almost one coat and will resist cracking at extreme flexing. I used it to respray the lower door moulding, rubber bumperettes, my rubber interior door handles etc. It still looks new and doesn't rub off.

Either would work well though for the gauge cluster.

 

The purpose of this thread was not to enable! ha

Thanks! There's a shop around the corner from me that sells Melotonian. 

[mike472]

1. Tied some new accessory that drew too much amperage through the unfused wire I connected it to and melted down a good part of my engine compartment wiring harness with attendant smoke.  

 

2. Had a engine ground cable go bad that manifested itself in a throttle return spring that was glowing like the filament in a fricken incandescent bulb.  Seems this spring was the only path to ground.  This happened while out on a date with another couple.  I opened the hood was again greeted by lots of smoke and me being the nimrod that I am, grabbed the spring with a piece of paper which promptly caught fire along with a nice huge spark from yanking the spring off the lip of the front cowl.  I was left with what Jean Sheperd referred to as a cerulean blue nimbus floating above the car.  I should have just turned off the headlights and ignition but that would have been too easy.

 

Be careful doing wiring work on your car and look for trouble before it happens.

[bazju]

I feel like I'll soon be reverting my ANSA exhaust from what I've heard about it on here. Maybe I can get a better mid pipe than the ANSA one to quiet the muffler down a bit. I've been driving with a pretty bad exhaust leak for a while now, so maybe it won't see so bad. 

[Kile Brekke]

Had a engine ground cable go bad that manifested itself in a throttle return spring that was glowing like the filament in a fricken incandescent bulb.

 

Very similar thing happened to me too!

I hit a massive pothole in SF and the battery tray broke, allowing the positive terminal to ground on the front nose. 
It was at night, all my lights and stopped working, car still ran but my throttle went really, really soft and lost all return tension.

I immediately pulled over, threw the hood open and saw my throttle return spring glowing bright red like a filament as well.

I then noticed the battery resting on the sheet metal and backed it off. All the lights came back on.

 

A lot of my wiring was melted as well but still worked enough to manage to get me home.

I asked my girlfriend to let her hair down as I rolled up my sleeves and installed her stretchy hair-tie as a temporary return spring since the toasted one lost all of its tensile.  Left it on there for a full year!

 

Bizarre.

[Jim_75Sahara]

I did not realize that my trailer hitch was a rare, sought-after part.  It was immediately taken off and pitched into the metal recycling bin.  Also, I should have had the engine rebuilt during my first year of ownership.  The M10 got weaker and smokier over time.  Imagine that!

[Rustpile]

Well.

 

1. Bought it. Could have gotten a good tii for the money spent on mine, and not have spent a billion hours fixing it.

 

2. MegaJolt ignition. I am sure it´s really good, but it has been a lot of work, and in retrospect, I should have gone with 1-2-3 ignition

 

3. Replacing the engine. Not a bad idea per se. Just a crappy engine. Should have paid a little more and gotten a complete good one.

 

4. Sidedrafts. So cool. So much work, so little time.

 

5. Rust repairs. If I were less moronic, I would just have fixing the worst of it, and flared it, and saved a lot of money on bodywork and paint.

 

But I am sure that I will be very happy when it´s all running again. Hopefully really soon.

[Rosheee]

What a great thread to read. I love this!

[AustrianVespaGuy]

On 6/9/2014 at 1:56 PM, Stevenc22 said:

Using urethane transmission mount on a stock car. Interior picked up too much vibration. Went back to stock rubber mount.

I think this (and the matching urethane engine mounts) are the only things I've ever changed back to stock.  Everything else, if I wasn't perfectly happy with it, I'd just keep pushing onward until I DID become happy with things, rather than going back.  But I'm stubborn that way  For example my oil pressure gauge: I first put in one of the mechanical ones, then realized I didn't like having high pressure oil plumped into my interior, so I switched it for a nice VDO electrical one, but then I missed the idiot light, so I upgraded the sender to one that gives both the gauge and light signals.  Then I didn't like where I mounted it, so I moved it.  Long path around sure, but got there in the end!

There are a few things I really regret NOT doing at the proper time.  The two biggest that come to mind are:

1.) Not putting in a new headliner when I already had the glass out for painting, aggh! Might never happen now. . .

2.) Not putting in new front lower ball joints when I had the struts out to put in the new Bilsteins.  Won't happen until either the struts or ball joints genuinely die. . .

[AustrianVespaGuy]

On 6/11/2014 at 10:50 AM, Rustpile said:

2. MegaJolt ignition. I am sure it´s really good, but it has been a lot of work, and in retrospect, I should have gone with 1-2-3 ignition

Is your MegaJolt crank-fired from a trigger wheel or similar?  If not, then yeah a 123 would have been a far easier route to get a programmable ignition curve.  But if it is, then you have gained significant accuracy/stability/repeatability over the 1-2-3 distributor-based system which in my opinion is well worth the effort involved.  So maybe don't regret this one TOO much ?

[Jbaumshelter]

My dumb thinking moment:

Bought Bilstein Sport shocks and put them on standard springs. Now I get to pay again to add the correct stage 2 springs instead of just doing it right the first time. Doing things 3 times before I get it right is kind of my thing. I'm growing comfortable with this for some reason. 

[2002#3]

I put really cool-looking, hot, sexy, racing-type, eye candy blue spark plug wires into my restored tii.  I might as well have installed blue make-out lights under the dash or purple LEDs along the rocker panels.  They were replaced with black wires within an hour.

[joysterm]

I wish I had read this thread four years ago....sure would have saved me some time and dollars not to mention the space here it will take to share my faux pas.......great thread! 

[bobthomas]

In 1975 I drove my Riviera '02 into a utility pole at about 50 mph.  Does that count?

[Jbaumshelter]

Just now, bobthomas said:

In 1975 I drove my Riviera '02 into a utility pole at about 50 mph.  Does that count?

 

Hell yeah, that counts. I've thought about doing that more than once. Now that I think about it, that thought only comes to my mind while I'm holding a wrench and sweating. Maybe they are related?

[chargin]

Funny to see this thread revived, I defiantly have a few to Add:

 

1. Let the body shop go with the INKA paint code that looked a little light, not Colorado but light
2. 4 sets of wheels over 4 years
3. didn't fix floors before respray because the shop said they would and then didn't
4. Should have sent a Gauge in to Speedhut
5. Should have paid more for my first steering wheel I knew I liked instead of buying 4 
6. Lowering springs instead of Coilovers the first time