"Damn that was a pain!" thread

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PanGasket

PanGasket

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Id like to see if everyone has had trouble with one particular thing that made you say "Damn! That was a real pain! Hope I never have to do that again!" and wanted to share their frustration lol.

I'll start with my biggest pain so far which I am sure is nothing compared to others.

The worst I have had to deal with is on these janky Hooker Geaders I got for $20. The inner bolts on the tubes from cylinders 1,7,2,8 are all a real pain to get even started. I had to end up buying a handful of grade 8 bolts that varied from 1" to 1/2" to find ones that could actually dodge the stupid tube and start to thread even. Then when I finally though I was out of the "pain in my as header" woods. You can only get a rachet on 7 out of the twelve and the rest you have to have a ball of a time shoving a wrench on getting maybe 2/3res of a turn at a time as they scrape the header tube. It was a wonderful time. I would have much rather have taken a rear main bearing and oil pump to the face again
 
My current pain in the arse is pulling the instrument cluster out of my Dart. It's out and not too bad once you know the tricks, but for a while I was ready to pull my hair out!!!
 
upper control arms from a 73 dart sport-- lots of cursing & hammering on the p/side. drivers side out it 5 minutes-- go figure. Lawrence
 
ARP makes a reduced sized head on there header bolts. IIRC, there 5/16th.

My own personal "Danm that was a pain" would have to be installing the 4spd manual trans on my back on some really crappy uneven broken up pavement. 8 hours of fustration on my back. Sore muscles.

The job was completed in 5 minutes once my best buddy showed up. My wife. She came home from work floored I wasn't done and ripping up the hood leaving stretch marks all over town. So I told her I needed her at the front of the car handling the jacks positioning.

Like I said, 5 minutes and we were done. I finish bolting it to the bell and called it quits! Sore and tired as heck, I didn't finish the job till noon the next day.
 
Gotta be the instrument cluster. I dread taking it out to fix something.
 
VDART said:
upper control arms from a 73 dart sport-- lots of cursing & hammering on the p/side. drivers side out it 5 minutes-- go figure. Lawrence
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I forgot about hammering the cam adjusters out of the upper control arms, I guess I suppressed that bad memory! I fought one for for several hours, back and forth. Spray with penetrant, repeat. The next weekend, I hit it with my buddies air chisel with a hammer bit in it and it was out in five minutes.

X2 on the ARP header bolts. They were another time saver. Well worth the extra cost.
 
Mine was replacing my oil pan. Well the pan was easy, but getting to it was not, i.e. remove the center link, hooker headers etc...all of which were rusted solid. Kids learned a few new words as a result.

Pat
 
Mine was changing out the front leaf spring bushings with the springs and rear end still in the car. :)
 
Ill x2 on th oil pan had to remove the steering arms and lift the motor. Got one coming up that im scared of. Cutting the holes for my 72 tail lights when the old owner replaced the panel they put tiny retarded led lights in.
 

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Guy in pick is old owner he thought the nova in the background was way cooler and bought it then sold me the duster. Some people rofl
 
Mine has to be removing the trans pan, have to remove the exhaust, loosen half of the right side header, remove right side header collector, remove the trans cross member, lower the trans, just to undo the trans shield belt so I can get the pan off.
 
My biggest PITA job by far was installing a 4 speed trans by myself.That day I over-extended many muscels while holding up the trans and working/moving the floor jack with my leg/foot.After numerous attemps(trans sliding off floor jack)I finally got it it,but had dead arm syndrome.LOL
 
rumblefish360 said:
ARP makes a reduced sized head on there header bolts. IIRC, there 5/16th.

My own personal "Danm that was a pain" would have to be installing the 4spd manual trans on my back on some really crappy uneven broken up pavement. 8 hours of fustration on my back. Sore muscles.

The job was completed in 5 minutes once my best buddy showed up. My wife. She came home from work floored I wasn't done and ripping up the hood leaving stretch marks all over town. So I told her I needed her at the front of the car handling the jacks positioning.

Like I said, 5 minutes and we were done. I finish bolting it to the bell and called it quits! Sore and tired as heck, I didn't finish the job till noon the next day.
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pettybludart said:
My biggest PITA job by far was installing a 4 speed trans by myself.That day I over-extended many muscels while holding up the trans and working/moving the floor jack with my leg/foot.After numerous attemps(trans sliding off floor jack)I finally got it it,but had dead arm syndrome.LOL
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I had replaced the clutch 7 times on my '69 Swinger 340 until I figured out that it was a motor mount issue. None of my friends would help me stab the 4-speed by the 8th time.(go figure) 6 hours later, my mom asked me what all the fuss was about in the garage. Being a "young guy" back then, it only took 2 days to recover. I miss my youth!
 
mine was installing the engine in my 66. schumacher conversion mounts, 318/904. the oil pan was interfering with the drag link on full left lockout. (yes i do have a v8 drag link) didnt realize at first that there was supposed to be a dimple in the pan for clearance....found that even in the aftermarket world most of these retailers that claim their pan will fit early a's, dont have this little dimple....after the 3rd time yanking the engine out to dent the pan, i had enough of those shenanigans...
 
Not necessarily a Mopar but this one sticks out in my memory... I had a clutch slave cylinder go bad in my '93 Jeep Cherokee and those Japanese (Aisin/Toyota AX-15) engineers being the geniuses they are made it so the whole transmission has to be separated from the engine to replace a $30 part. I spent three days with a rental transmission jack disassembling and reassembling all that junk in my garage by myself... Never again lol. When (not if) this one goes bad I'm just going to replace the whole tranny with a later model year version that has an external slave cylinder.
 
Replacing the trunk pan in my 67 Formula.The bumper support brackets were a **** to remove.I had to be careful so I could reuse them.
Also mini tubbing it.And I only have one side done.
 

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pettybludart said:
My biggest PITA job by far was installing a 4 speed trans by myself.That day I over-extended many muscels while holding up the trans and working/moving the floor jack with my leg/foot.After numerous attemps(trans sliding off floor jack)I finally got it it,but had dead arm syndrome.LOL
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Yup that damn 4spd is HEAVY by yourself on a jack stand. Mine almost slipped off the jack and landed on my arm. Was using my leg to jack up the jack in a funky position. After it almost fell I was totally exhausted. I set it down on some blocks of wood, regrouped and came back the next day...... It went right in. Crazy how that works.:banghead:
 
I was installing AN Fittings on my Trans for using PTFE braided line. One of the fittings snapped off and it was not even snug yet. The fitting was defective. So my dumb as says it is not that tight Ill try and EZ out. The EZ out snapped off almost instantly too past FLUSH of the trans just like the fitting.... Holy chit, now I am trippin. I got out the TIG welder and built up the material enough to get a hardened nut over the build up and then filled the threaded area and the build up to the top of the nut with the TIG. Put a wrench on it and the EZ out came right out. Got a small file, filed the fitting in a couple places and it came out too. That was a PITA and scared the chitt out of me. This is a brand new trans for my TT Build. If I could not get it out clean without any debris going in the trans, I would have had to tear it apart to fix it. another.....:banghead::banghead:
 
Have to say it was pulling the trans out of my old Ford Ranger 4x4 with a 302/c4 in it. Had to pull the exhaust out of the truck because the pipes were under the one side of the pan. Pipes were welded, and I did not want to cut them. So it meant having to drop the rear axle to get the pipes out. In order to get to the bell housing bolts I had to tilt the motor, which meant the radiator needed to come out as well as the heater box........which could not be removed unless you pulled the right side valve cover at the same time. Keep in mind that the truck seen A LOT of mud, so this whole precess was a nightmare thanks to all the mud, grit and rocks that no matter what you did you never got them washed off.....
 
pauly v.100 said:
installing a headliner with the glass installed- nuff said.
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I had an old interior guy do mine for $150. He wasn't too happy with me when I went to pick it up. Probably the best $150 I spent that year!!!
 
Replacing the heads on my 84 Ram Charger. not the mechanical part, thats pretty straight forward, its just the height of the truck, stock 4x4 suspension, with 35's on it.

Climbing up and down a stool to do all that stuff, or leaning over on your stomach across the fender or radiator.

How do the mechanics at shops do this, working on all the huge trucks these days?

Replacing the flex plate on my 71 Scamp Slant 6, on the garage floor, no leverage to lift the trans back up. A old friend just happened to stop by, "oh sure i can help" A true friend there.
 
Mad Dart said:
Yup that damn 4spd is HEAVY by yourself on a jack stand. Mine almost slipped off the jack and landed on my arm. Was using my leg to jack up the jack in a funky position. After it almost fell I was totally exhausted. I set it down on some blocks of wood, regrouped and came back the next day...... It went right in. Crazy how that works.:banghead:
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Mine was tough enough just getting out of the car while on my back. Motor is now also out, thinking about putting them back in together.
 
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