Had an Isuzu sedan, started running rough, I could not figure it out. Paid a shop 50 bucks to tell me I had a bad spark plug.....

Thought I'd change spark plugs on my '74 280C. It was a twin cam six with the plugs situated between the two banks.

Broke one off.

Had to be towed and have the (remainder of the) plug drilled out.

Expensive pastime.

__________________
62 220sb
67 250S
72 280SE 4.5
74 280C
77 300D
82 240D
85 190E 2.3
86 300E RIP 12/28/09
85 300SD
92 300D 2.5
00 E320 Current
Over 1,000,000 miles in Benzes, Since66

....and a whole passel of BMW 2002 and Tii

Oh heck, might as well....
'93 Suburban K2500/7.4. Radiator bad so order new one from online place about 300 miles away. $300 I think. Nice day, work out in driveway since truck doesn't fit in garage. Old rad. out, new one in, lotsa stuff in the way so had removed fan. Putting nuts back on water pump studs, tightening them down.
Very hot, red haired, curvy young neighbor lady walks out to her car next door. Bob is somewhat distracted. Wrench slips. Knuckles meet cheese grater, aka radiator. Showing incredible restraint, only made possible by presence of aforementioned red-head, quietly take shredded fingers into kitchen to be washed/counted. Later, come out and button up truck.
Next morning, sweet daughter requests permission to drive truck to school. (all three of my kids started driving on biggest truck I had.) She gets about five miles before she calls me and says, "truck made bad clunking noise and is now steaming on side of road, smells like anti-freeze". Yep, prop met rad. Have truck towed home, order another $300 radiator from even farther away. Pray red-head does NOT make an appearance while I am tightening nuts on fan this time. Still guys, she was worth the bleeding knuckles-maybe not the radiator

Saab 900 no start. It's sitting in the yard. Hook up charger over nite.. Take van to church the next morning, Saab is wrapped around oak tree. Seems I left it in neutral on a gentle slope , it slow rolled 40 feet to drive way, once on drive way it gathered speed a wrecked itself.

My biggest automotive screw up was buying the 85 ford one ton van with 6.9 diesel. It had a cracked block that allowed coolant into the oil when it got good and warm. I put a few thousand miles on it but lost at least 7000 on it when I sold it.

__________________
[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC]

..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis.

The simplest was probably pouring in oil before reinstalling the drain plug. Next was my friend at 2 am forgetting that the coolant system wasn't fully reassembled before pouring in fresh coolant. That was another early morning Walmart run.

Next would probably be not reading up on how to change the belt on a M103. I thought it would be like any other car. Nope. Destroyed the tensioner because I didn't loosen the bolt that compresses the rubber spring. That same night, again at about 2AM (things always take longer than expected, especially when working on an M103) I forgot to tighten the lug bolts when taking it out for a test ride. Got onto the interstate and was wondering why it was shaking so bad. That was the only time I have ever driven the minimum speed on the interstate.

The reason why I was up so late trying to get the car running properly was that the next day I was going on a first date with a girl I had know for a while. It was starting at around 8AM and going all day (her idea, not mine). So in addition to this other work, I made sure the radio was working in the car so we could have something to listen to. My 190D's radio only worked through one speaker and sounded horrible so I never used it much with her and she complained about it when I would drive her home from practice after school. She would instead sing but she sounds like a screeching cat. I really wanted it to work so I didn't have to hear that. When I was going 40 mph down the interstate the night before, it was working. When I got up the next morning and started the car, it was not working. It would turn on but not do anything else, bad head unit. So the date went fine besides having no radio, the belt squealing like hell, and the car almost overheating in traffic making me have to keep the defrost on full with the windows open on a moderate January day (I believe this was down to the chinese fan clutch and the aux fan switch being bad).

After that date, I went out and bought a new head unit and installed it. Awesome? Nope, the antenna decided to stop working the night before we were about to go on a second date. This was due to the mast being bent and the main gear stripping. After that second date, I completely disassembled the antenna to clean it and replace the gear and mast. It worked fine for a couple of weeks, until a few days before another date/get together because one of my friends was back in town after being in Rwanda for the past three years. I took her so she could meet this awesome individual. When I picked her up, I had to sheepishly tell her that the radio was broken again. Last week I finally got the antenna working, I discovered that the control board in the antenna was fried. Fortunately, I had a replacement and it is still working. I told her that I finally got it fixed and her response was, "Okay". My fear for the next date is that the car will all together stop working. It's been starting poorly lately and idles terribly, and keeps on throwing a code for the oxygen sensor, even after I replaced it. Probably a bad ECU or EZL or something of which I have spares. I haven't had any time to sort it out. Also, the tensioner seems to be failing again so there's also that.

Moral of the story is that you will never be able to impress a woman with your old car that continuously has problems that seem to somehow be tied to her. Also the M103 is the worst for anything on the front of it.

__________________
Current: 1975 450SEL, 83 300D, 88 Yugo GVX, 90 300D OM603 swap, 91 F150 4.6 4v swap, 93 190E Sportline LE 3.0L M104 swap, 93 190E Sportline LE Megasquirt, 03 Sprinter, 06 E500 4Matic wagon.

I work with my sons a lot on cars, I told one to install a battery and he put red on neg and black on pos. I had to to check with my wife to confirm he was mine. All it did was blow a big fuse. All was well.

This is my best screw up. Buy 80 300d. Adjust valves, pulled oil hose off oil rad so my big Chinese rachet would fit to turn the steering pump.. Set valves, went driving and killed engine. .. Forgot to reattach oil line. Owned car for 25 days.