Top 5 worst "repairs"- add your favorites!

[NiftySVX]

These are some of my favorite things I have seen people do to SVXs (and others, as well)

1. Stop leak.

Stop leak works. It stops fluid flow. It stops fluid flow in small passages, it stops fluid flow in valve bodies, in vane pumps, and in coolers. Also, it destroys water pumps, and is impossible to clean out of radiators, transmission coolers, and power steering coolers. NEVER, EVER use stop leak.

2. Retrofitting a R-12 system to 134a. Always a bad decision.

This works for awhile, but the refrigerants work at different pressures so it will never cool as well as it is supposed to, because the R-12 compressor is not designed to run the pressures that are optimal for 134a. The oil carried by 134a and freon are not compatible and attack each other, the hoses, and o-rings. Also the desiccant which dries the refrigerant is different from 134 to 12. If it was as simple as using the different refrigerant, the engineers would not have wasted their time using different expansion valves and compressors.

3. Non oem spark plugs in a japanese vehicle

I have had many cars brought to me with misfires because the owner "upgraded" to bosch 4 ground double throwdown-whooptie-do plugs. It's also fun to pull those out and find one or more of those grounds missing, because everyone likes their combustion parts to double as metal grinding machines.

4. Non-oem air filters.

These are such a gimmick. Okay, everyone has seen the thing at autozone with the ping pong ball. Yes, an aftermarket air filter flows way more air than the stock one, like I bet one for an SVX would flow 1.5 times the air of the stock one. However, the stock air filter already flows way more air than the throttle bodies so.... yeah. Don't see the point. Also, for the best efficiency, your air needs to be as cool as possible, so removing the box, (which serves the purpose of drawing cooler air from outside the engine compartment) to replace it with a cone air filter makes you loose power. Now you're getting hotter air, and as explained earlier you're not getting any more air. If you want to get more air in your engine, you need to force it into the thing.

5. Butchering wheel bearings

The wheel bearings are very sensitive in this car. Don't press them in. Use a hubster, and pack them by hand. Also, commonly overlooked is the sealing surface on the axle cup. If it has a groove, it must be replaced or care must be taken to ensure that the seal lip rides on a different part of the machined surface or the seal will allow contaminates to enter the sealed bearing area and destroy it. Also, Torque the axle nut, and do it with the wheel on the ground.

[Crazy_pilot]

Tire sealant.

Coming from my job as a tire monkey, this stuff is the bane of my existence. You don't need to load your tire up with a gallon of the crap because it lost 5 PSI overnight, and you're too damn lazy/stupid to dig the spare out of your overstuffed trunk and install that. I keep hearing it's non-toxic, but the reeking stink of ammonia and the instant headache I get from it says otherwise. Oh, and the fact that it takes me 5 times as long to repair the tire in the end, because I have to spend a pile of time cleaning and drying it out.

[SoCal LS-L]

+1 on the stop leak...... but hey..... I never would have done my timing belt if I didnt shred my waterpump first

+1 on the spark plugs, I find it humorous to pay upwards of $20 a plug for ultra-capacitor super-charged double-conductor pulse-starry gizmotrons that allow your coils to do what they did with regular plugs..... spark.

+1 on the R12 to 134A hack..... but backwoods A/C shops have to make a quick buck somewhere.... what better way than hack-jobbing the ignorant and misinformed?

I feel lucky that I myself was only dumb enough to use stop leak and shred my waterpump..... even IF that WAS the dumbest hahaha

EDIT: OHH WAIT, I thought of one ive seen recently!

Cooling system cleaner: "Help rid your cooling system of the tiny amount of deposits you couldnt get with just water and cycle OUR Ultra-Detergent through your cooling system. Flush all you want, our patented formula stays behind long after your attempted flush is done, eating away at your seals, hoses, even your head gasket!! Its harmful triple action will insure more of those weekends spent enjoying knuckle-busting grease diving and loudly shouting expletives! Its fun for the whole family!!

[NiftySVX]

Haha yes, Tire slime. That's a form of stop leak! Falls under #1

[1986nate]

Been using stop leak in our Durango power steering for well over a year with no problems what-so-ever... Just sayin...

[y2daniel1981]

Im not a big fan of stop leak. It has saved me in some jams, but ended up causing more trouble in the future.

As for "high flow air filters" they are good if your stock filter is a restriction and replacing the box with a cone filter will gain you some low end grunt but you'll loose top end power and in a car with good torque anyway and awd i'd go for top end with a cold air intake You could always just add a heat shield to the cone filter but still wont save you as much as a true CAI.

Some cars can benefit from different plugs, but i think i agree with you that they arent the best on a japanese car. I once used some different plugs in my turbo mazda and ended up smashing the plug eventually and almost ruined the head.

I also once used some "high performance" wires and they didnt fit securly enough on the coil and i ended up with a rusted out coil causing misfires.

[Hondasucks]

win/lose, tight/loose

R134a conversions work when they are DONE PROPERLY, meaning replacing the O-rings and receiver-dryer, and gettting the R-12 oil out of the compressor, if it is the type that has an oil reservoir in it. I've converted 4 or 5 of my cars over, and I have yet to have any problems.

I like all the chemicals and stuff they sell to make your engine stop smoking, or your whatever stop leaking, etc... It doesn't make the problem go away, it just delays it. Fixing it properly is always better.

[SoCal LS-L]

Originally Posted by 1986nate

Been using stop leak in our Durango power steering for well over a year with no problems what-so-ever... Just sayin...

I think it was meant more for the cooling system crap.

[Landshark]

Originally Posted by NiftySVX

4. Non-oem air filters.

These are such a gimmick. Okay, everyone has seen the thing at autozone with the ping pong ball. Yes, an aftermarket air filter flows way more air than the stock one, like I bet one for an SVX would flow 1.5 times the air of the stock one. However, the stock air filter already flows way more air than the throttle bodies so.... yeah. Don't see the point. Also, for the best efficiency, your air needs to be as cool as possible, so removing the box, (which serves the purpose of drawing cooler air from outside the engine compartment) to replace it with a cone air filter makes you loose power. Now you're getting hotter air, and as explained earlier you're not getting any more air. If you want to get more air in your engine, you need to force it into the thing.

I agree with K&N gauze/oil crap filters, but i got a Perrin foam panel filter (free with a purchase i made), and it works well. supposedly filters as good as paper, and the "oil" is more of a grease - way too thick to fly off and foul the MAF sensor.

plus, i clean it off, and its reuseable.

[Green1995SVX]

Originally Posted by Hondasucks

win/lose, tight/loose

Thank you.

[YourConfused]

rear diff repair bushing repair:

[svxistentialist]

Improperly tightened wheel rims at tyre centres.


This one winds me up every time.

When you get new tyres or wheels balanced the so-called experts in every fitting centre I use will tighten up your wheels onto the car using the air spanner in a clockwise fashion, 1 -2 -3 -4 -5.

This is a surefire recipe for shaking wheels than can be badly vibrational at certain road speeds.

The correct method is to tighten them diagonally. This is in part because on the SVX we use bolts, and these also secure the full weight of the disc brake and bell. If you tighten them hard [air spanner, anyone?] on studs 1 and 2 and it happens to be eccentric or off axis if you prefer, the other three studs will be unable to re-position all that mass back in the centre; result, wheel shake when driving.

For any that are interested in the correct method, and probably removing all that wheel shake which you thought was bad balance or bent rims, the following is the procedure:-

With the wheel in the air, hand tighten all studs in the sequence 1 -3 -5 -2 -4. Go over them twice, same sequence. With the wheel on the ground fully tighten in the same sequence, the OEM recommended torque value is 70 to 80 lbs.

I've given up telling them how to do it; these days I just bring the car home, jack it up and do it properly. They seem to resent being told how to do their jobs, they're the professionals and the experts. Yeah, right! Monkeys in boiler suits.

Joe

[dcarrb]

Originally Posted by Hondasucks

R134a conversions work when they are DONE PROPERLY, meaning replacing the O-rings and receiver-dryer, and gettting the R-12 oil out of the compressor, if it is the type that has an oil reservoir in it. I've converted 4 or 5 of my cars over, and I have yet to have any problems.

Both of my cars have been running R-134A (the teal for several years) without issue. The air these things put out is so cold it becomes uncomfortable on my hands. Maybe the #1 "worst repair" should be:

ANYTHING BADLY DONE.

Flushes of any description would be on my list of automotive services nobody needs.

dcb

[Mike621]

I agree with most of the bodges that have been already posted, but they are all fairly easy to fix, minus the stop leaks... I hate that stuff!

I will say that the worst repairs we encounter are cases of poorly-done bodywork! Bondo, rivets, spray cans, etc are seen on cars throughout urban NJ (Newark, East Orange, Jersey City, etc).

[subbieatnz]

1. Stop leak.

Stop leak works. It stops fluid flow. It stops fluid flow in small passages, it stops fluid flow in valve bodies, in vane pumps, and in coolers. Also, it destroys water pumps, and is impossible to clean out of radiators, transmission coolers, and power steering coolers. NEVER, EVER use stop leak.

How do you clean out stop leak from your cooling system?
I had to use it in a emergacy to get my other car home once