Best "jerry-rig"
 

Ok guys, at some point in time, for whatever reason, we've all wanted to either; get out on the water & didn't have what we needed, needed to make a quick fix, just wanted to save money, etc....................

So what was the best "jerry-rig" we've all come up with done ?

This is just for fun, so multiple listings ok.

Re: Best "jerry-rig"
 

Wow, I mean come up with, or done.....time for another cup of coffee !

back in the "jet-ski" days i had a carb bolt shear off and the carb was hanging by one bolt......i siliconed and zip-tied the thing back together and it lasted me the rest of the day! :D I was quite proud of that one! :D

Its amazing what you can think of when faced with a dilema! I once used a piston ring that i broke into two pieces to open the cable box outside a buddy's house so we can watch a fight that night! :D :D

i have a million of these stories! :D

Oh lets see.........
Bypassed a starter slave solenoid a few
times

Tie strapped open a non functional
corsa solenoid.

Bypassed open trim limit wire harness

Broke a shift cable on L/H drive,
pulled the drive, manually shifted it into
fwd gear, installed the drive, manuevered
around the docks with R/H engine.

I'll think of more as the day goes by.

That's cool..............one related to the boat:

I decided to put small blocks in a 31 scarab hull, where big blocks once resided. Everything went fine, but when I wne to connect the exhaust, I had Stainless marine manifolds. Anyways, it was about 4 inches low, anyways, we cut the manifold & welded an extension between the flange and riser (but didn't put a water jacket around it - you know had to get it done ASAP).

Anyways when we first took out the boat, we ran it, it ran great................ So my friend said crack the hatch, lets check out everything at 6000 rpms..........CHIT, they were glowing !

Anyways, I threw on some header wrap, but I still need to "jacket them" Actually, I'm tinkin of just building a set of full dry pipes.we'll see.

Another one............needed a circ pump on a sunday (of course)......bolted up an auto pump, but one of the hoses was a bit big...................well, lets just say a bunch of duct tape and a few hose clamps couldn't fix !

Tied up to a 36ish formula one year....nextthing ya know his swim platform is starting to go under water! Pop the hatch to find water up to the middle of the crank pullys!!! He flips the bilge pumps and nothing!! we can see water rushing in from one of the thru-hull water pickups....i grab a plastic bag from one of the subway sandwich bags and dive in the water and stop the leak....now we try and figure out why bilges dont work....turns out he says they have been broke for a while and he hasnt had time to fix em!!! :mad: So i disconnect his water pickup for his A/C unit and tell him to turn on the air....he gives me this look of "your crazy" and goes and does it......bout an hour later the waters down enough to start the engines up to charge the batts...luck for him he had a jumper box on board too!!! The guy limped home on one engine.....but the cabin was nice and cold! :D :D LOL

Velcro is a wonderful tool..............A trim piece fell off a boat, and I saw a guys struggling with it, so I gave him a couple pieces of velcro - one to stick on the trim piece (which was padded, and the screws came from behind), and one to stick on the side of the boat...............4 years later, it's srill there.......VELCRO, the alternative to duct tape !

I had a motor mount fall out of one my 500EFI's. The only thing I had on board was lunch, so I took out a hot dog stuffed it in the mount hole, secured it with a pretzel on either end and ran for the rest of the day. Best part is that the hot dog tasted good too!!!

Grenaded a rear u-joint street racing years ago. Had a buddy who was a farmer and always carried baling wire and pliers everywhere he went. Between the wire and a half roll of duct tape I was able to limp home at 10mph.

It was clunking as you drove, wasn't it ? LOL

One time I had a water pump that sprung a leak. The casting was bad and the only thing keeping it from leaking for 10 years was the paint on it. I had no time to fix it so I found a small screw and drove it in with some teflon tape. It worked for the rest of the season. Made a test light with a brake light bulb, some tape and some wire. Jumped the bad drive switch to the trim switch and got home. Now the real fixes come from snowmobiling. I have had to tear down an engine, break the siezed piston out, file the cylinder smooth, use what rings i had left and got home....slow. Used zip ties to stitch the hood together. Used a battery terminal to clamp a wheel on. I even welded a light piece of metal with wire and a battery, that was scarry as I was shocked more than once but the weld held and I was saved. One time I made a battery out of coconuts and turned my radio into a CB radio, then I .....oh thats right that was Gilligans Island.:D

Damn Mitch, I don't know what to say...but this comes to mind:D :D

Yah, shook the car like hell, kept it under 10mph. One of the guys had a police scanner and apparently they were on the way. Ended up replacing the pinion yoke but that was cheaper than another drag racing ticket!

Gone, but not forgotten....
 

My Uncle Henry (T-hen)- taught me (T-Ron) how to smoke, curse, etc., and was a poor Cajun farmer from central Louisiana. He could make tractor parts, etc. and had years of experience at improvising. After my Aunt Mary passed away, he met a widow lady that had big bucks. He went from a 1950's Ford truck to a 500 series Mercedes (with color coordinated Armani suits, etc.).

When the Mercedes was about a year out of warranty, a power steering line started leaking at the crimp collar. He took it to the dealership and was quoted $330.00, which he could not justify- knowing he could replace the hose for about $50.00. He went into the garage and started looking around. He cut the 'big' end off of a lawn mower engine and used it to compress the crimp- and fixed the leak.

The best part of this story is that he later went back to the dealership and showed this to the service advisor. He then advised they buy some old lawnmowers, and save their customers some money!

Bulldog aka Ronnie (T-Ron)

PS- the T means 'little' in Cajun. And Henry's dog was T-boy, or just T.

:)

We were driving a friends Mustang one night and the fuel pump takes a dump. Well we're about 10 miles from home so we pull the washer hose off of the hood and clamp it on the fuel inlet for the carb. Then we empty the washer bag and siphon some fuel into a gas can(everybody I knew had a gas can in the car:D ). Fill the washer bag with gas and drive home pushing the washer button every 10-15 seconds to put a little more fuel in the bowl. I think the next day all the washer components were melted from the gas-but we didn't have to walk:cool: .

Hmm have to keep the ws washer trick in mind. May add wipers to the boat!

Abbott Drive and Dodge Street bring back some fond memories:D :D :D

On the way to the ramp one morning, the truck quits like it just ran out of gas. I had just filled up the right tank a few miles back though. Turns out the tank switching valve had broke and was drawing from the left tank no matter what position the switck on the dash was in. Problem was the left tank was now empty, and the right was full. I took an ink pen (the kind you could take both ends out and make a good spit ball tube from) and bypassed the valve using the tube to connect the rubber hose from the right tank to the hose to the fuel pump.

Lunch
 

I know this cause I was at lunch one day w/ 4 people in the car, and I had a shift kit in a 1983 cordoba that I tweaked.........yep, vinyl top, turbine hub caps & of course a cherry bomb. Anyways, it shifted fo effin hard, (of course I had to tune it to the competition shift for my everyday driver) it would alwyas bark the tires. Well, let's just say there was one of those shift too many - busted a u-joint cap...............went to the hardware store got some duct tape, taped her up, and drove 15 miles home - - -I could go 15 or so, I still had one of the ujont caps....but man it rattled my teeth all the way !

Griff, occasionally, there are still some $$$ races held down there usually on Sat. nights. We'll run about 5 quick races and get the hell outta there to settle up elsewhere!

Throttle Rigging . . . Airplane
 

Had to get a twin engine airplane to another airport for repair of the right engine throttle cable which was broken. My bright idea, run a wire from the cockpit out through the window into the cowling to the throttle, install a spring for the return. No problem.

Started the engines, taxied to the run way and took off. Once at altitude, leveled off and realized that the wind resistance on the small wire wouldn't let the throttle spring close the throttle. We were running at full throttle with no way to pull the throttle back. Oops! ! !

I started a steep climb to reduce the airspeed and the spring started to work, throttle was reduced and leveled off. The rest of the trip was uneventful, but those several minutes were extremely nerve racking!!!!

I had my dad's old 1958 19 foot Squallking out with a couple buddies of mine. Damn thing must have weighed 4 tons. Pulling out of the boat launch, the tongue of the trailer broke. Being as how three of us had to pool our money to buy $5 in gas, calling a welder was out of the question. I rumaged around on the side of the road and found an old 2x4. We jacked up the tongue at the break, put the 2x4 next to it, took the anchor line and run it around and around the 2x4 and the tongue and made us a "splint" for it.:) Got us home.

One of my old Snap On tool trucks had a Detriot 8.2 diesel. These motors had thier share of weird problems:eek:

one day the motor just quit. after checking everything out, I found antifreeze in the fuel tank. Drained the tank and all was well for a couple of weeks them I found more antifreeze in the fuel filters.What turned out to be the problem was the injectors passed through a coolant passage in the head and the injector tubes were leaking, the antifreeze was making its way into the fuel tank through the return line :mad: this was a rather expensive fix with downtime of the truck and all so I kinda put it off and would replace fuel filters twice a week!.....well one day, my busiest day, I forgot to change filters and the truck sputtered and was about to stall, I was close to a truck stop and pulled in, drained the radiator:mad: and filled the radiator with diesel fuel! no more swapping fluids, the diesel in the radiator would make its way to the tank and vice versa:D

This truck ran diesel in the radiator for 4 more years, never had to put a waterpump after that ( great lube) but the hoses needed to be replaced every 6 months. I eventually traded her in:rolleyes: I would have liked to have been a fly on the wall when that mess was discovered!:D

Biggus......never mind....... :p :rolleyes:

Walt Disney woulda' been real proud of me:D I`ve been Mickey Mousin' stuff for a long time!

When I was 8 yrs old, I had a Honda QA50. Remember them little things? Well, mine was constantly in use and for some reason this thing ate throttle cables like mad,any way after messing around too many times with new t-cables, I just yanked the broken cable to the WFO position and utilized the kill button as my throttle:eek: Prettty good engineering for an 8 yr old huh?
....fire her up, knock her into gear/wheelie and away you`d go! Slow down???hit the kill button:D This rather simple modification worked perfectly for a couple years. One day, I had ventured down the tracks a little too far from home and ran into a group of punks getting stoned at a bridge. One punk pulled a knife on me and stole my prized QA50:mad: .....What happened next I will remember to the day I die:D He fired the monster up and it took off WIDE OPEN and I think I forgot to mention the the brakes were my Keds;) The dickhead went flying down the tracks and it shot him off, over the bars and them drove him into the ground like a tent peg:D ....I ran over, grabbed by bike (those things would take/give a beating) and took off down the trail:cool: It worked good for me!

I`d run into that jerk every now and them but he never f`ked with me again.

Kurt.

I was 18 and had a 79 Corvette. I was at a stop sign about 1/2 mile away from home. I floored it spun the tires broke a yoke the right side of the car bottomed out. I ran home grabbed a floor jack and placed under right side of car and drove home. When I got home the wheels on my Dad's jack were worn away.

In my first years as a seating engineer at Ford Motor in Dearborn we were on a ride evaluation ( had to test our designs right??)

a summer intern had the responsibility to organize the ride. we had about 8 brand new explorers ( first year of production) some were executives' cars.

Ford has this road in dearborn that they pay the city to leave rough and pothollie ( urband legend maybe) but used everyday by ford testing.

so we are making high speed passes on this road recording data with our calibrated butts and my buddy gets the idea to venture off the road a little into the muck. well, the next guy goes deeper, and so on. then my buddy pulls up to this huge bog ( well deep mud puddle) and inches forward with a $hitty grin:D
i wave two findgers frantically as I pass trying to indicate his vehicle only has 2 wheel drive. too late. he hammers it, and is sunk.

Did I mention we ALL are in full suits with wingtip shoes :rolleyes:
we take our shoes off, find a piece of conduit and back my truck up to his bumper. align the two bumpers and slide the conduit down the two 2" trailer ball holes on the bumpers. (his truck is sitting a little lower than mine) we pull till the conduit bends at each hole and pull him out.

the poor intern had to get all the trucks washed and back to the pilot plant and to the exectuives. we had to rinse our feet in the office bathrooms and promise not to say anything

oh, same intern backed one of the executives exploreres into a pole in the underground parking that day. bad day for him.

the good ol days.

:D :D :D
Just think, if you had a pretzel rod, you could still be running on it!
:D :D :D

Funny story. Someone mentioned in one of there post a windshield washer that used a bag instead of the standard bottle. I hate to admit it but:

I had a Fiat with one of these. The car came with a spare one that was unused. Of course since I was in high school I came up with a brilliant idea. What if I wired this one up as well and plumbed it below the dash??? With a toggle switch I could have liqueur on demand!!!!!! I filled it with peach schnapps and it worked like a charm. Press the button, get a shot, and no cop would ever find it! I was a god at school for a while. Well when I parked the car on a hill at a football game, I learned the lesson of a siphon. A whole bottle of peach schnapps was on the floor of my car. The smell never really came out. ;)

I built a complete 40' Skater out of JB Weld. Called it the Sorcerer. Wonder what ever happened to that boat?

My first boat was a 14ft rowboat with a 6hp Brittish Seagull outboard. the boat had three benches for seats, the middle bench had a big comfortable seat from a John Deere tractor bolted to it. When I was out trolling I wanted to sit in the middle seat becasue it was more comfotable and made the boat ride better. So to extend my controls, I duct tapped a few old broom handles to the tiller arm and wired a few coat hangers together and looped one end around the throttle lever:rolleyes:

Man was it a sight for sore eyes:D

My first boat had a piece of conduit over the tiller arm so I could sit in the middle too. Got a few extra mph out of her with the 5hp Sears.

I once used a purple magic marker to put the letters on my boat. Had to go the lake right now! Couldn't take 5 minutes to go into Wal*Mart and buy some.

melted a shift cable.

madea my buddy jump in the engine bay and i yelled at him when it was time to shift while docking :D

Was his name Jerry by chance? :p

i only wish!

Had a small boat with a lot of pin holes in the bottom. I rigged the plug so I could pull it from the inside. Everytime I stopped to fish, I put the plug in. Everytime I got on plane, I pulled the plug out and drained the water.

Always wanted a gokart. My parents told me if I could build one and buy everything myself, OK. By the end of the day I talked to a kid down the street who had an old frame and 4 bald tires, no brakes. Go that very cheap. Then my neighbor way throwing out a gas powered weed whacker. It wasn't very strong but had a built in clutch. Two days later, I found a chain and sprocket to fit it. I used plywood and 2x4 to mount the motor. Had no 2 stroke oil... mixed motor oil with gas (a little of this, a little of that.) I had to push that thing to get going but on flat ground it got up to about 25 mph!

I was the happiest kid alive. My parents on the other hand knew they were in for a life of H*LL as I never quite got out of the motor phase.

We were on Block Island a few years ago in a 30 Scarab Panther when both bolts on the Port seapump sheared off (motor had been rebuilt recently and looks like crappy grade 2 bolts had been put in). If you've ever been to Block, there isn't much there in the way of parts etc... Ended up borrowing a drill from some nice old Lady in town. Drilled out one of the bolts Had one "easy out" with us which we proceded to snap off in one of the broken bolts. Got the other out using a punch and a hammer. Couldn't find any new bolts on the island, so ended up using a bolt pulled off somewhere else on the motor (oil cooler maybe - can't remember) and ran home to CT with one bolt in the seapump..... A hole beautiful day on Block spent in greasy bildge....but it got us home.

:eek:

Iowa's finest :D

When I was about 8 yrs old my cousin and I pulled his olders brothers derby (soap box?) car out of the garage. It was a very cool one. Wooden frame with sheet metal skin over it, painted flames. We would coast it down the hill to their barn, then it would take us half an hour to push it back up the hill, but very worth it. Well one day we crashed, broke off a rear wheel. This was not good. We did not want the older brother to find out. so we put it away, with it kind propped together. This was ok, but we couldn't leave it alone. I don't remeber if it was me or my cousin that developed our next plan of action, but it got us back on the road, and deeper into trouble.
We found a skate board that also belonged to his brother and sat what was left the axle on it. It worked beautiful as long as someone was standing on tha skateboard to keep it straight, wich could get a little tricky. Everthing was good untill we crashed the coaster car into the older brother's 54 chevy that he had just painted. Crunched thefront of his coaster and dented up the passenger door of his car all at the same time. So we did what any kid would do. We ran like hell! Of course everybody knew who did it. We got in more trouble for trying to lie our way out of it than all the damage we caused.