Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

The other day i hear a wrattle in my exhaust. I got home and took a look at it. turns out none of the exhaust hangers are attached. Why didnt it wrattle before? zip ties a giant bundle of them.So i hook them up. working my way twards the headers i see a blob of junk on an exhause connection. so of course i pick at it. one little pick and the blob fell off. upon further inspectioni discoveritssome sort ofsealant. Great someone sealed an exhause leak with sealant not a weld. Thanks to me and my curiosity it leaks again. At this point im a little bothered. but its not over yet.
I went and got a new head unit to replace the empty hole. When picking up the harness a green wire falls down. Fallowing this wire to the end i find its not green its black and has a green wire attached to it. Ive got no clue what it does. Now its time to replace the speakers. well the previouse owner didnt remove the dash pad to put speakers in he simply cut a giant hole in it....... So i ordered a new dash pad and walked away for the day.
All and all the truck runs like a champ so im guessing the guy that owned it before didnt touch the engine and thats a blessing.

Anyone else out there have any funny jerry rigging storys?
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RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

Dont get me started. I could go all day long on ghetto wiring that I have seen. Lets just say, Im amazed more cars dont burst into flames!!

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

There's a guy in the dorms where I live that uses bungee cords to hold his doors closed, and a tarp to cover the huge hole in his roof.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

A freind of mine covered his whole car in duct tape to cover the rust.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

I worked at a drag strip for a season and a half and helped out in the Tech Inspection once and you would be surprised how many people take the cheap route with their drag cars. Its almost amazing.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

Some of the non-electircal things i have seen:

car in zanesville as I was growing up covered in green carpet
a piece of plywood as a spoiler (painted silver and black of course)
landscape edging (black blastic) used as body kit
Bill might be able to verify this one - a Pontiac Lumina van converted into a pickup truck (ugly creation for sure) running around in Lancaster

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

With tobacco farmers around here, they will saw the cab off an old scool bus and make itinto a tobacco hauler. I saw one on the road the other day with four lifting blocks on each spring and a big sprayer on the back, they made a highboy sprayer out of it!!!

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

wow hearing some of this makesmy zip tie exhaust not sound so bad.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

found something new to add. I went to install the head unit and couldnt figure out why it wasnt working. refering to my chiltons book i found the old owner removed and changed the factory harnesses wireing. keeping the same plug but changeing the way it was connected. luckely chiltons was able to help me understand the wireing enough to change it back and make it work. thus far the most annoying electrical grimlen ive come acrossed. there will be more im sure. everything i find wrong i am going to redo. that should make things much better.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

Sometimes you just have to make do with what you've got...

I've seen old pimping caddies towing a 5th wheel...
I've loaded a quad on to a 1993 Chevy Lumina Z34
Found out that the same Z34 can tow 3 hay bails (the big round ones) and not die...
My friend duct taped the front bumper of his neon, so it wouldn't fall off...

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

wow a quad on a lumina....... id like to see that one hehe.
ive seen some simaler things.
my dad used sheet metal tape to patch an exhaust leak on his 69 chevelle. the car looked great it was a shame to do that to it. my friend screwed a sheet metal patch to his leaking ford exhaust. of course shortly after he did the motor gave out. nothing could fix that. it crapped out at 85K just one more reason for me to hate fords.

this is the worst one. saw a big cadillac eldo that started its life as a hard top. of course that wouldnt work for this guy. so he cut the roof off and used tent poles and a big blue tarp to make a convertable top. as if that wasnt bad enough he gave it a 5 degree rake. and some nice big rusty side pipes...... this is no joke. it was a rolling abomanation.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

Saw an old Monte Carlo made into a flatbed. A tiny, tiny flatbed.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

The best is when you come across a car with a steel bar welded to the block for a "cheap" but retarded fix to a busted motor mount.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

Watch Pimp My Ride. Those are some wacked out fixes. I remember the one with the kid that had the escort that had the front half of one car and the rear end of another car welded together to make one car. Drywall screws holding in the front bumper. I saw a car on the road the other day. it was an old rickedey Buick that had two doughnuts on it, a plastic sheet for a window, obviously the shocks were shot, no muffler at all, and on the hood were a couple of large fake hood scoops. Oh, and he had an american flag on the antennea. I wanted to pull up in front of him and run his car over with my truck it was so bad.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

hehe so much good stuff.
You should see it over here. Im sure most of you are familiar with the term " Rice" to desribe little stickered up hondas with drag spoilers, apexi fart cans and so on. Well over here there are tons of them. most of them all show and no go. These are the most comminly ghetto fabbed rides. Saw an 80 something accord with Type R badges all over it. It had one wellfare window in the rear. and was dragging his exhaust when he hit a bump. not to mention many dents as well as an unpainted body kit. This is kind of off the subject but i think its funny. The guy driving it thought he'd impress his friends by beating me out on a merging lane. I was driving a barrowed ford explorer ( i felt dirty driving it ). Its a terrable truck, when you floor it it sounds like someone is gargleing listerine under the hood. basicly a rolling circus mobile. Long story short i stompped him. and oh was he mad. pulled up next to me flipping me off and yelling. Thats a game i love to play so i yelled back. Told him that his dang Type R badges dont add any horses. and laughed because he got stommped by a truck that barrely runs. so yeah off the subject but i had to share it with someone.
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RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

okay, The other day I saw a 2 door caprice that had t-tops cut into it... they definitely werent stock.... if that doesnt take the cake, they ahad made a spoiler out of 2x4's and not painted them... just screwed them onto the trunk lid. .

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

Wow that poor caprice, now that's just wrong.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

I saw that one too. They deemed it 'unpimpable' and bought the kid a new Scion Box.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

Saw an older Accord dragging the sides of his body kit on the ground while driving, double sided sticky tape didn't hold.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

1968 chevy C-10 Pickup....hydraulic "hay bale stabbers" made of random long heavy duty pieces of welded together steel, coming to sharp points....pointing out the rear of the bed ...could impale a vehicle and lift it up in the air. The controls for this....cut into the floorboard and sealed with a gallon or so of CAULK. On the sheet metal, large steel springs and pieces of heavy duty scrap metal welded all over the sides of the truck as "tool holders" with tools stuck inside them...like hammers. Chicken wire streched across the front of the truck and around to the fenders and welded. Just CAULK... lots and lots of CAULK. And DENTS...lots of dents too. And rust...very sad. Yay for Texas.

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

OMG dude I remember that thing! It was an early 70's Pontiac Tempest! Had green indoor/outdoor carpet covering the entire car!...LOL
Here's one for ya Pat.....Downtown Zanesville...there's a guy that practically lives at the Imperial Bar (herbies "hog" house..lol) he has a huge mid-seventies Olds. ninety-eight. He spray bombed it with that awful "silver" paint, and I mean all kinds of overspray on the windows and ****......and made all kinds of "spoilers" and such out of aluminum foil!......even put some sticking out of the hub caps like some Mad-Max ****.......LMFAO!

RE: Why must people jerry rig cars?
 

Hmmm seen a early 90s Pontiac 6000 with 2x2 wood for body skirts,and a 78-79 Lemon yellow Ford Fairmont wagon lowered by cut springs n 4 mini spares for the oh so awesome scraping ground effect and Duct tape racing stripes[&o]