Lost Tools In Car
Race Director
Joined: Jan 2006
Posts: 10,554
Likes: 33
From: Not on either liberal coast.
I've lost tools, fasteners and everything else into the bowels of various cars. Sometimes they rattle, sometimes they don't. I've also found a few tools in cars that the previous owner decided to leave.
Personally, I won't leave anything unaccounted for. A metal tool or anything else metal, left to bounce around near anything electric is a potential disaster. What if it drops out while you're driving down the road and damages or injures someone behind you?
I go after whatever it is...
Personally, I won't leave anything unaccounted for. A metal tool or anything else metal, left to bounce around near anything electric is a potential disaster. What if it drops out while you're driving down the road and damages or injures someone behind you?
I go after whatever it is...
Le Mans Master
Joined: Mar 2002
Posts: 8,466
Likes: 51
St. Jude Donor '17
Tech Contributor
Joined: Dec 2006
Posts: 10,962
Likes: 29
From: Van Buren Arkansas
Wounded Warrior Escort '11
I lost a socket in there somewhere when I had the heads off a few years ago. First trip out with it back together, heard a clunk and saw it fly out from underneath and onto the side of the freeway. Sure glad it went off to the side and not someone's windshield and no, I couldn't stop to go fetch it.
Safety Car
Joined: Dec 2004
Posts: 3,730
Likes: 217
From: Arizona AZ
My cousin just pulled the head off his wife's Saturn and found a 10MM Snap On socket. So it must happen even in the factory. I wish GM employees would lose cash between the seats. It's easier to find.
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Le Mans Master
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 8,352
Likes: 102
From: In the pit, trying to love someone.
Hahaha one time I lost a small 10mm wrench when I had my Camaro SS. One day I was working on it, and I pulled the intake manifold of and son of a bitch, there was my wrench right where I left it almost a year before! Right on the valley cover, under the intake.
Burning Brakes
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 1,152
Likes: 3
From: Hawaii
When I picked up my car last week my mechanic told me he dropped a (Snap-on) wrench in the bowels on my engine bay. Try as he may couldn't find it. If I heard some noise as it hit the street when I drove out, that was it and not to worry. I drove off and four blocks later I heard it drop out as I drove pass a construction site. (A cop was directing traffic around a construction crane where it fell.) I swung around the block, parked and explained the situation to the cop. We searched for the wrench and couldn't find it We asked the construction/crane crew if they saw it. NOPE!!! Yeah, sure! Somebody scored.
Le Mans Master
Joined: Jul 2005
Posts: 7,121
Likes: 3
From: Shreveport/Bossier Louisiana
St. Jude Donor '08
Ive actually left a wrench on one of the sway bar end link nuts for months and when I went back to replace the rotors It was still there. I was wondering where the hell that wrench was. haha
Race Director
Joined: Oct 2004
Posts: 18,401
Likes: 3
From: Retired but working
Cruise-In VI Veteran
Ever wonder where those spark plugs laying in the road come from?
Just pick the car up and give it a good shake. The tools will fall out.
Stilllooking for the magnet I lost trying to find a 10 mm socket I lost a couple of minutes before..
Just pick the car up and give it a good shake. The tools will fall out.
Stilllooking for the magnet I lost trying to find a 10 mm socket I lost a couple of minutes before..
Racer
Joined: Dec 2004
Posts: 455
Likes: 11
From: Clovis CA
with my windshield replacement business, i learned to keep several 10mm spares due to there being several places to lose them!! primarily in freightliner rigs.
i've done suspension stuff, taken the car for a drive, returned to double check fasteners and voila---there would be the tool i was just using prior to my test drive. made checking things easier.....:o
i've done suspension stuff, taken the car for a drive, returned to double check fasteners and voila---there would be the tool i was just using prior to my test drive. made checking things easier.....:o
Le Mans Master
Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 5,187
Likes: 6
From: Oakville Ontario,Canada
I dropped a socket into the tube putting in my Hurst shifter... I stared at it for 10 minutes debating if I should even bother... I then grabbed a coat hanger and wrapped some of my kids silly putty on the end and stabbed at it until it stuck.. Silly putty is now in my toolbox
Burning Brakes
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 774
Likes: 2
From: Syracuse NY
In a former life I was on submarines. After work in the shipyard and the crew doing a heavy-duty cleanup; we'd go out to sea and do "angles & dangles". Basically severe up and down angles to flush out the tools, pieces and parts left behind by the craft. You wouldn't believe how much stuff would be falling out of the overhead...watch your head and get to the good stuff before someone else does!