Accidents you have experienced...

Steve Plucker

Steve Plucker

BANNED
Here, I am not refering to crashes, roll-overs, ect...we all know those are trully accidents.

What I would like to know what other "types" of accidents have occured to your's or someone elses Model A/AA that you know.

Here is mine:

Just purchased a Feb. 1929, mostly all original, Tudor Sedan and felt real good about it (you know the feeling). I was showing the car to my brother and when I was not looking, he got into the car's drivers side.

When he got out, something on his clothing snagged the seat's back facing and ripped it...a 2 x 2 "L" shape rip...needless to say my heart sank as that was one of the reasons I bought the car for the upholstery.

One bummed guy (me) needless to say.

Pluck
 
:(Pluck, many years ago several friends were helping me assemble my freshly painted 30 ccpu. One well meaning Buddy home on leave grabbed a jack stand (upside down) the pedestal of course slipped out of the tube crashing on the just mounted left rear fender. I think he was more devastated then me.
 
One of my kids shoved my Tudor front passenger seat forward to get out and snagged it on the e-brake lever, causing a six-inch rip, which it still has, five years later.

Another kid tried to throw a scooter into the back seat, causing a couple of pretty big paint gouges around the window.

I won't even talk abouit what happens to hood louvers when you leave the hood sitting on the garage floor near kids and their bikes for more than a few hours.
 
My son jumped into the passenger seat with something in his hand. It scraped a twelve inch gash across the dash. The gash is still there and I don't know how to fix it.

It's times like this that you find out if you have a weak heart or not.
 
does a near miss count? It was in 1963 and I had just brought my 28 sport coupe from the shop with a completely new top and upholstery.... As a neighbor kid climbed into the rumble, I looked down and in a quick second grabbed the screwdriver (blade up!) out of his back pocket. whew.
 
Many-MANY years ago my buddy set an open grape flavored Nehi (tall bottles back then) in the package tray of his Dad's '31 roadster. It was a summer day and the top was down.I am an expert witness to the fact that grape Nehi is impossible to remove from a canvas top. My bud's remedy was to put on the top boot.We were sure to use ALL of the snaps. I guess that I was guilty by association, however,my friend didn't rat me out when the custom "dye job" was discovered. I never rode in that car again but I DID keep my distance from his Dad (no questions-no lies). The roadster is long gone but his Dad is still around--I think I'll go to see him. I'm sure the statute of limitations concerning this type of careless action committed by teenage boys has expired by now.
 
The first time I took my PU to work last year, I went to DQ for lunch. Usual thing to do when leaving was to fill up the soda cup and take it with. Not really taking into account that driving a Model A with an open drink (even with a snap lid on) is quite different than in a modern car, with AT, power steering, cup holders, etc. Short story is that after dumping the soda on the seat -- and myself, my PU now has one of the cup holders advertised in the Restorer.
 
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Jeff/Illinois said:
In about 1972 when I had the '29 Tudor and was dating a gal, her little brother (about 4 years old) decided that the front fender looked like something fun to slide down. I caught him on the first 'trip'. Later one day I had the hood up and he decided to climb up on the other side and grab the hood,,,left a big gouge on top of the fuel tank.

Dang.

If that wasn't enough about a month later I was out to see her and I kept hearing this 'clink-clink-clink'. What IS that? It's coming from the 'A'. We walked over to the car to catch him with a big screwdriver tapping the right rear fender as hard as he could and was making divits in the paint job.

When I grabbed him and exclaimed 'you little sh-t' his mother overheard and I of all people got chewed out for 'scaring him.'

The Model A didn't go around THAT house again for many years!
Click to expand...

Another excellent reason for birth control...
 
Driving my less than a week-old restored '31 Pickup home from the 2003 Dearborn MARC meet, I started to smell the strong odor of gas. Just as it started to get bad someone pulled up alongside and said "you're leaking something."

The solid gas line on the indented firewall had snapped off right at the fitting. Somehow enough gas was getting into the line to keep the engine running just fine at 40mph. It also dumped quite a bit over the firewall, out the hood and onto the fender and splash apron all of which has left a mark.

Some rubber hose was later put in the middle of the line to take the stress off of it.
-Tim

DSCN0324.jpg
 
WTSHNN said:
Driving my less than a week-old restored '31 Pickup home from the 2003 Dearborn MARC meet, I started to smell the strong odor of gas. Just as it started to get bad someone pulled up alongside and said "you're leaking something."

The solid gas line on the indented firewall had snapped off right at the fitting. Somehow enough gas was getting into the line to keep the engine running just fine at 40mph. It also dumped quite a bit over the firewall, out the hood and onto the fender and splash apron all of which has left a mark.

Some rubber hose was later put in the middle of the line to take the stress off of it.
-Tim

DSCN0324.jpg
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But I gotta ask: What caused the big dent?
 
I was in the process of removing the steering gear from my coupe and made a bonehead move. Everything was loose and the floorboards were out. I grabbed the steering wheel with my right hand and with my left got hold of the tube by the gas rods. I had just cleared the door when the thing slipped out of my oily left hand. The gear swung in an arc right into the left rear fender and left a large dent.:mad:
 
I was backing out of my barn for the first time this year...a barn that I have backed the Coupe out HUNDREDS of time in the past. Somehow I scraped the front drivers side fender against the side wall of the barn and tore it all up. Thank God for JC Taylor. Everything was fixed within a week and it didn't cost me a dime.
 
This didn't happen to me, but it is a classic. A club member was backing his A out of the garage; he felt some resistance but ignored it. What was happening was the rope that had secured the tarp over his 1930's gas pump had caught on his bumper. He continued backing out until he had pulled the pump over onto his hood and fender. Another club member commemorated the event with this limerick:

John, could you be such a chump?
You anchored your A to your pump!
It fell on your hood;
You knew that it would.
You deserve a big kick in the rump!
 
Several years ago I was at a car show and went to the restroom. Upon my return, someone had set a coke can on my hood near the radiator cap. If they had just set it up there, no problem; however, when I lifted the can off the hood, the can had been twisted and scratched a deep circle in my year-old very expensive professional applied paint job. I was so angry that I had cold chills for several minutes. I still do not know how to repair the damage. And I still get chills every time I look at it. I actually pray that I never find the culprit who would do this to anothers property.
Bill Lee/Virginia Peninsula
 
Again, this didn't happen to me but a friend. He replaced the engine in his car and had almost everything installed. Decided to start it up. Only problem was the headlight wiring harness was laying over the water pump. Fan caught it and it became a slick way to remove all your wiring. Didn't take long.
 
A guy in our model a club was at a car show one night in his '29 mail truck. He had one of those battery cut off switches, and he cut it off when he got to the show. He was a talker, and so he was the last A to leave and he got in it and hit the starter, and had absolutely nothing. So he thought, "OK 6 volt battery that's a couple years old, probably just went dead". So he got somebody to jump start him from a 12v system. So it started up and ran, but as soon as the jumper cables were taken off, it would quit running. So did this several times, and one time while he was having it running, he reached over and turned the lights on to see if they would work, which of course blew the bulbs. Finally, he remembered about the switch. He secretly reached down and flipped the switch, and magically the truck started. He had to drive home with no lights, and where he lives, you need lights.
 
I had one of those nice soft California car covers bought in Hershey for my Tudor. Pulled if off the car and folded it up on the passenger side running board, forgot about it when I pulled out of the driveway and remembered about a mile down the road. Of course it was gone and immediately I turned around and headed back but I never found it. Surely someone saw it fall off the running board and thought they had a score,grabbed it up and ran.
 
I'd just had my fenders painted a Beautiful Gloss Black by a fella who is really good at it and they came out like Black Onyx. Could not have asked for a better job.

So then we got enough snow that it had to be plowed. My truck plow is stored face down on some casters for ease of movement. I had to roll the plow/lightbar assembly past the dune buggy and the Model A. As I knew I had plenty of room, I obviously wasn't looking real close, but then came the SCREE-EE-EECH. My heart jumped into my throat. I didn't like that sound and I didn't realize that the snwplow headlight bar assembly, which was facing downward toward the floor had small screws holding the lenses. One of the screws scratched the outline of Australia right on the top of the driver's side front fender. All the way to the metal.

Every person who walks up to see the car asks "What Happened Here and points at the 3" scratch.

HEART BREAKER TO SAY THE LEAST...............
 
bobpo said:
I'd just had my fenders painted a Beautiful Gloss Black by a fella who is really good at it and they came out like Black Onyx. Could not have asked for a better job.

So then we got enough snow that it had to be plowed. My truck plow is stored face down on some casters for ease of movement. I had to roll the plow/lightbar assembly past the dune buggy and the Model A. As I knew I had plenty of room, I obviously wasn't looking real close, but then came the SCREE-EE-EECH. My heart jumped into my throat. I didn't like that sound and I didn't realize that the snwplow headlight bar assembly, which was facing downward toward the floor had small screws holding the lenses. One of the screws scratched the outline of Australia right on the top of the driver's side front fender. All the way to the metal.

Every person who walks up to see the car asks "What Happened Here and points at the 3" scratch.

HEART BREAKER TO SAY THE LEAST...............
Click to expand...

In some scratches on my fenders, I've taken a sharpee to them. it doesn't stand out too bad, and it isn't that tacky touch up paint that stands out like a sore thumb.
 
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