Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Fireballs & Explosions of the Past

For some odd reason this story comes to mind despite the fact that it happened awhile back. Thought my loyal fans might enjoy a good laugh. Although my disclaimer upfront is that I DID NOT INTEND TO LIGHT MY MOTHER ON FIRE! So don't think I'm some kind of psycho.

Back when I had a piece-of-junk truck, I was always having issues with it. Issues that turned more and more serious until finally the engine blew up. So, as poor as I was at the time, I had to scrounge another engine out of a junkyard to rebuild and put in my truck. Now I had a shop class in high school, and have fairly good common sense when when it comes to mechanical things so I figured why not do it all myself? (I also have a dangerous amount of confidence in my own abilities to fix things...which has resulted in numerous electricutions and explosions!) But I digress... Back to the story. So one of the first steps to replacing an engine is disconnecting everything...including the exhaust system. Now any mechanic knows what a royal pain it is to disconnect these things after 130,000 miles of rusting and heat-welding all the bolts together. So as expected, I am having a very difficult time getting the pipes (back part of engine compartment, underside of truck) disconnected from the engine. There's 2 things you can try to get stuck bolts to come loose...lubricant and heat (make it slippery or use metal expansion). You should only try one OR the other. Not both people...not both. (Lubricant is flammable!) So I've been spraying WD-40 on thes bolts for days trying to get them loose and am under the truck with a ratchet and 13 feet of cheater pipe trying to get enough leverage to bust these bolts loose. No luck. After 2 broken ratchets, 5 bloody knuckles, and 13,000 curse words I finally resort to fire. (Hey, I'm a guy. what'd ya expect?) Despite the fact that these bolts have been soaked in oil for days, and the fact that I am uncomfortabely close to the gas lines (right next to my face actually), I decide heat from a torch is gonna be the only way. You can see where this is going right? But no, I'm much smarter than that...at least after the first 3 fires. I quickly realize these dangers and despite lighting the bolts on fire numerous times, I have a wet rag handy to quickly put them out. (I'm not a complete idiot!) But I can't seem to get the small propane-bottle torch angled around to the top of the bolt by myself while still being able to crank on these things. So I enlist the help of my ever faithful Mom! "Hey mom, I need a favor. Really easy, when I hand you this flamming bottle of propane, I want you to tip it upside down and stick it way down into the engine compartment right here!" She probably knew better, but unfortunately trusts my mechanical abilities and common sense much more than she should. So I light the torch, hand it to her, and she gets it tipped down into the engine and pointing the flame onto the bolt. I quickly hop underneath with ratchet and 13-foot cheater pipe and start cranking on this bolt. And after a minute or so, it's starting to work! "Yes, it's working! Just hold it a little bit longer mom!" Well, unrealized at that time in my life, i later learned that propane tanks become cold and overpressurized when releasing alot of propane quickly when turned upside down. Thank goodness those designers put in a handy-dandy little pressure release valve on it for just such issues. Well after about 2 minutes of working with this torch, I'm starting to get these bolts to turn. I'm so excited! Then completely unannounced, the saftey valve blows and said propane torch turns into an evil ball of flames! Well my mom is not the type to panic, but she's also not the type to be okay with holding onto a flaming ball of propane...especially when it's now singeing off her eyebrows and hair! She freaks and yanks the bottle out of the engine (at least she didn't drop flaming tank onto my head below) and starts screaming. I come flying out from underneath and grab the flaming ball from her. I shut the nozzle off, but the flames are coming from the release valve. I now have a mini oil-well fire on my hands. Now I've always been fascinated by how they put out oil-well fires with explosives. And what it's taught me is that the only way to put something like that out is to BLOW it out! So I start blowing on this thing! Well, this isn't exactly like blowing out birthday candles people. I'm huffing and puffing and blowing my brains out trying to extinguish this jet flame...and it's just getting bigger and the stinkin tank is really starting to get hot. My mom is busy screaming "Put it out! Put it out!" "Thank you so much for the wise advise mom..." I accept that my lungs are not going to put this death-trap out so my next thought is to waive it around hard enough to get it to blow out from windsheer. So there I am in the middle of our street wildly and recklessly flinging around this flaming bottle of propane as hard as I can like a psychotic idiot doing the frantic pee-pee dance with my mom screaming unrecognizable things at me... Ahhhh, it's times like these that makes life great isn't it? Really makes ya appreciate the little things...like fire extinguishers. Well my plan finally works and I get the tank blown out and it even stops spewing propane once it cools off. But for some odd reason, even to this day, my mom refuses to help me with my truck anymore. I don't get it?