[vsbabu]

I've two.

1. While parking in reverse in our tight apartment lot, put my head outside, parked. Was lost in thought and hit power window switch. With head still outside. Neck still pains
2. While driving, wifey was talking a lot and I was not paying attention. Unwittingly, to cut out the noise, turned the music system regulator down to minimum and was wondering why nothing was changed. She caught that. I'm still alive by divine grace.

PS: I'm usually not this absent minded

[ObsessedByFIAT]

I bought the Nano XTA as it came with Bluetooth telephony. I could connect my then Nexus 4 phone and stream music without breaking a sweat.

Sometime later I got a new phone and as expected tried paring it with my Nano's system. Nope! It just wouldn't connect! Tried a lot of times and then gave up hope thinking that there might be a compatibility issue.

Around 8 or 9 months later, my Nano was due for service and I took it to the service centre. While speaking to the SA, I casually mentioned that the phone pairing does not work any longer.
SA tried his hand as well and same result. By this time I was pretty darn sure there is a compatibility issue.
Around the same time, one of the technician was passing by and the SA showed him the issue.

Flat 30 seconds and the phone was connected and music playing through Bluetooth!

Upon inquiring what magic did he do, he just mentioned that the system had reached its connection limit and that he deleted everything and started afresh.

Now, whenever I connect my phone, I feel stupid every single time thinking about this incident! :P

[Ameya_G]

Great thread and very enjoyable reading some of the experiences!

My lowest oops moment was when I was reversing into a very narrow parking slot. Put my lefthand behind the drivers seat, looked through the rear glass and reversed halfway through. Then wanting to check on the right (driver's) side tried to peep through the window - only to bang my head hard on the window, which I had forgotten to roll down

Had a black/blue/purple slot to remind me of my clumsiness for the next 3-4 days.

[mukeshgoel]

It happened in early days of my driving in 1997-98. After car came back from regular service. Rear doors lock got jammed and were not opening (from inside). For next few days, rear sitting friends managed by rolling down window and then opening the door from outside door handle and then again rolling up window.

After 3-4 days, visited serviced to get it fixed and he did it in less than five seconds, by disabling child lock.

[livetodrive]

1. Initial days oops moment: with a full hand brake tried to move the car in 1st gear. It keeps roaring and I wonder whats going wrong.

2. Recently this happened: while car is stuck in sludge, I switched off the AC (don't know why ) and rolled down the window. Mud splashed immediately on a wheel spin and seat is gone.

3. Wife comes out of the driver seat to fill petrol. I also come out for a quick break. She forgets to pull the hand brake and car rolls back the road. She runs to stop the car. I keep grinning and with God's grace still typing this post.

[bhavik.1991]

Here comes a huge oops moment for me..

I visited my native town a few years back. Honda had recently launched a new generation of Activa back then. I still have poor knowledge about different generations of Activa (scooters in general) & still don't know which generation it was. The only difference I remember is it was narrower than previous generation which was quite wider.

I wanted to visit an old friend of mine. As roads of the town were quite narrow, I decided to take my aunt's newly bought activa for a ride instead of my Dzire. I parked Activa on the side of the road near his place. When I returned a few hours later, I was shocked to see keyhole was covered with something I noticed a small knob near keyhole which should be used to slide keyhole cover. I tried to open the cover using that knob multiple times but all in vain

After trying to open the cover for more than 10 minutes on a summer afternoon (~42c), I decided to make a fool myself & called my aunt. She also had no clue about it (she must have never used that cover before). Fast forward 5 minutes, I decided to call my best friend who usually takes my advice for automobile related stuff. He had taken delivery of new Activa a few days back. When I explained him the situation, he burst into laughter. After enjoying the situation for a few minutes, he finally helped me. If making oneself embarrassed is an art, that day - I was Picasso of it.

[AtheK]

Switched to Vento Automatic from City Manual. Took it to an accessory shop the next day, and got out of the car, with still in D mode, thinking i am in Neutral as in Manual. Car started moving forward and shopkeeper had to run and get inside to stop the car before it hit some one.

Shopkeeper looks at me and asks "Tumhari hai ya chori kar ke laye ho" (Is it yours or did you steal it)

[ashwinprakas]

The image query says it all, the year was 2011 and I was 18.



This was the instance I lost my DIY virginity, never looked back since.

[swiftnfurious]

One of such my incident dates back to 2007 or so. We were a bunch happily coming after a party and being driven an Innova. I told my colleagues that the key of the Innova costs INR 75K due to immobilizer (as I heard from someone else), if lost & replaced.

10 years down the line, I can't think how stupid a statement was it - never bothered to even think in my common sense how it can be that expensive. The Innova driver, while we were dissecting the price etc, kept a simple smile and didn't say anything - was probably too nice a person.

[GrandTourer]

So I consider myself a proper petrolhead and took pride in knowing all the latest features in new cars. However, I was bogged down by a mere high beam toggle in the 2017 EcoSport. Having booked a self drive car for a road trip, I tried all the switches and buttons trying to figure out how to toggle the high beam. So for a good 20 mins drive to my friend's place, whenever I needed to switch to high beam, I decided to hold the pass beam for as long as needed (the pass beam was the same as other cars).

On reaching my friend's place, we googled how to toggle it and found out that the same action for the pass beam turns on high beam, if you pull it back enough for it to click in place. :banghead:

[parth.jain]

This happened while I was TD'ing cars in Aug 2015. I was TD'ing the Zest AMT Diesel.
We got out of the showroom and were still in the service lane. The speed was around 25-30kmph and I felt the need to change the gear. I pressed the clutch and the car came to a standstill IMMEDIATELY.

I asked the SA as to why the car came to a stop. He politely said, "Sir, you just slammed the brakes". I then realised again that I was driving an automatic car. (I very well knew how to drive an automatic car, I had forgotten that I was driving an automatic maybe due to excitement )

Went back to the showroom and booked a manual one

[jagan88]

1. 2013. Drove my cousin's Estilo in Bangalore to watch a movie, alone. Didn't know how to open the boot at a mall entrance for security check. After fiddling around, I gave sheepish smile and he waved me to proceed.

2. December 2012. Very confidently, was looking at the ORVM while driving the car out of parking space in apartment. There's a pillar just beside and I have drive the car with right turn to come out of parking spot. Carefully, I was watching in mirror and at about 5kmph slowly got the scratches marked on the right rear door of a new Alto 800. Then, I realised, "objects in the mirror are closer than they appear"

3. 2014. Reversing the car (Ford Figo) from a mall's parking lot near Marthahalli, Bangalore. This mall got parking lifts installed. Since it wasn't crowdy, the parking lifts aren't raised. My car was parking on the little slant. While pulling out, I noticed the chance of the left rear view mirror hitting the metal rod/pillar. Forgot I was on incline and took the foot up on the brake to move a little forward and correct steering position. To my horror, as I kept watching, the car rolled back half a foot and phat! goes my left ORVM.

[knightrider_7]

The first one when I was a newbie driver:

We had just bought a new car and I was the only one with LMV licence. Access to our home parking is via a narrow road (good for one car) and a left turn ascent (our plot is reasonably higher than the road). It requires atleast one reverse to get the car into parking space.

One day, after making the turn and then taking the reverse, I forgot to put the gear back to 1st. Gave the A pedal and car rolled backwards, hitting the wall opposite to our gate. The distance and speed was very less and hence the car got its first rear bumper scratches.

I thought the car was not pulling due to the height of the entrance. After some repeated attempts, father got down to reduce the weight and told me a white light is glowing at the rear.

I was like

Simply put it to the 1st and got the car into the parking as if it was indeed due to low pulling power of our new car

Now the latest one was while taking a test drive of one car with my wife. The car was equipped with cruise control and that was the first time I was driving a car with that feature. After seeing an open road, I wanted to try out the cruise control.

I turned on the left turn indicator, slowly stopped the car to the left, and pressed the cruise button, kept increasing the + button looking at the MID. The SA asked what I was doing. I said I am setting the cruise control.

He was a nice chap and explained to me how to do that.

[ashwinprakas]

Finally found the rest of the pictures from my first time DIY experience back in 2011, and these are the funny ones.

Being a little too enthusiastic I managed to work the feeler gauge a bit too much that the nut, bolt and spacer that was holding all the blades came loose and fell inside the head through the tappet window! Separately!



What I did not mention earlier was that this was my first ever motorcycle and a premium offering in the market that my dad just got me a few weeks before. I literally had no excuse for messing up a brand new machine.

So after a bit of brain storming with my buddies we came up with a solution!



We made this contraption with some wire and a magnet, back then I was 18 and had no clue of the existence of the tool called a 'Magnetic Pen', and until later on in life I got to see one I thought of ourselves to be bad-ass innovators for coming up with this invention.

We then fished for the fallen parts via the timing chain window;



And after a while managed to get all 3 pieces out, I immediately disposed of them and came up with a more reliable means of holding all the blades in place.



BTW If you were wondering what the abused blade looked like before the ordeal here's a picture;



As they say, what doesn't kill ya makes ya smarter or so I pray!

EDIT: In my defense, this was before YouTube and cheap Internet and there is only so much experienced enthusiasts can educate an absolute novice over the phone and automotive forums.

[ObsessedByFIAT]

Originally Posted by GrandTourer

So I consider myself a proper petrolhead and took pride in knowing all the latest features in new cars. However, I was bogged down by a mere high beam toggle in the 2017 EcoSport. Having booked a self drive car for a road trip, I tried all the switches and buttons trying to figure out how to toggle the high beam. So for a good 20 mins drive to my friend's place, whenever I needed to switch to high beam, I decided to hold the pass beam for as long as needed (the pass beam was the same as other cars).

On reaching my friend's place, we googled how to toggle it and found out that the same action for the pass beam turns on high beam, if you pull it back enough for it to click in place. :banghead:

Reminded me of a similar incident!!

I had recently got married and was visiting my in-laws for the first time along with my wife, of course!

My Father in law at that time had a Opel Corsa.

So, my wife requested that we go and meet her friends over dinner. Since she also wanted to shop before dinner we started in day time itself.
While returning back from dinner, I started the car and tried all the stocks and switches to put on the head lights. Nothing worked! Since, I was and still am a petrol head, I did not know how to own up that I did not know how to put on the head lights of a car in front of my newly wedded wife! :P
So what did I do? Just held the pass stock all the way (around 3 KM's) to home.
Just when I was about to come out of the car after parking it, I noticed a rotary switch on the right hand side of the steering and I fiddled with it. Low and behold! Head lights are on!!!