Scariest 3800 moment of my life

[ADrugDealer]

Had the blower off to work on a few things and out of caution I placed paper-towels in the intake manifold runners to avoid dropping a bolt down the runner -- which I ended up being thankful I did because I dropped a nut down in the intake manifold lol. After putting everything together and pulling out, what I thought was all the paper towels, I go to start the motor. Turn the key and crank it for a few seconds, didnt start. Normal for my e85, xp cammed car. Try again except this time I hear a "flump" and the car starts to misfire and shake violently. Turn the key off. At this point I had no idea what was going on. Checked the firing order, vacuum lines, the whole nine yards. Go crank it again and this time it just misfires like crazy and starts making some pretty horrid noises. Turn it off. Decide to try one more time, start it up, same story except it starts to smooth out, few seconds pass and its back to normal, walk around the car to grab something and there is paper towel shooting out the exhaust pipe.

1000 miles later still running great. I guess I'm very lucky I didnt bend a valve stem or something crazy.

[QUICKSILVER462]

Whoow, that is a good story, you should send it into ROckAUto newletter, they have stories of blunders and stuff. Once I was changing the distributor to a sbc350 and dropped the distributor anchor clamp bolt down the dist. hole. I spent an hour with a magnet and mirror fishing it out of the hole, it had caught between the cam gear and oil pump shaft. BUt eventually got it out.

[TLSheff]

Glad you didn't mess anything up either LOL. We all get lucky but this was crazy, must be a hardcore motor to eat the paper and **** it out without any cares.

[ADrugDealer]

Yeah, I am very lucky and it was scary as hell. I might send it into them lol

[231FUN]

LOL... use tape tape next time!
Coloured painters masking tape works well.
Only place I've ever used paper towel was to plug l67/l32 injector holes in the heads.

[dsmuts]

I never plug anything up on the motor. I've never had any problem dropping anything.

[Neil98gt]

I never plug anything up on the motor. I've never had any problem dropping anything.

Don't jinx yourself now...

[ILoveAudi]

Probably one of the best stories I've heard in a long time lol

[ericspecullaas]

Don't jinx yourself now...

tomorrow he will be saying how he blew up his motor....

[dsmuts]

I've torn many motors down and never had a problem. Once some acorns fell into a 3100 but I just bolted it back together and fired it up no problem.

[Silver2kgtp]

You did get lucky.

Good thing you didn't use rags. Don't think they would have shot through.

[coolone]

Omg... Lol! Go play Lotto quickly and parlay that luck! Lol...

[stealthee]

I was putting my turbo Talon back together one time. I was getting the valve cover bolted on when one of the little bolts jammed. I wiggled it and had to pry it with a screwdriver when it popped free, hit the hood, and landed directly in an open spark plug hole...

I spent an hour with an extendable magnet fishing it out.

[Timing]

When i was doing my sc coupler i started like an hour befor sun went down figuring i had plently of time. Got it all taken apart to realise coupler was fine. Started putting in back together got every bolt in, as i was putting in the last bolt i had to reposition myself and took my hand off it for 1 second and it dropped. I looked everywhere for this this thing for 4 hours in the dark with no luck. Finnally i found it resting on a power steering line or something just barely hanging there, after shaking the car ever which way i could and it didnt drop lol.

[REDCRAPGP]

I drop sockets all the time and find them months later. Yea I'm awesome.

[JaredR215]

Glad the car is okay man!

I dropped one of the washers when I did my pulley swap. Couldn't find it until I drove all the way to texas then back, had some car problems and just happened to find it laying on my sub frame haha

[Bio248]

I drop sockets all the time and find them months later. Yea I'm awesome.

my car had a weird rattle in the front end for a while and i didn't know what it was. i popped my hood one day to do something (probably an oil change) and i found a pair of side cutters that i left sitting on the cowl and just closed the hood, went on my merry way. it was probably there for at least a month.

[ADrugDealer]

Yeah, I think tape will be a new option other than rags. Have a cracked VC right now so oil mess! Just some advise, if you have a oil leak, don't go into boost haha

[BillBoost37]

How about not having parts near an open engine? I don't tape, rag etc, unless I'm letting something sit overnight. I've never dropped anything in, because nothing is right there to be dropped.

[Nighthwk12]

Nice lucky you have an un-catted exhaust system that the towel could pass right through.