It's time to take a break when ....

[Foxer]

.... working on the 2nd distributor for my Plymouth L-head 6 (the carpet monster ate the first) and after fabricating the lower body and shaft, attaching to the upper 6 cylinder cap from a 2nd 50 Chevy kit and gluing on a advance from RMCOM (first one lost had one of these too) it suddenly disappears! I didn't see it spring to the floor ... was positive I had put it down carefully, but was not on the table. I spent the next hour combing the floor.. and clearing the work table. Nadda. So, I vacated the area and haven't been back down for two days! Needed some calming...

So, today I figured I'd just do some sanding on a different project and ease back into thinking about the lost distributor. I couldn't help clearing away more on the table and scanning the floor again. This one is lost to the void for sure. As a last hopeless attempt I figured I'd look closely into the plastic baggie I keep the engine in ... I already scanned this 10 times looking before ... but wait! .. whats that thing sticking out of the block side at 45 degrees... !!! .. what a DUMB place to store a distributor!!!! ... in the hole meant for it ...

... time for a break.. ehhe

[E St. Kruiser50]

HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I BEEN THERE ??????

MORE THAN I CARE TO COUNT

[Harold]

Heck, I can do that working on real cars. I'll set a wrench down and then spend the next twenty minutes looking for it and questioning my intelligence. Then, it magically appears on top of the air cleaner where I set the $%^#$@* thing.

[John E. Bowers Jr.]

Heck, I can do that working on real cars. I'll set a wrench down and then spend the next twenty minutes looking for it and questioning my intelligence. Then, it magically appears on top of the air cleaner where I set the $%^#$@* thing.

WOW! I guess I'm not alone! It happens about every other time that I work on a car.

[nitrojunkie]

I'm glad I'm not the only one.I was thinking I was getting Alzheimers....

Edited July 10, 2009 by nitrojunkie

[RodBurNeR]

I had that happen to me before many times. I usually find what I lose, but it's months later.

I learned my lesson to check myself over before leaving the room when I realized I had the part inside my shoe for the rest of the day. Another time I couldn't find what I lost because it was glued to the back of my forearm.

[Fernando Roman]

I'm convinced there's a "black hole" under my work table, I just can't prove it.

[Eshaver]

I think thats one of the primary reasons that both Snap- On and Matco did the Coloredhandles as opposed to Snap - On's Black and Matco Maroon. I bpught a slew of new screw drivers and pry bars off both distributors years ago when they did . I still like the grip on Snap - On better though . No you are not alone sir, FAR FROM IT ! Ed Shaver

[Helipilot16]

Have you noticed that every thing you look for is in the last place you look for it?

[Harry P.]

Have you noticed that every thing you look for is in the last place you look for it?

Just think how much faster you'd find stuff if you looked there first!

[envious8420]

I had that happen to me before many times. I usually find what I lose, but it's months later.

I learned my lesson to check myself over before leaving the room when I realized I had the part inside my shoe for the rest of the day. Another time I couldn't find what I lost because it was glued to the back of my forearm.

Glued to your arm, ha thats great!

I'm convinced there's a "black hole" under my work table, I just can't prove it.

I proved mine or at least thought i did. I lost a body under there.

Didnt know it, but when i dropped it the dog was under there, he picked it up and took it up stairs to my wife.

Edited July 12, 2009 by envious8420

[elan]

Model shipbuilders use an odd apron. The loop goes around your neck like normal and the other end is attachs to the edge of your workbench. I don't know what you do if the phone rings and it's nature calling.

[Billy Kingsley]

Ouch...don't you hate when you go crazy looking for something and it's not there, then later it is??

It is worse though to go crazy looking for something and never finding it, though, Way back around 2000 or 2001 I was working on my first AMT 59 Edsel when I dropped the front spindle. I have not found it, and I've been over the area many times since then. My only theory is that it hit the floor and bounced into the heating grate. The odds of that are nearly impossible (considering it's a good foot off the floor, and I was sitting between them!) but it is the only option I can fathom.

Unless, of cource, as it fell it vibrated enough to travel to a different dimension!

Luckily, someone on the ModelCarList, I can't remember who, had a spare and mailed it to me, saving the build!

[Joe Handley]

Heck, I can do that working on real cars. I'll set a wrench down and then spend the next twenty minutes looking for it and questioning my intelligence. Then, it magically appears on top of the air cleaner where I set the $%^#$@* thing.

Sounds like the oil change I did on my Jeep this last time, I kept looking and groping for the wrench by the tool box, which was to my right and infront of the truck by where I put the drain plug as I lay on my back under the front axle.......then found the friggin' thing to my left between me and the left front tire...........................

[diymirage]

wouldnt be the first time i heard of a car burning to the ground because a grease monkey forgot his oilrag somewhere under the hood

[Joe Handley]

I've heard of that too, a customer who's family owns a towing service had to haul off a Wrangler that some young girl driving had done the same thing after checking the oil in it's engine!

[cruz]

Believe it or not, I lost a distributor once, was going crazy looking for it and found it 2 days later in the back of one of my Yorkies. Happened to be petting him and felt something weird near the tail, thought it was a tick or something Told my wife to keep them trimmed more often now!!!

[Ddms]

I was recently gluing a tiny windscreen on a very primitive kit of an old 1/43 race car. It was just a 1/4" square cast frame with a clear screen. When it started to topple toward the cockpit, I tried to catch it, but it fell out of sight. So I looked in the cockpit, figuring that the cockpit was the only place on earth it could be. I probed around with various instruments. But it wasn't there!

I was sure I had seen it fall into the cockpit, but who knew? Maybe I had somehow flipped it out onto the table.

So I did the usual table and floor search, to no avail. I figured it had joined its many buddies in the Tiny Parts Matrix and would never be found, so I made up a brass replacement. But the two attachment pins wouldn't fit into the holes on the cowling. Hmmm. I got out the magnifier and tried to see what was blocking the holes.

Mystery solved! The original windscreen had done a backflip over the edge of the cowling and had slipped through a narrow gap between the cowling and the dash. There had been wet CA on the pins, so it had managed to instantly glue itself to the inside of the cowling, up behind the dash where it could not be seen. I drilled through the holes and mounted the new windscreen.

After making up a replacement, I'm not about to take apart the entire interior just to retrieve a hidden windscreen that been damaged by my drill bit. Under the dash it shall remain for all eternity.

Ddms

[Tommy Kortman]

...the x-acto knife rolls off the bench and into your foot!!!!!

[Foxer]

The Black Hole Gods have been appeased after all these great stories!!!!!! :lol: :lol:

Please continue..

[James W]

I had been working on a 57 Chrysler 300C, but put it away.

When I got it out months later I went to put together the front suspension but could not find the coil springs.

I got very frustrated, trying to remember what other kits I'd had open at the same time so I could check them.

I could sub in parts, but still, where did they go.

A few days later I took up the search again and checked the instruction sheet(see signature box)

Oops, Chryslers used torsion bars back then... DUH!

[torinobradley]

I don't know what it's called or if it even has a name but I call it chaos theory. Ever notice that if say, you drop a tool or part while your working on the car, it will bounce/roll to the least accessable place under the car, or if you move your corded dremel that cord will loop over and grab something you couldn't lasso with the cord on purpose if you tried a hundred times and then, drag it to it's death or off the bench or into the black hole. You know, how something unique happens that you couldn't repeat no matter how hard you try. Sometimes it's amazing, sometimes it's annoying, but always, it's amazingly annoying...