Knock on simulated wood (I have an Ikea desk), I’ve had pretty good luck with my cars not getting messed up outside of a collision. The only really significant bummer I’ve experienced was the golf-balling my wife’s then month-old RAV4 received when we were caught in an unpredicted hail storm on the way back from a movie, which suuuucked (the hail, I mean, but as I recall, the movie wasn’t great either).
I do, however, have plenty of second-hand experience with cars getting damaged due to bad luck or carelessness or just plain stupidity, including a tree mishap like the one in the top pic – RIP Uncle Charlie’s Buick Regal.
I once saw a person slide a chair into their hatchback, back-first and legs out, and then shatter the rear window because they didn’t account for the legs extending beyond the slope of the hatch. Also shattered: their spirit.
In college, a buddy of mine procured spray paint for an art project before a few hours’ worth of classes one day in early June. When he returned to his car, an art project of a different sort had been completed in his absence as a can of flat black had split in the heat and graffiti’d the interior of his Sentra.
And then there are the more minor, but no less irritating and possibly heartbreaking annoyances such as kids (or pets, which are like kids) hurling up breakfast all over the back seat, spills of stain-producing liquids onto light-colored upholstery, and the like.
Oh, nice! Antti just piped in on Slack:
I once had a hailstorm wreck all horizontal surfaces of my month-old lease, on a work day that could have been an email. When I got the $4000 worth of PDR performed on the car courtesy of the insurance company, the guy doing it leaned on the headliner and broke it and stained it trying to fix it. He ordered a replacement one and the delivery driver left it in the rain outside the shop. He eventually found another headliner in time for the lease return as I just wanted the car gone at that point. Dents did disappear though.
I was mildly annoyed when I accidentally used the rear wiper on the dry and dirty glass on my current lease, but then I remembered what happened to the earlier car and figured I can live with it. Still, I’d hate scratching the glass!
What’s the worst not-a-crash incident … wait, now Thomas is hitting me up:
There was the time the belt tensioner on the Crown Victoria grenaded, lodging the pulley against the timing cover and wearing a groove in it. Then there was the time it sort-of caught fire. Then there was the time wheel studs sheared over a nasty pothole. Then there was the time the transmission gave out …
What’s the worst not-a-crash incident you’ve seen or experienced yourself? See you in the comments.
Yes, I’ve had an unoccupied car totalled by a falling, fallen, tree. By just one minute I missed driving under another one two weeks ago. The hazards of living in the woods.
Anything I have pales in comparison to the time my friend, who worked for a catering company, spilled a giant tray of beer-brats-in-saurkraut in his Chevrolet Blazer. That thing had a rank, sour, funk for months and months as he tried in vein to clean it over and over and over again!
I realize I have an embarrassingly long list from which to choose, so I’m picking the one I’ve never heard someone else say (but maybe it’ll be here so, fingers crossed!).
My parents had a sweet 1984 VW Rabbit Wolfsburg Edition. Dark blue, tweed seats. It had exactly two vices: no tach & a slight wheel vibration between 55 and 60.
Coming home from a grocery run, a gallon of whole milk turned over, cracked and proceeded to empty all 128 ounces into the carpet, insulation and then puddled in the rear footwells. The smell never really left. They traded it in shortly after on a good-but-dull Mazda 323 sedan with a three speed slush box.
My 93 LX 5.0 fix body mustang was stolen from me. I was 20 years old at the time so it did alleviate me from my $120 monthly note payment and my $240 monthly insurance payment. This is when I learned about salvage/rebuilt title vehicles. The car was paid off by insurance and I got a check for $80 to apply towards my next vehicle. I was absolutely heart broken.
&^%$()*& Hurricane Harvey washed 3 of our vehicles to the salvage yard. Still salty about that storm and the damage it inflicted.
When I lived in Miami for a couple of years, I had a Geo Metro that I’d had parked outside but hadn’t used in a week or so during some monsoon rains.
Started it up, got to the first stoplight, and started getting bites from my ankles. Looked down and my fucking jeans were coated solid in fire ants, and the bites were rapidly increasing. Panicked, pulled the parking brake, jumped out of the car and did the boogie dance in front of everyone at the intersection getting down to my boxers.
Turns out an entire nest of fire ants had decided my engine compartment was a far nicer and drier place than wherever they’d been previously.
I think you have both won and lost this discussion.
My old Saturn (bless its heart) had to get its front struts replaced, but because it was a Saturn and Saturn hasn’t existed for over a decade, the only options available were used from a junkyard. A year later, I heard a metallic popping sound from the front end as I was merging onto the highway, then a rapid thumping. I pulled over and found that one of the used struts had failed and was ramming the underside of the hood out of shape. I drove it to the mechanic as gently as I could, he replaced the bad strut with another (used) part and bent the hood back into place as best he could. Six months later, it happened again on the other side. Not wanting to deal with this nonsense again, I quickly sold the car after it was repaired. I still miss it, but that’s the danger of relying on an orphan brand for your daily.
Not personally experienced by me, but reliably informed by friends or witnessed the following incidents:
Stolen