Your favorite Macgyver moments\tricks

I am just thinking that he mounted a camper to his tractor to protect himself from the weather

the weather... or flying springs

Coming home from the airport many years ago in the GF's VW jetta. Headlights just go out, fuses fine, can't find any obvious wiring issues (in the dark) .

Bought a common 110v extension cord at the convenience store, stripped the wires at one end and clamped them to the battery posts. Simply plugged the other end into the backside of one of the headlight connectors. Drove it home 1.5 hrs that way.

The driver side wiper arm fell off my 68 VW camper van while driving to Alaska thru the Yukon... at night in a rain storm. Turned around and drove slowly looking for it. Found it lying in the road unharmed but the set screw was corroded in place (steel vs aluminum).

Sat and thought a while, got a beer can from the garbage and cut a 1/2" wide strip, formed a ring to fit over the wiper stud just below the windshield and hammered the wiper arm back in place. It lasted for the life of the vehicle. Sold it several years later with the wipers still working.

My friend had his wiper motor burn out on a trip, so rigged soda straws in the wing windows and strung braided fishing line thru the straws, tied them to the wiper arms and had a loop to operate the wipers. His high school kid worked the wipers as needed.

Fixed my chainsaw wire with a soda straw.

The insulation had worn/burned off the ignition wire and the saw wouldn't run. Ran the wire thru a short chunk of soda straw to use as insulation. It's still on the 031 Stihl saw many years later. The ignition module is outboard on the side of the saw.

Dave

Beer can shims. Pirsig would be proud.

Once while working in China, I repaired the tranny on an old Nissan with a pair of chop sticks. The internal shift mechanism destroyed it self. Pulled the shift boot off and I could see down into the transmission. Used a pair of chop sticks to fish out the broken pieces of the mechanism. We no longer had reverse so you had to be careful where you parked, but we did have 1st and 3rd gear if you held the shift lever in place. We drove it that way for about a week.

I see what you did there.

DK

On a week long Lake Powell trip we were out late one night on the ski and fishing boat filling the boat with stripers and catching some pretty serious buzzes.. Must have been 5 of us on that rig having the times of our lives.

We had been trolling around for hours on the electric trolling motor. Finally the beer ran out and the electric trolling motor was getting sluggish we decided it might be best to find our way back to the house boat.We went to fire the boat up and got the dreaded click click. Apparently fish lights and marker lights and a cd player can drain even a good battery over several hours.

Immediately we pondered our fate drifting aimlessly in the main channel of lake Powell miles away from anyone at 3am. On top of that it was a moonless night and navigation was exceedingly difficult.

Within the minute I had brilliant idea, I'd try the trolling motor's deep cycle battery in place of the boats battery. Not even close to cranking it over. Damns.

Then it hit me, connect the two in series to produce more voltage. With a pair of jumpers and 2 pairs of vice grips we got them connected. Boat roared to life. Cheers abounded.

Finding our way back thru mazes of canyons at 3am dead drunk in no moon, is well..... the other half of the story.

Alternator ate a set of brushes on the way to Alaska (think remote) and ran out of charge to keep the truck running. Having lots of time, realized that a D cell battery has a center post (anode?) made of graphite. Cut a piece about the right size, epoxied the lead into a hole drilled with a swill army knife, carved a wooden holder to adapt to the original metal clip and viola! Last the entire way to Anchorage

. by jestragon, on Flickr

Bought a battery in the Gambia after the one I bought locally (which was the only 12v 12ah battery I could find anywhere; this country is seriously lacking in parts) died shortly after buying. Come home (in the bush), realise the battery is about a centimeter too fat for my aprilia Tuareg's battery compartment.

I live a three hour drive from the nearest internet/petrol station/town where not much can be had anyway, so I had to resort to a little creativity with scraps of a plastic jerry can (which I'd already cut into to fashion the liner for a machete sheath) heated over a small gas camping stove, copper wire, bits of old floor mat and the shock absorbing mount on the bottom was achieved with an old rear wishbone silent block, locally carved from an old truck tire. It's not pretty but it's pretty snug, holds the battery well. No problems with the battery either so far.

Years ago my wife and I were tooling around Long Island Sound in our new 20' Shamrock inboard when all of sudden we lost steering, around and around we went. Went back to the steering assembly and found the bronze rudder arm which attaches to the rudder shaft snapped in two.

Fortunately I had a pair of vise-grips in my toolbox and clamped it hard around the rudder shaft and steered the boat from the stern, sort of like using a tiller in a sailboat. If I had another pair of vise-grips I could have clamped the ends of the steering cables to the grips on the rudder and I could have steered it like usual

It's funny my wife always used to ask me why I always carried that big clunky toolbox on the boat, she doesn't ask me anymore.....


Ron W.

I had an intermittent failure of one of the two CDIs on my ’90 Transalp. I was able to limp the 600+ miles home by attaching some dental floss to the connector of the failing CDI, and every time it failed I would pull violently on the floss until it would resume working. True story.

Something similar

Years ago I went an looked at a Yamaha Dirtbike, upon inspection I found a small C clamp on the CDI unit. Ask owner, he didn't know shit, yeah right. Removed Clamp bike died. Replaced Clamp bike runs. Went home without bike.

There must be a need for these,as I have actually seen stuff for sale to hold the little straw on the can.......
I was at Lowes the other day and got a free coffee. The little stir thingies for the coffee are a nice fit over the outside of the spray can straw.
Cut the coffee stirrer off a little shorter than your spraycan straw,melt one end closed,tape it to the can, and it holds the little dispensing straw nice and neat. I put a kink in the coffee stirrer and I can turn the spray can upside down without losing the dispensing straw.
Sorry for writing such a long explanation,,but my camera is broke and so am I.

I lost one of my swingarm pivot caps - no problem, I found another one, and it's chrome too!



I converted to road tube breather last week, and needed a breather filter, in the bottom of my carburettor box I found an adjustable breather filter.

I just use a rubber band...

I have a couple of these molded rubber pieces that fit over the can and hold the straw at the end of a length of the rubber in a small hole. They look like they should work but for somereason I never use them. if I put one on a can I still loose the straw or something happens I don't like them . They have been in the glove box of my car for years. I got arrested and when my car was towed by the cops stuff got stolen out of my car at the cops impound yard but these stupid rubber things are still in the glove box when I got the car back. URRRGH.

I like the coffee stirrer thing. I'll give that a shot.

Can we talk about actual macgyver episodes? I love that one where he is in the wilderness and he needs water, so there is moss growing on the ground and all he does is stick a straw into it and lets the water run out.

Truly genius stuff that is.

The episode is Season 3 Episode 4

Oh also, once I triggered the starter motor on a carburetted car by simply getting the wire from a speaker out the back and putting the car in ignition and hooking it up between the positive terminal and the starter's solenoid, kicked over like a charm.