Best engineering screw ups

[EmGo]

67 thru 71 Thunderbird had the windshield wipers hydraulically driven off of the power steering pump. Have a 2 inch coating of ice on the car? No problem, switch on the wipers and *kaboom* the ice would explode spectacularly

Late 40's early 50's lots of upper-end cars had hydraulic everything - seats, windows, tops. Don't let your fingers get caught

 

[Bill D]

Neighbor used to have a Cadillac with hydraulic windows when he was younger. One day he looked outside in a big rainstorm and noticed the windows had all gone down in hydraulic failure while parked.
Bill D

 

[charlie gary]

After reading all that, having to remove the grill from the front of a Mazda B2000 pickup truck to change the headlights doesn't seem like that big of a deal.

 

[rawen2]

Speaking of windshield wipers... maybe it was already mentioned but the vacuum operated ones in some older vehicles were a stroke of non-genius. They somewhat worked only when not accelerating or going up a hill. Can't imagine who thought those were a good idea.

 

[Joe Gwinn]

Speaking of windshield wipers... maybe it was already mentioned but the vacuum operated ones in some older vehicles were a stroke of non-genius. They somewhat worked only when not accelerating or going up a hill. Can't imagine who thought those were a good idea.

Everybody, back in the day. Way cheaper than an electric motor. And far easier to control, before transistors matured enough to be practical for civilian automobiles.

 

[DDoug]

Gravity fed fuel tank and a certain hill most people backed up it....

 

[jim rozen]

Model T had that feature - fuel tank was low under the front seat. Also reverse was the lowest gear, so a hill that could not be taken in low, could happen in reverse.

 

[boslab]

Many years ago there was a tank hull in work, laminated aluminium thing, when I asked it was a scorpion light tank ( 50+ both fwd and rev) it ran on gas, the tank being a giant rubber thing under the drivers seat!, good design I think not
Mark

 

[memphisjed]

https://m.facebook.com/lakemichiganwhales

The great lakes whale population is finally on the rise!

We watch them migrate up the river. The carp dam is hurting the Great Lake spawn.

Whet Thursday - Whale Watch

Whet Thursday: Whale Watch is back! The fun and free summer event series continues by the river on June 30.

memphisparent.com

 

[WizardOfBoz]

Not sure if this is in the spirit of the thread, but the 1981 Hyatt Regency skybridge collapse was a pretty big screwup. 114 dead, 216 injured.

Hyatt Regency walkway collapse - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[moonlight machine]

Talking of clutching defeat from the jaws of victory was the De havaland comet, that was when aluminium alloys were a newish thing and fatigue in is was little understood, it’s still a beautiful plane
Mark

You just can't do windows with square corners in a pressurized fuselage.

 

[moonlight machine]

I like that!, I watched a video of a guy rebuilding a Russian lorry, that had hydraulic wipers too if I remember, handy in Siberia
Mark

Old Cadillac's had hydraulic window lifts using brake fluid. Sucks when your window lift leaks and you have to do a respray as well as fix the lift!

 

[John Garner]

You just can't do windows with square corners in a pressurized fuselage.

Care to guess how the engineers figured that out?

 

[Bill D]

I think that whale watching in Michigan is kind of like taking your girl to the beach to watch the submarine races.
Bill D

 

[technocrat]

TE Ferguson tractor in petrol had the fuel tank over the engine, under the bonnet (hood). Ferguson was a great engineer, but clearly never had the experience of opening the tank on a hot motor on a hot Aussie day to check for fuel when the engine would not hot start. Boiling fuel foamed out of the tank headed for all hot parts down south. I had the presence of mind to replace the cap and then run like all heck as the highlights of my life (briefly) flashed before me.

 

[boslab]

Comets and Liberty ships found out about square corners being stress raisers,
Mark

 

[moonlight machine]

Care to guess how the engineers figured that out?

No need to guess, I know exactly how they figured it out.

 

[boslab]

The Griffith critical crack length stuff was interesting, who knew the bang was the crack going supersonic, amazing.
Then there was the ductile brittle transition, stick some phos in and down she comes, polar fleets were the ones that pointed to 5degree transition , warm water ships were holding out,
Mark

 

[michiganbuck]

EG screw ups..one was putting left-hand lug nut on some Chrysler cars.
The wrong logic may have been that some race cars have lefts on one side...and fail to think that a spindle axle needs that / not a wheel with lug nuts.

 

[steve45]

[B]bosleyjr[/B] said:​

Not sure if this is in the spirit of the thread, but the 1981 Hyatt Regency skybridge collapse was a pretty big screwup. 114 dead, 216 injured.

Hyatt Regency walkway collapse - Wikipedia​

en.wikipedia.org

This was most definitely NOT an engineering failure! The contractor changed the design from the original design.