I've been branded by my 66 GTO!!!
 

Don't do this. I was adjusting the idle stop screw on my 66 GTO when I felt a burning on my wrist and smell of burnt flesh. After whipping my left hand off the engine my watch fell off my wrist. I inadvertantly touched the back of the alternator with my watchs' metal band and must have shorted out something. Burned my wrist and melted the link on the band.
Moral of the story remove watches before working near the alternator.
OUCH!!!

Rings, watches and jewelry were all something we had to take off for auto shop class in HS.

Our instructor told us a horrible story of a guy that shorted out a circuit with his wedding ring. I guess it glowed red hot and he pulled it off so quick that he tore all the skin off his finger too. Yuck.

Burns like that suck.

Saw a guy working over the engine at an All Pontiac show many years a go.
No shirt & nipple rings. It gave me one of those evil smiles, thinking what if.... :)

Alternators scare the crap out of me. I've been hit by all kinds of voltage doing other work, but amps.... that is scary stuff.

I thought you were going to say all your buddies now call you "66 GTO" instead of by your name like on Street Outlaws...

OUCH! That's as bad as having a wrench in your hand and accidently shorting out the + side of the battery to the car. :boom:

The only thing worse than that Crew is a battery blowing up in your face. I've seen it happen first hand. Thank God for a water hose near by to flush his eyes out so he didn't go blind. Yep, when it blew he was standing over it and caught it all full in the face.

I was a teenager when I managed to short out the back of the alternator with a coffee can of gasoline while cleaning the engine. I still don't know how all that sparking and spilled gasoline never found each other. That incident forever cured me from using gasoline as a cleaning agent.

Do you have the red cap installed on the hot post of the alternator? I have seen many cars with the red mounting ring in place but no red cap. Cheap insurance and available from Ames and other vendors.

Jim

Hi Jim,
No I don't have the cap. Didn't know it had one. Thanks for the tip. Maybe I should get a watch with a leather band. LOL

What rohrt said. I actually witnessed the wedding ring fiasco first hand about 25 years ago...a service writer was installing a battery for a customer and ZAP: melted the ring and burnt a new one around his finger. I was right there, and I can tell you, the guy was in pain....and his wife later got very, very upset. Jewelry around cars is a huge no-no. Especially rodeo belt buckles!!

Me too.
 

I have a similar brand, while reaching behind the dash my metal watch band shorted the amp meter posts of my 52 Woody. I thought a spider had bitten me so I tried to brush it away but no spider and the pain was increasing. I finally had to rip off the watch and threw it on the ground. Still bear the band link imprint, nearly fifty years later.

I knocked the tip of my finger off from an alternator when I was in high school. not fun.

I haven't worn a wristwatch or any kind of jewelry whatsoever in many, many years for that very reason. The watch was the last to go but I don't miss it at all with a cellphone in my pocket.

I remember a buddy of mine back in the day purchased the new Armitron digital push button watch. (I'm going back a few years, lol)

Fried it same day working on a car with a HEI distributer. Boy was he mad, all of us laughed till it hurt!

I think many of our cars have branded us. Great post.

My teacher was missing a finger all the way into his palm and when we got to the electrical part of the course he stated he had his wedding ring on and had it welded to the bone. I still have the visual on that when I am under the hood messing with anything electrical. Yikes!

I worked with 2 guys at Anchor Mtr Frt that lost their wedding ring fingers. We were all told not to wear wedding rings or any other kind of ring while at work. Well, they didn't listen like a lot of us didn't. Both had gloves on and were climbing down the outside of our carhaul trailers. I know many of you have seen these types of trailers. They slipped and went to grab a handrail and missed. Their left glove caught on a burr and the burr caught their ring. Off acme all the meat from their finger. One guy completely lost his ring finger and the other walked around with his ring finger stuck inside the skin of his belly for 6 months while it healed. Which it did but never worked right after that.

Worked as a mechanic for many years and always took off wedding ring and left it on my directional signal lever when I got to work. Forgot it there and sold the car. My wife of 47 years has not let me forget.