Just bought a car and got it home and went to change the oil.
Done a routine change, started it up, quickly went into the kitchen to let my wife know I was nearly done and within that 20 second window, oil had burst out of the bottom of the engine and the oil light was on.
I had only had the car for 3 hours.
So tell me, what’s your biggest f*ck up?
Oof. Felt this in my rusty ass project 4Runner soul. Came this close to doing that on my truck but luckily I made the realization just as the bolt was starting to stretch and backed it out to find a couple threads missing halfway down the shaft. Valve jobs get new bolts now on my cars. It’s small insurance I don’t make a 45 minute job into a 4-5 day job.
In all honesty, this is something that’s almost never discussed with valve covers: you really should replace the bolts, it’s just too much heat up there (especially on old cars) they’re gonna get fucked up over time.