Your worst DIY disasters?

[msfreud]

Please tell me your DIY horror stories to make me feel better about mine...

Decided today was my last chance to paint the door frame before winter (the temperature was around 12C). Opened the tin of paint indoors and was stupidly moving it out at the same time with the step ladder. Paint tin fell down, paint all over hallway carpet and the varnished wood threshold and brand new door mat. Have spent hours scrubbing the carpet (luckily am going to get wooden floors fitted to the hallway in a few months anyway). Lesson learned: always, always put dust sheets down before opening the paint tin!

Always check that there is not an open tin of paint at the top of a stepladder before you move the stepladder.

This was learned by me when I failed to do the above as I sent a streak of paint all over the sofa and the carpet. Fortunately it was water based paint and I cleaned it up successfully, but still

Do not assume electrics have been installed by a competent person. I learned that when I drilled through a live cable which went diagonally across the wall instead of straight down to the plug socket. Thank goodness the fuse tripped. I was thrown off the ladder.

DH and my first flat together was a grotty rental. We did quite a lot of work - painted, put up shelves, new toilet seats etc etc. We were very proud. One day the agent came round with a builder, saying that there was a water leak from somewhere in our building into the shop below and could they see if it was coming from us. Of course, of course they could. They looked around, couldn't see anything, went away.

They came back a week or two later, leak was still happening, could they look again. Still couldn't find anything but resealed around the bath.

Then again, a couple of weeks later, still happening. Faffed around with the kitchen sink. Presumably this was going on at the other six flats in the building as well.

This carried on for a while, until one day, just the builder came by, he'd been sent to find the leak and not give up until he had. He looked at the shelves we'd put up and got a funny look on his face, asked if they were there when we moved in. Noooooo, I said.

Well, said the builder, by the looks of that bit there, there might be a pipe running behind that wall. Better have a look.... so down come the shelves, and they opened the wall...

I still have a photo of the waste water pipe for possibly the entire building with six lovely holes drilled straight into it. DH was mortified.

We lifted our carpet in preparation for a new one arriving that day, DH bumped the living room radiator somehow and it came crashing off the wall and the pipe that feeds it with water snapped off.
It had been held on the wall by resting on a 6 inch nail.
luckily my GFather was a plumber and managed to do a repair just as the carpet fitter arrived.

Installing a kitchen cabinet on the wall that had been re-located from elsewhere... I put the brackets in too low, but the situation was rescued by finding some coins which I put on top of the brackets and then hung the cupboard from them!
Mind you, I was married to Mr Bodge-it-and-bash-it at the time, so had learnt to rescue various DIY disasters!

I decided to redecorate my bedroom when I was about 15. I took the bus to town to buy the paint. The bus home was driven by the evil step dad of a girl in my class at school and I was quite scared of him. I went to the back of the bus and remembered thinking I needed to keep a good hold of my tin of emulsion....as we turned out of the village square I'd obviously not been keeping a good hold of the paint as it was suddenly all over the seat and making it's way down the bus thanks to the village being on a hill. It was horrible, he drove to the end of my lane and parked up while I had to go and get a mop and bucket etc to clean it all up. Strangely, I still absolutely adore diy. The puppy eating a tile spacer and us having to wait 3 months for her to grow big enough for her to poo it out was alot funnier.

DH stood on the radiator (yes, I did say stood on the radiator) to check a damp patch on the ceiling.

£250 later and the radiator looked exactly the same as it had the day before and so did the damp patch.

I painted the downstairs loo. Put the mirror back in the exact same place the builders had but used a new picture hook. The new one must have been 1mm longer and punctured a water pipe behind the wall. Had to call a plumber to fix the pipe then just put the mirror over the hole in the plaster. Only fixed it just before moving a few years later.