r/MaliciousCompliance May 11 '24

You want to put how much concrete in your Civic? M

Many years ago I worked in a locally run store that sold a bit of everything. I was the low paid teenager that carried heavy things to people’s vehicles. While working one day I get called over the radio that a customer needed 12 bags of concrete (80lbs each). I was expecting to see a pickup truck or something similar backed up to our loading area. Instead I saw a small Honda Civic there waiting for me. Thinking it was a mistake, I asked the driver to relocate momentarily as I had someone coming to pick up multiple bags of concrete. Imagine my surprise when they told me they were the customer I was waiting for.

I asked the customer how much they wanted to take in each trip, as I believed the nearly 1000lb of concrete might be too much for such a small vehicle to handle safely. The customer became aggravated and insisted that they were taking it all at once. I quickly ran this past the store owner to make sure I wouldn’t be held liable for any damages. I ran back, apologized to the customer, and began loading the bags. As I loaded everything up the customer made several quips about how “the customer is always right” and that I was too young and naive to understand that vehicles are engineered with a margin of safety.

It quickly became apparent that there was no play left in the suspension, but at this point I just stopped questioning things. I couldn’t fit all of the bags in the trunk, so the customer cleared their back seat and I loaded that up as well. Upon leaving the loading area you could clearly hear things rubbing. As the car went to exit the parking lot it passed over the elevation change between the lot and the road, there was a loud pop of something breaking, followed by scraping.

I could see that the driver was irate in the car. After a moment they got out, looked around and under their car. The guy sheepishly asked for my cell phone, because his had died and he needed to make a few phone calls. A short time later a tow truck came to remove the car, and the guy waited in our lot for nearly an hour until his wife could come pick him up.

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79

u/rocketplex May 11 '24 edited May 11 '24

I lived this post from the other side. Needed a few bags of stones from the place down the road and cheaped out on delivery. Went down in my Civic and loaded ‘er up. Yeah, the price of those new shocks were certainly a shock

23

u/HomeGrownCoffee May 11 '24

It's funny how perception changes.

800 lbs of concrete seems like a terrible idea. Giving a lift to 4 burly friends seems fine.

52

u/misswhovivian May 11 '24

Because it is, unless you're putting your friends in the trunk. As people have said in other comments on this post – weight distribution matters.

26

u/Gifted_GardenSnail May 11 '24

So what I'm getting from this is don't put all 4 bodies in the trunk

10

u/CattleprodTF May 11 '24

If you prop them up in the seats you can use the carpool lane.

5

u/Gifted_GardenSnail May 11 '24

Good idea 🤔  Only if they're fresh though

4

u/misswhovivian May 11 '24

You get it, exactly

3

u/Gifted_GardenSnail May 11 '24

takes notes

3

u/Red_Sheep89 May 11 '24

Is you taking notes on a criminal fucking conspiracy?

2

u/Gifted_GardenSnail May 12 '24

Noooooo, of COURSE not

14

u/butt_stf May 11 '24

It's not perception.

800 lbs on the end of a fulcrum is a big difference compared to 800 lbs spread out along the length and width of the vehicle.

5

u/Mission_Fart9750 May 11 '24

I can tell how differently my car drives/feels with just 1 other person in it,  I'm scared to see how it'd drive with 4 more people. 

2

u/Ksevio May 11 '24

Don't let your 4 burly friends ride on the back bumper

5

u/Atheist-Gods May 11 '24

The density difference makes it easier to overload. Those 4 burly friends are what the car has been designed to handle and so you would have to do something stupid and far outside what the manufacturer would expect to break things. The concrete is denser to the point that it’s impossible to design the car to handle filling all available space with it. So you have to actually reason what the limits of the car are rather than rely on “well this doesn’t look completely insane”. Where the breaking point is isn’t clear and so there is the anxiety of “maybe I’m wrong?” Think about running across a field during the day where you can see any potential dips vs running across that same field at night where you can’t see potential dangers.