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(TV Tonight, Saturday, October 31st, 2009) Not much on tonight, being Halloween and all.
All times are central
It’s been a busy week here at Toolmonger. If you’ve been spending time in the shop — you should! — and you haven’t had a chance to keep up with Toolmonger this week, we suggest you start with these posts, which our readers helped to select:
A Light Saber’s Little Brother
I just replaced my trusty but annoying 3AA Maglite with the incandescent bulb and twist-on lens. I’ve never been too much of a Maglite fan, but it’s hard to argue with the sheer number of them out there. They work, but now there’s a new hotness in my roll cab’s top drawer.
My Current Favorite Beater Knife
I own more than a few pocket knives — not as many as Sean, of course, but I have at least 20, including some really nice ones. But the nice ones aren’t the ones we carry around day-to-day, are they? My daily-carry knife is a total beater, and it’s the one you see pictured above: a 3-1/2″ Winchester.
Eaton M90 Rebuild: Part 3
The next series of steps in rebuilding the Eaton M90 requires some new parts and careful disassembly. An arbor press is a must for this stage. Once the snout’s removed, it needs to be disassembled. There are two bearings, a seal, a spring, and the drive shaft inside, all of which need to be removed without damaging the snout.
Jackass Projects: Porsche 944 S2, Part One
Longtime Toolmongers will remember me mentioning my Porsche project a couple of times on the blog, mostly surrounded by four-letter words and complaints about German engineers’ total disrespect of the auto mechanic and outrageously insane parts prices. But I have some good news to report: it’s running, and I’ve been daily driving it for about six months. Here’s part one of the whole (jackass) story.
Budget Shop Truck Build, Part 5: Engine Teardown
What the hell’s been going on with the Toolmonger Shop Truck Build? Well, for a while, a lot of nothing. You may have noticed that the economy isn’t exactly stellar, and honestly we just didn’t have the dough to mess with it for a while. But we’re off the dime, and the truck’s on the move again.
Help us choose next week’s Top 5!
We’d appreciate your help in choosing next week’s Top 5, which’ll be featured here, elsewhere, and in the podcast as well. While you’re reading TM this week, look out for the “Interesting Post” button at the bottom of the article:
When you see an article that piques your interest, click the button once. You’ll return to the same page, but TM’s software’ll score your click for future reference. We’ll check in on the totals before selecting next week’s Top 5.
Everyone needs a flashlight. Seriously. If it’s dark, you need light to see. And we see tons of flashlights here in the Toolmonger offices, lights in almost every flavor ranging from candy coated (gimmicky) to chicken (simple and useful for everything). Over the last year or so we’ve discovered a few favorites and thought we’d share. Here’s our fourth favorite: the four-cell Maglite.
Let’s just get the jokes out of the way up front. Yes, you can easily beat the holy crap out of someone with one of these, assuming the ass-kickee isn’t a judo or ninjutsu expert who’ll just take it from you. I’m sure that’s why so many cops and bouncers carry ‘em. And I’ll admit that mine (which I’ve had for at least 18 years) has seen such duty.
But that’s not why I bought it, nor why I still have it. I bought it because in those pre-LED days it was surprisingly bright — and it fit perfectly in the little space between the door sill and the seat in the CRX I drove in college. I kept it because it came in handy so many times I can’t even count ‘em. I’ve pounded nails in with it. I once wielded it against a water valve that wouldn’t close. I even twisted it into a tow rope one time to shorten the rope.
This is one seriously hearty* flashlight, considering its vintage. Mine still works fine — on its original bulb, no less. Sure, more modern lights push this one aside — which is why it’s #4 on the list — but I’m still glad I own it.
Update: If you’re looking to buy one of these now, Maglite offers an LED version for around $27 (see Amazon link below, and it’s available all over). If you already own one, you can update it to LED for around the same price as a new flashlight (which is why I haven’t updated mine). Again from Amazon, here’s a sampling of the upgrade modules [What’s This?] which are widely available.
Update #2: Before any of you make fun of me for using a stock photo instead of a picture of my actual light, please understand that it’s in my truck which I’ve loaned to a friend.
*Editor’s note: And hardy.
4-D-Cell Flashlight [Maglite]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
4D Maglite Via Amazon [What’s This?]
LED 4D Maglite Via Amazon [What’s This?]
I usually delete spam from my inbox without reading it, but recently an email caught my eye, touting the new Pressurex Tactile Pressure Indicating Sensor Film. I looked up the website and it looks like a handy tool for determining whether two surfaces mate well. The film has tiny “microcapsules.” When you tighten or clamp two surfaces together with the film in between, it makes the microcapsules rupture and makes a permanent picture of the forces on the surface.
Here’s an article showing the applications in assessing disc brake contact with the rotor. It seems like it would be great for any automotive assembly where you want even pressure around a gasket. It’s also a good way to diagnose any adhesive bonding problems, especially when the members are clamped as the adhesive dries. The site says they’ll provide free samples, and free is a great price.
Pressurex [Website]
Amazon has the Cobra Toilet Auger for 75 cents, a whopping 94% off the normal list price of $11.99.
The deal likely isn’t that great as it sells through acehardwareoutlet and shipping is on the order of $8.50, but then again that’s still pretty cheap compared to other prices plus shipping. It’s best to check your local hardware store first, though.
Toilet Augers are simple tools for dealing with a somewhat disgusting and annoying problem. Here’s a good guide to their use should you need it spelled out.
(TV Tonight, Friday, October 30th, 2009) Just a night of reruns for your Friday Halloween preparations; best to get carving your pumpkins…
All times are central
Longtime Toolmongers will remember me mentioning my Porsche project a couple of times on the blog, mostly surrounded by four-letter words and complaints about German engineers’ total disrespect of the auto mechanic and outrageously insane parts prices. But I have some good news to report: it’s running, and I’ve been daily driving it for about six months. Here’s part one of the whole (jackass) story.
I’ll just say it up front: I’m a total and complete sucker. When I was in high school I put on some of my more dowdy clothes (trying to dress like my dad) and headed down to the local Porsche dealership. In those (way, way) pre-9/11 days if you looked sorta OK, you could test drive a car without so much as showing a driver’s license — and that’s what I did. I conned the poor sales guy into handing over the keys to a shiny new 944 S2, one of just a few at dealerships around the country.
It was an awesome car (at the time): 208 horsepower from a normally-aspirated 3.0L four-cylinder, just 30 or so HP less than the Turbo, but without those nasty ’80s turbocharging woes. It had the Turbo’s slick nose and tail, too, plus a bevy of next-level s#!t like four-wheel anti-lock brakes and dual airbags. It was a serious automobile that listed for over $40,000 — back then.
As you might imagine, I trounced on it. I hammered it up, down, and around the local freeway and underpasses, and generally had a severely good time before returning it to the salesman, expressing disinterest, and insinuating that maybe if he got in something more interesting I’d be back.
Then a couple of years ago I was over in Mississippi visiting a friend and we stopped by his daughter’s house. And in his driveway I saw sitting a definitely-no-longer-mint 1989 Porsche 944 S2 — even the same color as the one I flogged about as a kid. With about 65k on the odometer, the owner apparently bought it from a guy in Florida a couple of years earlier, then parked it when the water pump crapped out.
(OK, that’s not entirely true. He pulled the belts off, realized he had no idea how to put ‘em back on, called a couple of shops to discover it’d cost north of $2k to fix his mess, then parked it. Then backed a trailer into the driver’s door.)
I pretty much went stupid at that point, forgetting that if he drove it much after the water pump failure, he might’ve cause all sorts of nastiness inside that rare engine. And when I say “rare,” I mean r-a-r-e. Forget junkyarding. While you can find fenders, seats, suspension components, and so on all over since they’re shared with other various 944 models, the engine in the S2 is unique. And that means you’re looking for one of the few thousand that made it to U.S. shores.
I also forgot that 944 water pump replacement is filed under “oh God no” in the book mechanics use to determine “book rates.” It’s a nasty job. You’ve got to remove all the accessory belts, the timing belt, the balance shaft belt, and pretty much most of the front of the engine to get at it. Then you’ve gotta access a ton of near-inaccessible bolts to remove the pump, install the new one, and reverse the process. And that’s when everything goes right.
I also forgot that these cars just aren’t worth that much and paid out my nose for it. Sure, it’s still only a couple of grand. But in hindsight I should have offered $500. Live and learn, right?
At this point Sean enters the story, as I convinced him to drive out to Mississippi with me to trailer it back. Besides making the run in a super hurry because we didn’t have much time to spare, we also had the joy of loading it by ourselves sans winch.
Did I also mention there were three or four wasp nests under the car, too? I really wish I had a video of Sean shooting 20′ streams of waspicide into the air like the fountains at the Bellagio while fleeing the scene. Or pictures of us driving the truck into a ditch to try and get the trailer as level as possible. Or audio recordings of the words we used when our arms fell completely off ratcheting a come-along to get the car the last bit of the way onto the trailer. Sadly, I don’t. You’ll just have to trust me that it was an adventure, and we did finally get the car back into my driveway at home.
And then the real fun began.
Spline wrenches are cool because you can turn a variety of different fastener heads such as hex, partially rounded hex, 12pt, square, external Torx, and yes, even spline heads, with one wrench. If you’re willing to give up the ratcheting feature in the Stanley Proto and SK spline wrenches, you can get a set of seven Craftsman combo open end/box spline wrenches from Sears for under $20.
Craftsman angles the wrench heads by 15° to save your knuckles and they reinforce the open end so the wrench doesn’t deform under high torque, rounding the head. The set normally includes 5/16″, 3/8″, 7/16″, 1/2″, 9/16″, and 11/16″ wrenches, but to be nice Sears is throwing in a 5/8″ wrench and a storage tray.
Universal Wrench Set [Sears]
What the hell’s been going on with the Toolmonger Shop Truck Build? Well, for a while, a lot of nothing. You may have noticed that the economy isn’t exactly stellar, and honestly we just didn’t have the dough to mess with it for a while. But we’re off the dime, and the truck’s on the move again.
Once we got the engine out and on its stand we discovered we had a lot of work ahead of us. (Remember: a “free” truck is never free.) Time did a number on this truck, and its previous owner had ridden it hard and put it away wet more than once. Under the hood was just as rough as the interior and body work. In fact, it was worse.
Old auto repair wisdom states that dirt washes off; it’s what’s underneath that counts. What was underneath this pile of nasty was, well, pretty nasty, too.
Back before we pulled the engine we took the truck to our favorite local mechanic, who took a look and suggested that the lower engine just needed to be cleaned on the inside and the pistons and crank were fine — but the upper engine had to go. Most of the seals were gone and the heads just weren’t right. After a little shopping online we decided to forgo rebuilding the heads and just replace ‘em. So our job now that we had easy access was to strip the old motor down to the block.
If you’ve never taken an old-ass engine apart before, this is what you’re likely to find. There’s buildup and scoring on almost everything — lots of black, gunk, and nasty s#!t. At least everything’s easy to get at now that the engine’s on a stand — even our crappy 2×4 stand. There’s more room to work and you can get a better bead on trouble spots.
A good manual will make the whole tear-down process a lot easier, but we didn’t have hundreds of dollars in our budget for factory manuals. So instead we just shelled out $25 to AllDataDIY.com for online access to their tech material on our make and model. Sure, these old V8s are pretty simple, and you might be able to get away without some online help. But a decent manual provides a clear picture of what has to come off as well as where you can find bolts long since MIA under caked layers of muck.
Just go slow and work from the top down. Remember everything went on at one point, so it’ll come off. You might blow through a couple cans of penetrator (and end up busting out a heavy wrench) but even the nastiest bolts will come off. Our friends at Stanley lent us a set of their Professional series auto tools — reinforced and heavy walled for engine work — which made things a little easier.
Our first clue that this wasn’t going to be pretty came when we pulled the distributor. The shaft read like a core sample from an ice flow. It said “dirty times ahead.”
Eight bolts and a few screws after the distributor came our first moment of horror. The intake manifold and valve covers came loose and the true scope of 200k plus miles was laid bare for us to see. It wasn’t pretty.
The valves were all caked over or stuck open. Some rods were slightly bent and others looked fine. Coolant ports were gooped up and springs were filled with so much spent, dried-up oil that the rockers had a tough time compressing them.
Thankfully we’d already decided to scrap the heads, springs, rods and rockers. So, an hour of wrenching and three hours of careful scraping and wiping with plastic knives and chemical loaded rags later, one side of the block was ready to go.
The other side was just about as bad. But one night of hardcore scrubbing got us where we needed to be to stop: a clean engine sans heads.
Next up: we order our parts.
If you bought one of the Halloween-themed flashlights pictured above from Target recently, you should “immediately stop using the flashlights and return the product to any Target store for a full refund.” The CPSC reports that these flashlights “can overheat and melt, posing a burn hazard to consumers.” So far the manufacturer has heard of eight such incidents, “including one report of burns to the hand.”
Or hey, better yet, skip the Halloween-themed gear when it comes to the important stuff. If you want to give your kids a flashlight to carry during the yearly loot-fest, why not go with a tried-and-true quality flashlight? Bonus: it’s far less likely to end up in the trash can once we move on to Turkey day and X-Mas.
Sean previously covered the Veritas twin screw vise with a chain drive here at TM. Evidently Lie-Nielsen thought it was such a good idea they produced their own chain drive vise. The concept behind both vises is simple: make sure the large jaw closes parallel by turning both screws the same amount.
The 1-1/8″ x 5tpi screws are made from rolled thread acme rod and are designed to give you a maximum opening of 8-1/4″. You can choose to set the screws 8″, 12″, 18″, or 24″ apart depending on your needs. Four bronze bushings and four needle bearing and washer assemblies reduce wear and make the vise operate smoothly.
The hardware to make the vise will run you $285 with $18 shipping. You can either buy a pre-made jaw with 12″ screw spacing for $70 plus $12 shipping or “borrow” an installation kit for a $45 deposit. The vise handle, which can be mounted on either the right or left screw, is sold separately for $35.
Chain Drive Vise [Lie-Nielsen]
A day spent sanding is a day spent in hell. Unfortunately I like my projects to come out looking good. Over the last few years we’ve spent hours upon hours “in the grit.” Gator products are normally what get stuck to the bottom of the sander or wrapped around a block. One of Gator’s newest creations is the Ultra Power paper with Black Zirconium.
What’s the big deal, right? Yeah, that’s what I thought as well, until we had some in the shop recently. Gator claims it sands three times faster and last three times as long. We can’t put numbers like that to it but we can say our projects move faster with the Zirconium-loaded discs, and we don’t switch them out as often. In our book that’s a win.
The new Ultra Power black Zirconium is available in 50, 80, 120 and 220 grit and will run you about the same couple of bucks as most other sandpaper.
Black Zirconium Sandpaper [Gator Products]
Craftsman’s 8-amp variable speed reciprocating saw is on sale right now in Sears stores and online for $59.88, about 25% off its normal price. The trigger-operated saw runs up to 2,500 strokes per minute with a 1-1/8 inch long blade stroke.
Recip saws are a Halloween favorite around here for carving out your favorite scary pumpkin face and making with the gourd carnage. And of course, you can wipe the slime off and use the saw for other things throughout the year, too.
Craftsman 8 Amp Reciprocating Saw with Soft Carry Bag & 3 pc. Blade Assortment [Craftsman]
How to Carve Pumpkins with Power Tools [ExtremePumpkins.com]
(TV Tonight, Thursday, October 29th, 2009) We get new episodes of American Chopper and Street Customs — finally TLC is giving us something to watch even if it involves Larry King and overpriced slacker shoes.
All times are central
Instead of adjusting the air flow at the compressor, Astro Pneumatics’ digital flow regulator screws right onto your spray gun or other air tool to precisely control the flow of air. Love it or hate it, instead of a analog gauge it uses a digital readout.
Constructed with a mirror-plated finish, the regulator’s electronics are sealed and the display is behind impact-proof glass. Unfortunately this also means the battery’s not replaceable, but the display shuts off 45 seconds after you press the button to give the battery a life expectancy of 5,000 readings.
You connect the diaphragm regulator to your supply at the 1/4″ NPT inlet, and the device regulates pressures from 2.5 to 160psi. What I don’t exactly understand is why they call it a flow regulator when it sounds like it’s actually regulating pressure?
As with most tools there’s always the Harbor Freight equivalent at about 1/3 the price. The Astro Pneumatics regulator runs about $40, while you can pick up the Central Pneumatics knock-off for $12.
Digital Flow Regulator [Astro Pneumatics]
Digital Flow Regulator [Harbor Freight]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Dynamite Tool currently has the Channellock 350S 9-Inch Ironworkers Plier with Spring for $19.50.
The 350S is designed mainly for working with rebar tie wires (baling wire!). The hook at the end of the handle is a stop for the hand and allows pulling with greater force when tightening the wire. We never thought about the lack of a return spring on other pliers of this size, but it does make the repetitive opening and closing of pliers much easier. They are also available on Amazon for $20.50 and eligible for Super Saver shipping so that may be a better deal if you’re ordering other stuff.
Channellock 350S 9-Inch Ironworkers Plier with Spring [dynamitetoolco.com]
Via Amazon
If you want to know how the welding supply industry is reacting to the cordless market, take a gander at the Trek 180 battery-powered MIG Welder. It’s awesomeness in a 52-lb. box.
We’re not saying this is meant to replace a larger shop model, and neither is Hobart. What the Trek 180 is designed to do is take care of small jobs when you are away from anything resembling civilization. The rig can run off its own 120 amp 17VDC battery or from an 115V power outlet with a 20 percent duty cycle.
It doesn’t sound like a lot until you are miles from nowhere with a busted-ass whatever you need to take care of on the spot. Then the little Trek 180 looks awfully powerful. Of course, this assumes you have a burning need to shell $1400 for this convenience. Then again we have met some off-road guys that would be all over this.
Trek 180 Cordless MIG Welder [Hobart]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Part of the fun of doing TM posts is the discovery of tools I’d never seen or used. The Ideal 9-in-1 Ratch-A-Nut Screwdriver is one such beast. It’s a ratcheting screwdriver with 1/4″ and 3/16″ slotted bits, #1 and #2 Phillips bits, 1/4″, 5/16″, and 7/16″ nutdrivers on one end, plus a ratcheting wire nut wrench on the back end that can handle a variety of wire connectors. The typical price runs around $19, but True Value has it for a bit over $9.
Ratch-A-Nut [Manufacturer's Site]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Ratch-A-Nut Via Amazon [What’s This?]
The CobraHead® Weeder and Cultivator (modestly called “The Best Tool In Earth®”) can apparently do almost everything “with ease”: weeding, cultivating, scalping (?), edging, digging, furrowing, planting, transplanting, de-thatching, and harvesting. Its “steel fingernail®” blade works in almost any soil, and is easily used by either the left or the right hand.
It comes in two sizes: the short handle for $25, and the long handle (48″, 54″, or 60″) for $60. Prices include shipping to the USA or Canada.
It certainly sounds good, and all the reviews on Amazon are positive. Have any Toolmongers used the CobraHead? What’s your impression?
CobraHead [Manufacturer's Site]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
CobraHead Via Amazon [What’s This?]
If you sharpen your own handsaws or backsaws, the Gramercy Tools 14″ Saw Vise, seen on Ron Hock’s The Sharpening Blog, might just be the clamp you’re looking for. Its ¼” thick machined steel jaws are set at 45° to the saw, providing clearance for your files and allowing you to slope the gullets. The rotating clamping cam has lots of travel and provides plenty of pressure at the jaws. It’s designed to be bolted to a bench for more rigidity and less flex.
The Tools for Working Wood site has some interesting notes on how the design process went for this saw vise.
The vise’s pre-production price is $98.95 (shipment “sometime in October”).
14″ Saw Vise [Manufacturer's Site]
Anyone who has seen his work will tell you that Toolmonger reader Txinkman has some great toolbox restorations. It seems this little cube is no exception. Again we turn green as Txinkman describes in his typical humble way his latest project.
Mostly a clean up job. Glued down loose letherette, polished metal, refinished the drawers, and cleaned paint and residue from the cover. Then redyed it and gave it a couple of hits of black shoe polish.
Sure, sure, just a little nip and tuck, a bit of spit and polish and voilá — a perfect, new-looking toolbox. Don’t let him fool you; normally more than a few hours go into a project like this, and the great ones always make it look easy. In any case, it turned out great, as we might expect.
Toolmonger Photo Pool [Flickr]
(TV Tonight, Wednesday, October 28th, 2009) We get a new Mythbusters about kitchen grease fires and cheese cannon balls. Also, a new Time Warp.
All times are central
The next series of steps in rebuilding the Eaton M90 requires some new parts and careful disassembly. An arbor press is a must for this stage. Once the snout’s removed, it needs to be disassembled. There are two bearings, a seal, a spring, and the drive shaft inside, all of which need to be removed without damaging the snout. Only two snout parts carry over from the old to the rebuilt blower: the drive shaft, and the press-on, three-stud coupler.
The studded coupler must be removed first, a job handled nicely by a gear puller. Putting it back on is real fun, but we’ll cover that later. Once the drive shaft and end coupler are separated, the shaft can be pressed out the front of the housing. Since the front bearing is larger than the rear, you can also press the shaft out from the front, then separate the shaft, rear bearing, and drive coupler later. Once the snout bearings, male coupler, and shaft are removed, you’re left with a bare snout. Give that a good cleaning, and it’s ready to accept the new bearings.
From here, you’ll need a rebuild kit for the snout. Two bearings, a shaft seal, and some GM supercharger oil completes the shopping list. Mine came from Rolling Performance, and I opted for the uprated Viton nose seal (since I don’t believe in half measures with gaskets) and standard bearings. High-life ceramic bearings are available for a little extra.
Rolling Performance [Manufacturer's Site]
I keep a couple of crappy dead blow hammers around the shop, but this new kit from S-K blows ‘em away. The hammer features a non-slip “flanged-butt” design — stop snickering, it’s just bigger at the bottom so you don’t accidentally throw the hammer. And the kit includes eight color-coded screw-on tips in various hardnesses.
The tips range from “super-soft” to “extra-hard,” and the kit also includes a brass-face tip. The whole shebang fits into a nice blow-molded plastic case. One bit of bad news: it ain’t cheap. It lists for $148. But you can find it from various online distributors (including Amazon) for around $70.
9-Piece Replaceable Tip Hammer Set [S-K]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
A commenter after a recent Toolmonger post about French curves complained about the cost of 3D software, which is a very good point. Retail copies of software like SolidWorks, Autodesk Inventor, or CATIA can go for ridiculous amounts. No, seriously. Their markups can make Snap-On reps run for cover.
But, as is the case with basically every rule in human history, there’s a loophole. An online retailer called JourneyEd offers software at educational prices, which are massively less than retail. SolidWorks, my graphics program of choice, sells for $140 through JourneyEd, but full retail is $2995. 95.3% off, anyone?
The catch is, only students are allowed to buy the software, but JourneyEd won’t check on exactly who the end user is. If you have a kid in high school, or access to any student ID, you’re set. It’s a great way to add some high technology to your arsenal.
SolidWorks [JourneyEd]
NX 6 [JourneyEd]
Inventor Pro 9 [JourneyEd]
You wire your shop for electricity and run ducting for your dust collection system, so why not outfit your shop with compressed air outlets where you’ll need them rather than dragging the air hose around?
RapidAir makes running air lines throughout the shop as easy as running PEX water line. You don’t have to cut and thread pipe or mess with pipe dope at the fittings. The system can handle pressures up to 150 PSI using just flexible 1/2″ nylon tubing and simple push-on fittings.
Pricing for the master kit starts at $140; it includes one compressor manifold, two outlets, and 100′ of 1/2″ blue nylon tubing. Outlets, tubing, and fittings are also available separately.
Master Kit [RapidAir]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
From WPXI News in Pittsburgh:
Roy Rubin, 62, is accused of trying to stab a neighbor at his home in Union Township with a power tool. Police said Rubin cut down his neighbor’s chain-link fence with a Sawzall.”
WPXI says Rubin then “allegedly punched his neighbor in the face and went after him with the power tool, according to police.” It seems the neighbor was able to unplug the saw.
As a Toolmonger, I can’t help but wonder how this fight might’ve started. I’ve certainly seen my share of neighborly disputes over fences. Hell, two of the most-damaging-to-calm-living words ever invented are “shared fence.”
I remember a guy living down the street from me in Orlando, Florida, back in the early ’90s getting a $5,600 bill from his neighbor who’d unilaterally decided hire out the job of building a 12′ board-on-board cedar beauty on their shared fence line. When said non-new-fence-desiring guy pointed out he didn’t have $5,600 (and wouldn’t have spent it on the fence if he did), nastiness ensued, starting with ugly words, escalating to legal action, and culminating in unhappy living ’till one of the two moved.
And I also wonder whether the tool was really a Milwaukee or a recip saw of other make. Seems it made short work of the fence.
(Thanks, ben matthews, for the great CC-licensed photo.)
Man Allegedly Threatens Neighbor With Power Tool [WPXI Pittsburgh]
This weekend I read a thread on the Practical Machinist forum asking what size hole to drill for a given diameter of spring pin (which we often call a roll pin). I never gave it much thought, but it turns out to be a pretty simple answer: drill the hole of the nominal size of the spring pin (and in many cases up to a few thousandths over), so for a 1/8″ spring pin, a 1/8″ diameter hole. I decided to poke around and of course Machinery’s Handbook has all the data for both slotted and spiral spring pins.
Never being one to overlook a chance to waste time on the internet I did some surfing and found the technical data from both Driv-Lok and Spirol (slotted pins, coiled pins) for their spring pins. Spirol also has application case studies, such as this interesting look at the way to replace machined, clip retained, pins with spring pins in an air rifle trigger. No data is available for the cheap import pins found in those assortments from Harbor Freight, etc. so we wouldn’t use the technical data for quality pins when designing with the imports.
Spring Pin Applications [DRIV-LOK]
Application Case Studies [Spirol]
We’ve seen this before: Craftsman will etch names, slogans or whatever else on the side of each piece for a super-customized set of special “heirloom” tools. You know, like M&Ms, but a crap-ton more expensive. But every time I see these, I get a different vibe. Sometimes I love the idea, and sometimes not so much.
Admittedly, I could write “now quit borrowing mine, jackhole!” on the wrenches, leaving my future kids to wonder what uncle Sean meant by that when they inherit the tools 40 years from now. But then again, you could snag another whole plain-Jane kit for the difference in price. (So theoretically at least, the jackholes could steal a set.)
I’d risk a quarter on one thing, though: I bet sales of these skyrocket around the holidays. What do you think? Do you own any? Do you wish you did?
Street pricing runs around $200.
Personalized 187 pc. Tool Set [Craftsman]
(TV Tonight, Tuesday, October 27th, 2009) We get a new Dirty Jobs tonight that seems to be about dromedary husbandry. We’re sure to get a gratuitous and salacious reference to their digits.
All times are central
Are these awesome pry bars? I don’t own these, but I’m gonna guess not. So if you’re prying the tops off nuclear reactors or something, this one might be more your speed. But if you’re just looking for a way to keep your screwdrivers from ending up bent or otherwise molested, they sound pretty great (considering the price).
I can clearly remember my dad removing a screwdriver (or once a micrometer — hey, I was six at the time) from my grubby little hand, replacing it with the correct tool for the job: one of the many cheap-ass pry bars he kept around. We scored ours from the flea market — still a great place to look. But now you can score a set of three for six lousy bucks at Harbor Freight. Consider it an investment in keeping your real tools safe.
3-Piece Heavy Duty Pry Bar Set [Harbor Freight]
Reader Jeff Immer always makes me feel lazy. I have two dozen half-finished projects laying about and he’s busting out ceiling art. This Air-Cav insignia is the bomb and a half for the unit’s new hang out — also built buy Mr. Immer.
You can keep pace with some guys. But some guys make your other half smack your arm and ask why the new dresser drawer set you started back in the summer isn’t done yet. Jeff is the latter. And you’ve just got to love the fact that he enjoys his work so much that keeping the unit outta the rain isn’t enough. It’s gotta be better.
Toolmonger Photo Pool [Flickr]
Necessary Numbers: An Everyday Guide to Sizes, Measures, and More by Mary Blocksma may not make you the “Cliff Clavin” of your local pub, but it will give you a broad overview of all types of numbers. An expanded version of her earlier book Reading the Numbers: A Survival Guide to the Measurements, Numbers, and Sizes Encountered in Everyday Life, this one covers a variety of diverse numbers including zip codes, highway route numbers, pencil leads, bar codes, SS numbers, clothing sizes, and — as the title says — “more.”
A new paperback costs $12, but you can find used copies for around $4, or “swap” for the earlier version.
Necessary Numbers [Barnes & Noble]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Reading The Numbers [PaperBackSwap]
The name of this is “Improved Video Inspection System.” Improved from what? The cordless driver they used the case to make this?
This feels overpriced to me. Like the gun-style form factor will make up for all the things that the Milwaukee already does that this can’t.
The Milwaukee has more modes and better attachments along with the bad-ass battery system. Save your cash if you need one and find one with the white lighting bolt on the side. Just say’n.
Improved Video Inspection System [Garrett Wade]
You’re rolling down the road and the sound of your own trailer’s driving you crazy. That unholy racket could be caused by the hitch bar being loose in the receiver. Luckily there are a few ready-made solutions that’ll dampen that clanking.
Just slip Valley’s anti-rattle hitch bracket over the hitch bar and tighten the bar against the receiver with a single bolt. Made from steel, the bracket fits most 2″ square receiver hitches. If Valley’s anti-rattle hitch bracket just doesn’t get the job done, there’s always the Eliminator from Surco. This beefy anti-sway bracket slips over the 2″ hitch bars and clamps down on both the bar and the hitch with 16 points of contact on all four sides! Surco coats the steel bracket with a rust-resistant black powder coat.
If Valley’s anti-rattle bracket will work for you it’ll only set you back $20; otherwise you’ll need fifty bucks from that “friend” of yours to buy the Eliminator.
Valley Towing Street Pricing [Google Products]
Eliminator Street Pricing [Google Products]
Valley Street Pricing [Google Products]
Eliminator Street Pricing [Google Products]
Valley Via Amazon
Eliminator Via Amazon [What’s This?]
The Noden Adjust-A-Bench uses a pair of 26.25″ tall nesting frames that can ratchet up, using foot pedals, another 16.5″ via 12 locking stops (1.5″ increments) to provide the legs for a bench that can easily change height.
A basic kit (17″ W leg sets, 2 foot pedals, hardware package, and assembly instructions) costs $430 plus $60 shipping and handling. You provide the bench top (18″ min. recommended width) and the rails. Available accessories include different width castor packages (17″, 22″, 28″, and 40″; $160 plus $30 S & H), rail brackets, standard rails, and threaded rod. Complete benches (leg sets, bench rails, threaded rod, and solid hard maple butcher block top) are also available starting at $800 (60″ × 30″ × 1 3/4″ top, or 72″ × 24″ × 1 3/4″ top). The kit is designed and manufactured in the US.
I like the idea of an adjustable-height bench for many reasons, including that I would be less likely to tweak my back when the work surface is at a reasonable level. Have any Toolmongers used this bench? What’s your opinion?
Adjust-A-Bench [Manufacturer's Site]
Adjust-A-Bench Leg Set Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Get all those weird endoscopic thoughts out of your head*. This USB Snake Scope “is a handy pipeline inspection and surveillance tool to help examine places that are hard to reach.” Powered by your computer’s USB port, the water-resistant camera head has two adjustable white LEDs for illumination and a 54° viewing angle f/2.8 lens with a 6 cm to infinity focal distance. Its 1/6″ CMOS VSA sensor (640×480 pixels) can take up to 30 fps videos, and also has a snapshot function. This flexible borescope’s cost ranges from $49 (but from a UK supplier, so shipping could be a tad expensive) to $74, and you also get a clip-on magnet for retrieving ferrous metal objects.
*Although I must admit I paused when I got to the “Insert into Post” command for adding its picture to the TM blog.
USB Snakescope Camera [Firebox]
Handheld USB Snake Scope [USB Fever]
USB Snake Scope Camera [Manufacturer's Site]
(TV Tonight, Monday, October 26th, 2009) Worse than Sunday — no better night to head out to the shop instead.
All times are central
(TV Tonight, Sunday, October 25th, 2009) endless reruns of How It’s Made for a second night in a row.
All times are central
(TV Tonight, Saturday, October 24th, 2009) Mythbusters and How It’s Made for your enjoyment tonight.
All times are central
I own more than a few pocket knives — not as many as Sean, of course, but I have at least 20, including some really nice ones. But the nice ones aren’t the ones we carry around day-to-day, are they? My daily-carry knife is a total beater, and it’s the one you see pictured above: a 3-1/2″ Winchester.
It’s not fancy, but I did put some work into it. In fact, since it’s so cheap (between $8 and $12 dollars at a local sporting goods store) I picked up four of ‘em. Then I picked my favorite two and spent a weekend opening and closing ‘em to work in the 3-in-1 and wear ‘em in. And, of course, I conned my favorite sharpener into working the blade with his best gear.
The result: a cheap-ass knife that works well, but with which I’m not afraid to hack an aluminum can in half, break down boxes by the trash can, or pry at things.
What’s your daily-carry beater?
Well-known electronics tool manufacturer Weller offers a whole mini-website aimed at promoting their Zero-Smog campaign: a plea to you to stop breathing in the nasty stuff released in the air when you’re soldering. And even a quick look at the site shows that the contaminants you smell when soldering are truly hideous health-wise.
Even after you’ve switched to lead-free solder, Weller says there’s still plenty of nasty left — everything from airborne particulate matter to toxic gasses and solvents. Thankfully their mini-site offers lots of advice to help you understand the risks and the options available to you to prevent experiencing those risks.
Of course, it’s no surprise that Weller recommends their own products. But even if you don’t choose Weller, the site’s a great read. Their selection guide walks you through the whole process from selecting either a tip or volume extraction system — tip extraction sucks up the nasty right from the tip of your iron while volume extraction pulls air from around the work area — to maintaining it and understanding how using an extraction system might impact your work.
Remember: The life you save might be your own. Or that of an employee with a workplace injury lawyer for a cousin.
Zero-Smog [Weller]
I just replaced my trusty but annoying 3AA Maglite with the incandescent bulb and twist-on lens. I’ve never been too much of a Maglite fan, but it’s hard to argue with the sheer number of them out there. They work, but now there’s a new hotness in my roll cab’s top drawer.
It’s Dorcy’s 160-lumen, 3AA K2, model number 41-4297. I’ve had it for about six hours, and I have no idea why the switch took me so bloody long. It’s a pocket rocket; I’d swear it’s brighter than a lot of car headlights. At about 5″ long, it’s pretty compact, though the flared lens housing makes it a little uncomfortable in one’s pocket. It’s a small price to pay, though, for swapping my peashooter for a tactical nuke. The switch on the rear is translucent, showing a battery status light that stays green until the battery life drops below 20%, then it switches to red.
Dorcy has the 3AAA K2 on sale for $35 before shipping, which is annoying since I just laid down $40 at Craftsman for it. Better yet, Amazon stocks it for $25, also before shipping. Serves me right for getting it out of the package before I got home. At $25, this one strikes me as a no-brainer if you need a light. And, if the K2 isn’t quite up your strasse, Dorcy makes a huge variety of intensities and sizes.
Dorcy Flashlights [Dorcy]
Dorcy 160-lumen, 3AA K2 LED Via Amazon [What’s This?]
The whole point behind owning utility lighters is that they fit into much smaller spaces than a big torch — and they give you a little room to get something lit without igniting yourself in the process. This lighter from Bernzomatic totally fits the bill: you can contort its flexible stem into all sorts of odd shapes to put the (”windproof”) flame exactly where you need it.
A built-in LED light helps if you happen to be, say, grilling at night — or trying to light a cooker from the back side. It’s refillable, too, just like most kitchen torches. And unlike my kitchen torch, the Bernzomatic includes a little window so you can see how much fuel’s left. You know, before you carry it out to the camp site sans refill.
$17 to $20 will buy you the lighter and a couple of refills, and I’d be willing you bet you can find this in most sporting goods stores as well as a few smoke shops.
Flexible Utility Lighter [Bernzomatic]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
The Art of Japanese Joinery by Kiyosi Seike is one of those books that shows how far one can take wood joinery as an art, not merely as a functional process. The book starts with the history and philosophy of Japanese architecture as it relates to joinery, then (at least in my edition) there are 57 pages of pictures of wood joints, 9 of which are examples as found in Japanese buildings. The remainder are simple pictures of joints between two pieces of wood. The joints range from the simple scarf joint to the insanely complex joint such as the “Mechigai-koshikake-kama-tsugi” - lapped goose-neck mortise and tenon joint with stub tenons and “Kanawa-tsugi,” mortised rabbited oblique scarf joint. Some of the joints are truly puzzle-like in construction.
The text continues with a chapter on the functions of Japanese joinery, then a chapter on “Tsugite,” splicing joints and finally “Shiguchi,” connecting joints, both of which have drawings showing the construction of the joints with hidden lines for further clarification and obfuscation.
All in all it’s a great read for those seeking to complicate their woodworking and push the boundaries of the craft! It’s available on Amazon for a reasonable $18.21 and around $5.00 on the Internet generally.
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
We’ve covered miter sliders before, but here’s a different take on the problem from Micro Jig. Rather than use set screws or “adjusting disks” to fit into a miter slot without slop, their ZeroPlay guide bar uses two stacked half-bars that expand and contract along the entire length of the bar so it’ll work in any 3/4″ wide by 3/8″ deep miter slot — even Shopsmith and General miter slots.
Micro Jig manufactures the 9-1/2″ guide bar from a composite material. Two pins on the top bar ride two wedges on the bottom bar, so depending on which direction the bars move past each other, the width of the stacked bars either expands or contracts. When the bars match the exact width of the slot you secure them together with three button-head screws.
MicroJig claims the Zero Play jig is available at many online shops like Rockler and Woodcraft, but the only place we could find it was Hartville Tool, where you can get two ZeroPlay guide bars, two stops, some hardware, instructions, and jig plans for $22.
Zero Play Guide Bar [Micro Jig]
Zero Play Guide Bar [Hartville Tool]
Fed Tactical has the Lyman 1200 Pro Tumbler right now for $44.48.
Vibratory tumblers (mass finishers) of this type (relatively light duty) are used for dry media finishing and polishing. In this case they are being marketed to reloaders who use them to clean and polish brass cartridge cases before reloading, but they work well for all sorts of mass polishing such as jewelry. The media used is often sawdust or walnut impregnated with various polishing compounds. It is rated to hold 2 lbs. of media and will clean up to 350 cases at a time. I have a load of earrings going right now in my similar Midway tumbler, which is much easier than buffing.
1200 Pro Tumbler [fedtactical.com]
(TV Tonight, Friday, October 23rd, 2009) A night of HIM and HDTDT reruns, as is all to usual…
All times are central
Noted on Fine Woodworking’s web site, this set of three DVDs by Canadian woodworker Hendrik Varju has a total of almost six hours of videos. The videos cover a host of things about wood and its use, including wood’s basic structure, different cuts of lumber, wood movement and a formula for it, orienting growth rings, cross-grain construction, breadboard ends, and examples of wood and furniture pieces. The videos’ table of contents can be seen by using the pdf link below. Price for the set is $80 CDN plus shipping, handling, and applicable taxes (that would be $76+ using 10/21/09 conversion rates).
Wood Science & Design [Manufacturer's Site]
Wood Science & Design Table of Contents [PDF]
Looking at a printed circuit board (PCB), ever wonder how they bend every one of those resistor leads perfectly every time? Depending on how many PCB’s are in a production run, you’d use different tools. For a run of one or two boards, you could always try a pair of pliers and a keen eye, or you could use a plastic lead former. If you’re running a ton of boards at once, a better solution would be a lead forming machine from a company like PEI.
Slots for radial lead resistors run along the length of the high impact ABS plastic former. Each slot is .05″ longer than the next and has radiused edges to make perfect bends without stressing the leads. It can be used to bend the leads of 1/2 watt resistors, 1/4 watt resistors, and diodes.
The lead forming machines, on the other hand, can take a strip of taped axial components and spit out components ready to be stuffed onto a PCB board. The machines cut the leads and bend them to a variety of different shapes depending on what you need. They can be motorized or hand-powered to save some dough.
Pricing for the plastic lead former starts at $5 before shipping. If you don’t have a PCB stuffing house, you probably can’t afford a PEI lead forming machine — if you do run a production house you can’t afford not to have a tool like it.
Lead Forming Tool [Jameco]
Lead Forming Tool [Wassco]
Lead Forming Tool [Evil Mad Scientist]
Axial Machines [Olamef]
Want to get the kids involved in handiwork but not ready to hand over your power drill to a first-grader? Arizona Tools offers a cool gift idea for kids aged around 6-10: Allied’s Junior Cruiser Assortment Tool Set. Aside from giving them a chance to spend time with Dad or Mom or Grandpa Joe, it goes a long way toward developing dexterity and a sense of independence (read: when they’re thirty they won’t still be calling you to help them put air in a tire).
The kit is made with heat-treated, likely inexpensive materials (the whole set retails for under $30) including a flashlight (batteries not included), tire gauge, Phillips and flathead screwdrivers, 18 hex keys (SAE/Metric with holders), a 10′ tape measure, 6″ slip joint pliers, a 1/4″ spinner handle, and 20 1/4″ drive sockets of various SAE and metric sizes. Customer reviews at Arizona Tools are positive, though many folks wish that it included a hammer. Then again, when you’re eight, everything’s a hammer.
Allied Junior Cruiser Assortment Tool Set [Arizona Tools]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Allied Junior Tool Sets Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Right now Total Tool and Home has the Dremel 220-01 Workstation for $33.39.
Basically an updated version of Dremel’s old drill press stand for the Dremel rotary tool, the workstation allows regular drill press use of the Dremel as well as positioning it up to 90 degrees for angled drilling (in our opinion it’s always better to angle the work not the head) and for holding the Dremel for controlled work while holding the workpiece with both hands. It also will hold the flexible shaft attachment, and telescopes up to 29″ for hanging the Dremel out of the way. Of course, a dedicated drill press is always a better solution, but if space and budget are a factor this may be what you need.
It’s worth noting that Amazon has it for $39.63 with super saver shipping, so that may be a better deal.
Dremel 220-01 Workstation [totaltoolandhome.com]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Ever since we launched Toolmonger and started letting hundreds of thousands of other tool folks in on our tool-related conversations, we’ve tried to excise our habits of calling all tools by one manufacturer’s brand name. Just like people down here in the South call all soft drinks “a Coke” (No, really. We do), we used to call all circ saws Skilsaws, all portable band saws Porta-Bands, and all adjustable wrenches Crescent wrenches.
So you’ll have to forgive me when I think of every small, elongated, cordless vacuum as a Dustbuster. They’re not — especially when they’re completely different, like this model from Makita. This one’s clearly designed as a floor sweeper, kind of like the cheap-o model I have at home for sucking up stray cat litter in the utility room or peppercorns in the kitchen. But more importantly, it’s powered by Makita’s 10.8V tool batteries.
The specifics: Makita says you get 12 minutes of use from a single li-ion battery and if you twist it open in the middle you’ll find a two-stage cleanable cloth filter. It’s bagless, too, so you just open it and dump it.
Makita offers an 18V model as well, in case you’re invested in the 18V line but not the 10.8V line. (Which, incidentally, we could see. Makita’s 18V tools seem quite popular among our readers, especially on the West coast. But Makita’s 10.8V line meets some pretty serious challengers from Bosch, Milwaukee, and others.) But Makita says you’ll only get 10 minutes out of the 18V battery. Maybe it sucks harder.
Regardless, they run between $70 and $100 online.
By the way, Sean, being the ever-stubborn bastard* that he is (bless his heart), solved the “don’t use the brand name” rule in his usual creative way: He just buys the brand-name tools so I can’t give him crap about it. Yes, his “Skilsaw” was made by Skil. And it’s more famous than we are.
10.8V Compact Li-Ion Cordless Vacuum [Makita]
18V Compact Li-Ion Cordless Vacuum [Makita]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
18V Model [What’s This?]
* Note for non-Southerners. “Bless his heart” is a special phrase that serves to cancel out any negativity related to the preceding epithet.
I always heard this saying applied to your melon when talking about, say, riding a motorcycle. In this case, it’s something almost as important: your ears. You can pick up a pack of 200 Howard Leight LL1 Laser Lite cordless earplugs at Amazon for $20. Made of expandable foam and resembling stylish red-and-yellow rocket ships (hey, it’s cool), it’s worth 20 cents a pair for long-term hearing protection.
Research suggests you subject your tubes to no more than a maximum of 85 decibels for eight hours a day: that’s about the level of busy street traffic. But what about those who work in factories or warehouses, in construction or demolition, or in elementary teaching? Power tools easily run at 100-110 db; jack hammers at 120; a lawn mower at 90 db. (By the way, a sound 100 times louder than 10 db is 20 db. A sound 1,000 times louder than 10 db is 30 db, and so on.) I bet an elementary school kid can do at least 100 db.
With a maximum of 32 db noise reduction rating (NRR), these little plugs can turn your growling John Deere rider into a gentle purr — so you can enjoy sweet engine sounds into your golden years.
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
(TV Tonight, Thursday, October 22nd, 2009) We get a bonanza of new episodes tonight, with a new Ultimate Factories tour of the Porsche plant and the making of the 911, then a new American Chopper builds a bike for the Saginaw Chippewa. At the same time a new episode of How Do They Do It? looks at some luxury items.
All times are central
Halloween is just days from Thanksgiving, which means we’re actually starting to see some Christmas goods hitting shelves around these parts. And you know what that means: It’s time to start digging for the boxes of house lights in the storage unit — and time for us to start thinking about our holiday gift guides.
Obviously we have some favorites that we hope will end up in socks and boxes this year. It’s been a great year for tools in many ways! But before we start the list, we’d like to know what you want to find under the tree in a few months. Let us know in comments if you will, as long as you don’t mind us maybe borrowing your favorite want this year to add to our own, both personally and professionally.
(Thanks, Hendrick’s Photos, for the great CC-licensed photo. And we hope Dennis liked his toolbox and other tools.)
Know what else the holidays entail? Checking out all the new gimmicky tools that magically arrive just in time to become gifts. Kidding aside, not all “stocking-stuffer-esque” tools are junk. Each year we come across a few that’ll serve a useful purpose all year long — and a few that’ll end up in the trash by Valentine’s Day.
So which bin does B&D’s new ReadyWrench fall in? First, let’s take a look at the basics.
Each end of the ReadyWrench consists of a rotating set of four sockets for a total of eight sizes. On the SAE wrench you get a 5/16″, 3/8″, 7/16″, 1/2″, 9/16″, 5/8″, 11/16″, and 3/4″ and on the metric you get an 8mm, 10mm, 11mm, 13mm, 14mm, 16mm, 17mm, and 19mm — representing most of the common sizes we see around the house. The set’s rotation allows you to swivel the wrench around to fit (and still turn) in tight spaces.
I know, I know. As a hardcore Toolmonger you’ve probably got a full set of sockets, so B&D’s video suggesting that the ReadyWrench will “save you time searching for sockets” doesn’t apply to you. But before you thumbs-down the ‘Wrench in favor of your big set, consider this: what about your friends? What about that guy down the street who has four sockets left out of the set his father gave him when he was 24 — and they’re like a 1-1/4″, a 12mm, a 6mm, and an 11/16″ (but he lost his 1/2″ drive, too)?
And what about what my Dad used to always call “emergency situations”? He endlessly pointed out to me that when the s#!% hits the fan, having any tool that’ll accomplish the task (even if it breaks in the process) is better than none. The ReadyWrench might not be a bad choice for a downsized car toolkit.
Of course, torque specs’ll be interesting in terms of a car kit. We’ll see if we can’t find some for you. But it certainly looks sturdy enough for the tasks you see in B&D’s promotional video, like tightening a bolt on a bicycle or assembling lawn furniture.
It’s $30. What do you think?
ReadyWrench [Black & Decker]
ReadyWrench Via Amazon [What’s This?]
DeWalt says their new 6-3/4″ metal-cutting circular saw can plow through up to 2″ conduit and pipe in a single pass. A stainless-steel shoe prevents rust and helps smoothly push chips away to keep them from tearing up your cutting surface, too. But is DeWalt’s 18V battery line enough to keep it running all day?
You’ll have to help me out here. I’ll admit that I don’t own a metal circ saw. I understand that they’re popular among electricians, and I imagine that even fairly large conduit doesn’t put up much of a fight. But I have used more than a few cordless wood circ saws, and while they work very well in trim sizes — and they’re awesome for quick small job work where you’re away from power — you’d better bring lots of batteries if you’re planning to cut loads of ply or use ‘em for a day’s framing. Also, is it common to use these for cutting sheet?
If you’re already bought in to the DeWalt 18V line, you can score the bare tool (no batteries or charger, called the DW934B) for around $200. A full kit with two batteries and a charger (DW934K2H) will set you back around $600.
6-3/4″ 18V Cordless Metal Cutting Circ Saw [DeWalt]
DeWalt DW934 [Google Products]
DeWalt DW934 Via Amazon [What’s This?]
TM had a preview of the Milwaukee SwitchBlade Selfeed bits on 7/9/2008. Tools of the Trade recently published a test of these replaceable-blade self-feeding bits by John Mytle, an owner of a plumbing and heating business. He concluded that “Milwaukee has come up with a welcome revolution in quicker and easier maintenance of these expensive bits.” As an online bonus, John also gives a short tutorial on his method of sharpening self-feeding drill bits.
Milwaukee SwitchBlade Selfeed bits [Manufacturer's Site]
First Test: Milwaukee SwitchBlade Bits [Tools of the Trade]
Milwaukee 1-½” SwitchBlade Selfeed Bit Via Amazon [What’s This?]
What’s a modern mini-Li-Ion cordless tool kit without a flashlight to let those awesome little batteries go to work brightening up the dark spots? Nothing, that’s what. So we’re glad that Craftsman’s NEXTEC set includes one. But rather than heading down the single-bright-LED path, Craftsman hung a left, opting instead for 24 (!) individual light sources.
Admittedly, the rotating head is kinda cool. There’s something nice about being able to stand the light on end (or wherever you can stably cram it) then bend the light to point where you need it. But I’m a little concerned on a few counts:
First, does it actually stand well on the battery? We haven’t laid hands on one of these yet, but we do have a couple of other NEXTEC tools around the shop, and I suspect that that large, rotating head might unbalance this light — especially if you’ve got the head bent at an angle. Also, will its massive array of LEDs provide a truly wide field of light, bright enough to justify the battery drain?
We’ll see when we get a chance to check one out in person. One bright light: If you already own some NEXTEC tools, you’ll only pay $16 for the light.
NEXTEC 12V LED Worklight [Craftsman]
The environment seems to be the latest flag to rally around, so it should come as no surprise when companies tout that their product “saves the environment.” Why should Prazi be any different? They waste over half their copy on how their product is “Green.” Cut through the bullsh@t and here’s what’s left.
They claim it can keep any size paint brush fresh for days or even weeks so you don’t need to clean up between coats. It fits over round one-gallon metal cans. That’s all the information they give. We get no details about what it’s made from, what it’s packaged in, or even how to properly use it, just eco-babble.
The paint brush storage lid runs $8 at Prazi’s online store — unfortunately they won’t even give you shipping information until you enter a credit card, so you’ll understand why shipping charges aren’t listed.
EcoPrazi [Prazi]
Ideal True Value has the Jorgensen Model 8048 Cabinet Master 48″ Steel Bar Clamp for $20.02 ($29.01 w/ shipping)
The Cabinet Master is definitely a deluxe bar clamp, with a maple handle, wide clamping faces, and a 1000 lb. rating. The clamp is designed to sit upright and has plastic-lined jaws to reduce marring. The jaw adjusts quickly and requires little turning to clamp firmly.
Jorgensen Model 8048 Cabinet Master 48″ Steel Bar Clamp [idealtruevalue.com]
(TV Tonight, Wednesday, October 21st, 2009) Tonight has a new Mythbusters that looks at whether a dirty car gets better fuel mileage. Hmmm…if that’s so then we’re definitely doing our part to save gas.
All times are central
Putting up Halloween decorations today reminded me it won’t be long before I’ll be struggling with hanging the Christmas lights. I’m always looking for a better way to hang lights, and I think these stainless-steel loop hooks from Lee Valley look promising — a lot more promising than plastic gutter S-hooks that can pinch your cold fingers.
Think of an eye hook — now bend the tag end perpendicularly away from the shaft and squish the loop so the tag end overlaps the loop. The hook that’s left completely captures the wire, yet you can easily remove the it without backing the entire string through the eye. The loop hook can accommodate wires up to 5/16″ in diameter.
A package of 20 loop hooks will run you $13 before shipping.
Loop Hooks [Lee Valley]
Want to fasten your fall climbing plants or keep your indoor herb garden from exploding outward like a Tina Turner wig? Soft Ties are simply aluminum wire core covered in soft rubber, which means it can easily be cut with scissors. You can use them for supporting climbing plants or anywhere wire or nylon ties might cause damage.
AeroGarden sells the Soft Tie wire in a 25-foot spool for about $13. When the growing season is over you can save the ties and reuse them for many years.
Soft Tie [AeroGarden]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Once you’ve sourced an M90, the next step is rebuilding it. For better or worse, most of the motors paired with the M90 were fantastically durable, which means high miles on the blower. At the very least, the snout should be rebuilt. While there are different lengths available depending on the original application, they all use the same seals, bearings, and coupler, which are the snout parts that should be replaced. I’ll frequently reference the photo above, which comes from an ongoing project by user NVA-AV6 at V6Performance.net, and there’s a high-resolution version for easier viewing.
First, remove the pulley from the ‘charger with care. The suckers are really on there, thanks to an M12 lock nut and high-interference press fit, and I damaged the stock pulley when removing it with garden-variety three-prong gear puller. A steel backing plate for the puller to grab will protect the pulley, as will a more expensive but perfectly-suited supercharger pulley remover. The snout itself is the tall aluminum casting on the far right, which mates with the supercharger body via some odd M6 bolts. Some of them have very tall studs for wiring harness mounts sticking out of the head — tall enough that some deep sockets may not be enough, but a 10mm box-end wrench should fit.
When the pulley and snout are off, you’ll be able to see the coupler, which is the gray plastic part between the supercharger housing and pulley nut in the photo above. As you can see, it’s a sort of lovejoy coupling with three fingers from each side joining in a hex pattern at the coupler. Normally, these are deformed, and the photo’s coupler is an aftermarket part. Stock versions may have a beige plastic coupler with two springs inside, designed to absorb vibrations from the accessory drive system. Mine had a stock coupler, which was cracked in three places and dangerously close to falling apart. Aftermarket solid couplers are much stronger, but a bit tougher on the supercharger.
Right now you can find the CST Berger 18-90N Computing Function Digital Roller Planimeter on sale for $393.39 at Amazon.
Ah, the Planimeter. I first found out about the Planimeter when I picked up an old-fashioned analog one at a garage sale. I guess the easiest way to describe it is that it’s an instrument that will determine the area of an irregular space through mechanical integration. There’s some good stuff up on Wikipedia as well as these two pages (#1, #2). You can still buy analog Planimeters — we found one new for $174.
The digital Planimeter certainly has some advantages; it will measure up to 10 square meters at 1:1 scale (often times planimeters are used in measuring off of maps, such as lake area) and claims an accuracy of +/- .2%. It also converts between units, which should eliminate a lot of calculation errors.
(TV Tonight, Tuesday, October 20th, 2009) We get a new Dirty Jobs about crushing toilets in San Francisco, which sounds awfully similar to the recent mattress-crushing episode. A new Disaster House does more damage with horses and Ginsu knives.
All times are central
From Fine Woodworking, “the New Yankee Workshop is ending after 21 years on PBS.” But don’t throw out all your plaid shirts yet because Master Carpenter Norm Abram will continue working on This Old House.
“We’ve had a great run, built challenging projects, met wonderful woodworkers and received loyal support from millions of viewers,” Abram said in a statement.
The New Yankee Workshop is a co-production of Morash Associates, Inc. and WGBH Boston. Russell Morash — whose backyard is the secret location of the workshop — is the creator, executive producer, and director of the series. He is also credited with introducing the “how-to” programming concept to television through other celebrated WGBH produced series as This Old House, The Victory Garden, and Julia Child’s The French Chef.
New Yankee Workshop Series Ends [Fine Woodworking]
Norm Abram Closes “Yankee Workshop” [Hartford Courant]
Maybe I’m just becoming more of an old fart curmudgeon, but when I see something advertised as “now only $923″ I think what’s only about $923? You do have to use coupon code TSC7 to get this price on the 52″ range Incra TS-LS Joinery System with 32″×32″ right side router table, but are systems such as these good values?
I do like the Incra rulers and markers (as seen on TM 10/5/07 and 7/29/08), but this joinery systems seems more than a wee bit expensive, even if it does include the Wonder Fence split router fence, rip fence, support legs, rails, and router plate with inserts.
INCRA TS-LS Combo #4 [Manufacturer's Site]
There’s conductive thread and fabric, but have you heard about conductive hook and loop fasteners? I’m not exactly sure what you’d use it for other than Electrostatic and RF shielding. Maybe you could use it as a switch for some project, or to detect if the last guy through the dust barrier actually sealed it behind him.
The one inch-wide strips will conduct electricity both along the length and from the hook side to the loop side. When closed the resistance across the fastener is 0.8 Ohms. Expected to last 5000 opening/closing cycles, the silver-coated fasteners can be either sewn in or glued.
The stuff is not cheap — it runs about $17 a linear foot. That foot will cost $7 to ship and every additional foot adds around another $1.
Conductive Hook and Loop [HookandLoop.com]
Conductive Hook And Loop [EMF Safety Superstore]
A handful of weeders exist that are designed to extract the entire root with the weed, but this cork screw weeder made in Holland by DeWit has got to be one of the strangest.
To use the weeder, you screw the corkscrew into the soil around the weed and pull up to remove the entire weed, root and all. Dewit manufactures two different versions of the weeder; one measures 22″ long and weighs 15oz, the other extends 40″ and weighs 2-1/2lbs. Both weeders feature a wooden T-handle.
You’ll shell out $44 to have the 22″ long corks crew weeder shipped to your door. You’ll pay a little extra for the pleasure of standing — the longer 40″ weeder runs $65 shipped.
Cork Screw Weeder [DeWit Store]
Long Handled Weeder [DeWit Store]
Mechanical Details for Product Design by Douglas C. Greenwood is a simple book of different, well, mechanical details that you could find useful if you’re designing a tool or other mechanism. The book contains lovely two-page spreads of mechanical detail ideas from the pages of Product Engineering magazine, about 340 pages’ worth. The first chapter is typical charts and graphs as relate to spur gear design, bending, geometry, etc. Then we move on to the meat — each two-page spread typically starts with a header such as “Clamping Devices for Accurately Aligning Adjustable Parts,” “6 Ingenious Jobs for Roller Chain,” “Dimensions for Hand Grips,” “8 Stops for Panel Doors,” “Assemble Sheetmetal with 8 Interlocking Fasteners,” “Getting the Most from Screws,” “4 More Ways to Prevent Backlash” — you get the idea.
Hydraulics, Mechanical Drives, Electronics design, and all sorts of different solutions to various (1960’s era) design problems are discussed in clear text with great illustrations. If you’re the sort of person who designs or invents just about anything mechanical there’s something in here that will help you out of a jam. It’s very different from the encyclopedias of mechanical designs that are out there, more specific and real world related.
The book is out of print, but used copies are quite affordable, in the $7-$12 range on Amazon [What’s This?] and the Usual Book Dealers. It’s well worth picking up a copy if it’s the sort of thing you enjoy.
While supplies last, Rockler has the large Bessey VarioClippix Spring Clamps on sale for $3.33 each (limit six per customer), a 67% reduction from their “regular” price. These high-impact plastic clamps have a 2″ throat depth, a 4″ maximum jaw opening, soft pivoting pads for work surface protection, and large ergonomic handles. If you fall into the you-can-never-have-enough-clamps camp, you may want to grab a few of these.
VarioClippix Spring Clamps [Rockler]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
(TV Tonight, Monday, October 19th, 2009) Nothing new tonight.
All times are central
(TV Tonight, Sunday, October 18th, 2009) You know the drill…
All times are central
(TV Tonight, Saturday, October 17th, 2009) Extreme Logging and How It’s Made marathon action tonight.
All times are central
How many times do you run back and forth setting up sprinklers before you get the coverage just right? Normally, if you’re not looking for a soaking, you can go all the way back to the spigot on the house, try kinking the hose, or try to outguess where the sprinkler is spraying next. A better way might be to use the Floa Constrictor.
Made in Canada from PVC, the Floa Constrictor clips over any 1/2″ or 3/4″ garden hose and uses a wide screw which squeezes the hose to restrict or stop the flow altogether. It’s easily placed, moved, or removed anywhere on the garden hose.
You’ll pay $7 for the Floa Constrictor before shipping charges.
Floa Constrictor [Corporate Site]
Floa Constrictor [Lee Valley]
You can use bar clamps, parallel clamps, or a vertical clamping system like Hawk’s to glue up a flat panel from several small pieces, but you have to watch out for the panel warping or cupping. The Plano glue press ensures flat panels by exerting force on both the edges and the top and bottom of the panel.
Advanced Machinery claims that by using their system you don’t need other alignment methods like dowels or biscuits, and the panels come out flat so there’s no additional planing or sanding required to get a flat surface. The clamps mount vertically on a 39″ rail to save space, which also supposedly reduces drying time. You can make panels up to 5″ thick and can expand the system to make almost any length of panel, but they recommend one clamp at least every 12″.
A set of 43″ clamps with a rail runs about $350, while a set of 49″ clamps and a rail cost about $450. You can buy additional 43″ clamps for $120, 49″ clamps for $150, or 55″ clamps for $240. Other configurations are also available from the Advanced Machinery website.
Plano Glue Press [Advanced Machinery]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Right now Amazon has the Coleman Cable 9347 Indoor Safe Tree Extension Cord for $6.85.
The Safe Tree cord is a somewhat bizarre product. It is presumably a mercury switch in an extension cord. The box is lashed to the tree and if the tree falls over power is cut off. It’s certainly a dream product for those of us who worry too much, although we can’t really see how a falling tree will cause a problem electrically. Unless it falls in the pool. In which case the switchbox will get wet anyway. But we can think of other tools or products that could benefit from this, and it is certainly a cheap “hackable.”
Coleman Cable 9347 Indoor Safe Tree Extension Cord Via Amazon [What’s This?]
(TV Tonight, Thursday, October 15th, 2009) We get a new How It’s Made as well as way too many reruns. We do love seeing axes made, though.
All times are central
I recently rebuilt an Eaton M90 supercharger for a project engine, and a reader suggested I chronicle the process. For starters, I found lots of good information online but ran into a few problems that no one seemed to mention. Sources like Rolling Performance and Thunderbird Infoway served me well for both details and parts, but I’ve since located an even better source for rebuilt kits. More on that later.
The first thing you need to do is locate the supercharger itself. Mine was a decent eBay find selected more for the $90 price tag than for apparent quality. It’s in decent shape, but 170,000 miles is hard on any component. New or freshly-rebuilt M90s cost anywhere from $300 to $600, usually with a core charge tacked on if you don’t have an old blower.
There are two problems with my blower that you should watch out for. First, scoring in the housing. Small particles, despite the air filter, can get in and tear minute scratches in the wall, which reduces the ‘charger’s efficiency. The only fix is a new housing, which is a little rich for me right now. Second, a damaged pulley left over from a botched removal attempt by the shop I bought it from. If you’re using an M90 as a stock replacement, that’s a big issue, but my plans called for an aftermarket interchangeable pulley system anyway.
As far as junkyard sources go, you can pull M90s from Buick Park Avenues, Pontiac Grand Am GTPs, Jaguar XJSs and XJ6s, Ford Thunderbirds, Mercury Cougars, and probably a few more I don’t know about. None of these are uncommon vehicles, but you should look for one with its intake tract unmolested, which should give good odds of finding a clean Roots-type inside. Pulling them is pretty simple, but keep an eye on the snout lengths. The distance from the case seam nearest the pulley and the outermost face of the pulley varies from car to car, and may affect fitment in your application. To my knowledge, Cougar/Thunderbird snouts are longest, and Grand Am GTP snouts are shortest. There are also several intake and pressure flange designs, just to make life interesting.
Stay tuned for part two later this week.
Despite the name and looks, don’t expect the alien horde to wave these around when they come for Earth. This $310 oddball is designed to spread CV joint boots wide enough to slip the narrow end over the bearings to save time. I can’t say I’ve ever met anyone without the patience to remove the joint’s circlips to install the boot, so this is probably a production-only or very specialized tool. It seems to use an adjustable air supply to apply enough torque to spread the boot, but I can’t be sure since I’ve never used one.
The only reason I mention the Rapid Flexx is the sheer oddity of this thing. Why spend over three hundred dollars to save five minutes? Maybe some CV joints are just more of a headache than I’m used to, but I honestly have trouble seeing the point of this one. And I own a special socket for Ecotec oil filter cartridges. What say you, Toolmongers? Can you think of a time when the cost would be justified?
Rapid Flexx Boot Gun [SJ Discount Tool]
Currently MSC is selling the Flexbar magnetic Soft Jaws for vises for $12.99.
You can get less expensive vise jaw liners (such as these from Sears), but the Flexbar soft jaws are a bit more versatile. One jaw has a horizontal vee groove and the other has two vertical and one at 45 degrees for holding all manner of work. They’re made of nylon, which wears well in this application. MSC is difficult to link to for sale pricing so the part# is LR09232208.
Flexbar Magnetic Soft Jaws [mscdirect.com]
With a few Hitch Masters and some rope you have a compact and versatile system for pulling, lifting, or keeping stuff tied down — at least that’s what Anderson Products claims. Weave a rope the right way through the several hooks and you have something like a block and tackle to multiply your pulling force without the pulleys. Weave the rope in another way and it serves as a tie-down.
You can pick up a pair of small Hitch Masters for $25, a large pair for $35, or a kit with a pair of large and small Hitch Masters, 30′ of rope, a U-pulley, and carrying case for $60.
Hitch Master [AK Cool Tools]
AllProTools has the Porter Cable 7335 RO sander for $99.00 on sale right now.
The 7335 has a 3.7 amp motor, variable speed, 5″ diameter and a generally high build quality. It seems as if it may be a discontinued model in favor of the 7445, so prices may continue to fall over time. I’ve been using a yard sale score ($20!) 7335 for the past few years and it has never failed me in spite of having been mightily abused by the previous owner. Being able to hold it with two hands means greater control and less fatigue (although it is heavier) than palm type sanders.
Porter Cable 7335 [allprotools.com]
You can chisel out mortise and tenon joints in timbers by hand, program a CNC milling machine for the task, or you can use LignaTool’s router system. Their system lets you create dovetail mortise and tenons for connecting timber without fasteners.
The system is comprised of a mortise template and a tenon template. Both have sliding fences built in for quick setup. With the LignaTools templates you can make mortises and tenons in wood cross sections from 3″ by 3″ to 8″ by 15″ — plus you can vary the tenon length and make joints with compound angles up to 45° in both directions.
Here’s the bad news: the templates alone will cost you $4000. An 8° or 15° router milling bit will run you another $400, and there’s also the matter of having a 2000W heavy-duty router that can handle milling timbers.
LignaTool [Timber Frame Tools]
(TV Tonight, Thursday, October 15th, 2009) All we get is a new How Do They Do It? but we’re not complaining!
All times are central
I couldn’t care less about a stiff left leg when traffic crawls; I am a religiously dedicated manual driver. I’ll stay away from the reasons - we’ve all heard them ad nauseum. Servicing a clutch can be a chore, but the same is true of torque converters, though the latter can’t really be serviced by less than a professional.
Replacing a clutch requires an alignment tool, which is usually included with aftermarket clutches, but not necessarily with OEM and stock-replacement clutches. And sometimes the guy in the packing department had a liquid lunch. When you need one, the imaginatively-named Clutch Tools has just about everything. Manufactured from pressure-molded plastic by Kingsborne, and available for everything Chevrolet to Jensen-Healey, Clutch Tools retails them for about $10 apiece with free shipping.
There’s no getting away from the fact that these aren’t versatile tools. You’ll use them once every clutch replacement, anywhere from 25,000 to 150,000 miles depending on how vicious your car is, but no sane man would attempt a clutch job without the correct tool.
Kingsborne Clutch Alignment Tools [Clutch Tools]
If you ask me, the worst part of a project isn’t the sanding or the finishing — it’s getting the dust off the project so it doesn’t ruin the finish. Forget about tack cloths, brushes, or compressed air; the Baker Model M4i Board DeDuster can remove the dust from 700 feet of boards per minute. At that rate, I probably only need to run it for a few minutes every year!
Typically used after resawing applications, the machine measures 108″ long by 36″ wide and adjusts from 38″ to 48″ in height. Independently powered by 2HP motors, the three nylon brushes remove dust from all four sides of each board the conveyor belt brings. A 6″ dust port optimally moving 1300CFM of air removes the dust, and you’ll also need 220V or 440V three-phase power in your shop to run the machine.
The stock Deduster can handle boards between 36″ and 55″ long up to 2.5″ x 8″, but Baker can modify the machine for larger boards upon request. There’s no reference on the site to how much this beast costs, but I’m sure if you have to ask you really can’t afford it.
Model M4i [What’s This?] [Baker Products]
When it comes to automotive work, there are two things every Toolmonger shy of Jay Leno has troubling handling in their garage: suspension alignment and anti-theft systems. Tools exist to handle both, but very few have these tools. For the latter, leave it to the dealer, but most suspension adjustments can be handled with simple gear like the Longacre Racing toe bar.
As you can see, it’s easy to make one yourself. The bar amounts to two adjustable points on an arm. Use a scribe and test stand to to put a fine circle in either tire, the same radius on either side, by putting the scribe and stand on the ground and rotating the tire. Then use this bar to measure the difference in the width between the front and rear extremes of each circle.
There are other methods for measuring toe and differing opinions about which method is best. This one takes a steady hand, but isn’t affected by any weirdness (a highly technical term) in the sidewall. Longacre Racing’s part number 7962 is among the best if you’re going to purchase a toe bar, which will cost, near as makes no difference, a hundred dollars, but a few hours in a fab shop and a stick-on ruler will serve just as well.
Longacre Racing Toe Bar [Baker Precision]
The Smart-Holder holds log firmly off the ground so you can safely saw them without rolling, bending, or burying your chainsaw blade in the dirt.
AMGA in Sweden designed the Smart-Holder to assemble and break down quickly. Once it’s set up you just push the end of log through the swinging jaw of the Smart-Holder and push down on the log to wedge it in place.
The 27 pound Smart-Holder measures 47″ long by 15″ wide and will hold any log 1/2″ to 9″ thick. When it’s set up it stands 38″ tall and when it collapses it’s just 2″ high. Stihl and Remington also market the Smart-Holder under their own branding. No matter which company sells it, pricing starts at $100.
Smart Holder [Corporate Site]
Smart Holder [Remington]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
The National Geographic Channel’s Inside show had an episode on the Science of Armored Cars. I didn’t see it, but, if the picture above is any indication, I may have missed a good one. I did a quick search of the TM archives, but could not find if Nick had covered this in his TV Tonight posts.
The picture above is Dillon Aero’s Tactical Vehicle, a customized GMC Yukon featuring their M134D Gatling gun. Those are spent 7.62mm NATO shell casings on the roof and base of the windshield. The M134D Gatling gun can fire 3,000 rounds per minute.
Did any Toolmongers see this show? If so, what did you think?
Inside [National Geographic]
Video [National Geographic]
Dillon Aero [Manufacturer's Site]
Or it’s just cooling. In any case, I saw this on Fast Company — “…Doesn’t Suck, It Blows” –, and couldn’t decide whether to go with the “Cool” title, the “Hot Or Not,” or the “Tool Pr0n” title. Dyson’s new Air Multiplier™ is probably not the fan you want to have out in the garage, but the technology involved is kinda neat. It is, as you may have noticed from the picture, blade-less, and based on phenomena the Dyson engineers noticed when developing their Airblade hand dryer — which is also interesting in that it uses a single thin sheet of air, moving at up to 400 mph, to blast the water off your hands. In the Air Multiplier™, this sheet of air, generated by a “mixer flow impeller” in the base, creates negative pressure as it exits the rim, and draws in more air from behind the fan. The result is a claimed 15× amplification in air, and none of that annoying “unpleasant buffeting” from fan blades.
The 10″ fan is $300, and the 12″ is $330. So while it won’t hurt if you stick your hand in it, it will cost you an arm and a leg.
Dyson [Manufacturer's Site]
Lee Valley has four discontinued books on sale (they bought remaindered stock) for $6 or less each. The two that I find most interesting, pictured above, cover building workshop workstations and power-tool joinery (the other two are about garden design and orchids). Stock is limited.
Building Workshop Workstations [Lee Valley]
Building Workshop Workstation Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Power-Tool Joinery [Lee Valley]
Power-Tool Joinery Via Amazon [What’s This?]
(TV Tonight, Wednesday, October 14th, 2009) What will those nutty Mythbusters do with Duct Tape? Find out in a new episode tonight. Time Warp might be new, although we’re not entirely sure.
All times are central
Judging by the main page, Grape Ape Racing was put together by one man. The car above is the fruit of his labors and was the testbed for many of the theories assembled in a series of superb technical articles on the site. He covers almost every aspect of the build in exhausting detail, from the conceptual to the execution stages, from calculations to crankshaft.
Several short-and-sweet articles are the site’s gems, covering connecting rods, cooling systems, engine blocks, fuel systems, induction, nitrous, turbocharging, supercharging, torsional dampers, and valvetrains. These are broad enough to show the advantages and disadvantages of various approaches, yet in-depth enough to expose the math and let the readers decide for themselves. Add a detailed blow-by-blow of the Camaro’s build, and you have some great no-cost, rainy-day reading.
High-Performance Articles [Grape Ape Racing]
Malco’s “The Sider” helps you measure and mark pieces of vinyl siding quickly and accurately. Made from 18 gauge stainless steel, the Sider has precisely spaced holes staggered vertically every 1/8″. To draw or score perfect horizontal lines, stick a pencil or knife blade into a hole and slide the tool along the siding.
Malco sells five different varieties of the Sider to work with most siding styles: the 4″ double, the 5″ double, the 4-1/2″ Dutchlap, the 5″ Dutchlap, and the 3″ triple. Any of these versions of the Sider will run you somewhere between $11 and $21 before shipping or tax.
The Sider [Malco]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
The smarter we become, the more we realize that wood dust and other airborne pollution isn’t very healthy for us to inhale — not to mention the how pissed off the homeowner becomes when there’s a thick layer of sawdust or drywall dust over everything in the house. For your shop you can install permanent air cleaners, but are you going to drag them with you to every job site?
Demo Air Nets look very similar to the bags that inflate when you turn on your dust collector, only they attach to portable fans. Eagle America claims the Air Net captures particles down to 5 microns, but I couldn’t actually verify that fact on the Demo Air Net Website. When you’re finished using the Air Net you can clean it by throwing it in a washing machine on gentle and air drying it.
Demo Air Net manufactures four different size bags: the Small fits 9″ circular fans and has an effective area of 20 cubic feet, the Medium fits 18″ circular fans and covers 3200 cubic feet, the Large fits 24″ circular fans or 20″ square fans and covers a 4800 cubic foot area, and the Monster fits a 42″ circular fan and can cover up to 30,000 cubic feet. Prices for the Demo Air Nets run $40, $100, $190, and $260 for the Small, Medium, Large, and Monster respectively.
Demo Air Net [Corporate Site]
Demo Air Net [Eagle America]
Automotive aftermarket supplier Eastwood is best known for their painting and media-blasting products, which are uniformly excellent. They also retail a simple set of pliers designed for forming hard brake lines. It’s probably harder to use and less accurate than models from Ridgid, Swagelok, or Imperial, but the $30 price tag is nice and low.
Benders small enough for brake lines aren’t that common since most OEMs make expensive but excellent direct-replacement lines in case the originals fail. Decent brake shops and car parts stores sell straight sections of tubing in many lengths with pre-made fittings on the ends, so buying those and using a bender like this is a good way to save.
Eastwood sells their pliers for $30, and as usual, there’s a Harbor Freight option from God knows who for less. $6, to be exact. The shape of the two options looks identical, but different grips and what looks like a higher-quality casting set the Eastwoods apart.
Brake Line Pliiers [Eastwood]
Brake Line Pliers [Harbor Freight]
Amazon currently has the Black & Decker VEC1086BBD Smart Battery 6/4/2 Amp Battery Charger for $30.14 and it qualifies for free shipping. It’s doesn’t fall in the “best buys of all time” category but it is handy if you don’t have one already. Trust us, you want one of these before you need it.
I had a lovely time coping with a dead battery this weekend, small-child-playing-with-dome-light related, and used my very old battery charger to get the battery charged. As I was setting the battery charger up at night, in the semi-darkness I got a bit paranoid about hooking the wrong polarity up as well as leaving it charging for too long. The B&D charger has circuitry that they claim prevents both of those situations. This isn’t a power pack, and it doesn’t jump start a car (and chargers like that are available for not much more) but it does seem like a basic useful battery charger.
(TV Tonight, Tuesday, October 13th, 2009) A new Dirty Jobs hangs out 30 stories up and washes windows. While Man Caves is usually lame, this new episode looks at making a Hog-friendly garage instead of the usual wine bar or self-esteem workshop. A new Disaster House repairs the damage done by wrestlers and bears, or something like that.
All times are central
Sure, you can use a calculator or even your head to find the circumference of a round duct by measuring its diameter, but with the Cooper Tool Tinner’s Circumference Rule all you need to measure is the diameter — the ruler will read the circumference.
The tempered medium-weight steel rule measures in inches by 1/16″ on the top edge and circumference inches by 1/8″ on the bottom edge. The black markings are easy to read, and on the reverse side Cooper has printed relevant formulas and tables for easy reference.
The rulers come in 3′ and 4′ lengths — both rulers measure 1-1/4″ wide and 1/16″ thick. At $60 on the bottom end these circumference rulers aren’t cheap, so practicing your arithmetic might be a little more cost effective.
Tinner’s Circumference Rule [Cooper Tools]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
I dunno; it’s just something about seeing monster versions of standard kitchen tools that I find fascinating. Every so often, while channel surfing, I catch some show with people either using or making commercial or industrial sized things like mixers, and I think how neat it would be to have one of them. I don’t know what the heck I would do with it — except maybe make enough pizza dough for a year — but the idea still appeals. Part of it is that they somehow take me back to my early youth and watching Industry On Parade on Sundays.
This post was triggered by seeing a reference to the KitchenAid time line, and its note about the early (1908!) development of the stand mixer including being listed as “regular equipment” on all U.S. Navy ships by 1917.
Admit it — isn’t there a little voice in your head telling you how cool it would be to have a 140-quart floor mixer in the kitchen — or even the garage — to mix up a big batch of something?
Industry On Parade Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Hobart [Manufacturer's Site]
Nailing up hidden gutter hangers can be a challenge. One reason they’re called “hidden” is they are fastened to the fascia under the lip of the shingles and inside the gutter where there ain’t much room to swing a hammer. To solve this problem, Malco’s Gutter Nail Driver both holds the nail and transfers the striking surface outside the gutter where you can get a good swing.
The two-piece steel tool consists of a plunger within a tube. You stick the nail in the business end which pushes the plunger out. Then you place the nail in the hidden hanger hole and hit the plunger with a hammer to drive the nail.
Malco plates the tool with zinc and nickel to resist the elements and wraps it with a non-slip grip. It’s made specifically for 8D galvanized nails. Pricing for the Gutter Nail Driver starts at $10.
Gutter Nail Driver [Malco]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Speaking of lock picking (TM 10/6/09 and 3/7/08, for example), where does the “easily re-keyed” Kwikset SmartKey™ fit in the security spectrum? It does have BumpGuard™ for protection against lock bumping, and the re-keying is done on the inside handle (by inserting a functioning key, turning it ¼ turn to the “learn” position, inserting and firmly pushing the SmartKey tool, removing the tool, taking out the current key without rotating, inserting the new key — available in a kit [What’s This?] –, and turning it ¼ turn back to the starting position), but is it more or less secure because of this re-keying feature?
Kwikset [Manufacturer's Site]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
I picked up a used copy of Making & Using Your Own Tools and Workshop Accessories (ISBN 9780830600328) a couple of weeks ago, and it’s a good cheap read. The book is a series of reprinted projects from “School Shop” magazine, originally published by Tab Books, a division of Rowman & Littlefield. The book focuses on making tools and accessories in the typical high school metal and wood shop. Many of the projects are of the typical type found in other books, such as making a sander, hammer, etc., but there are many gems to be found in this 360 page tome. It’s the only book we’ve found with instructions for making a magnetic vee block! So if you love projects or need some inspiration, get a copy. It’s especially valuable if you happen to be a shop teacher.
The book is out of print, but as is typical for most TAB books the used prices are cheap, from 35 cents to $10. I paid $1.50 for my copy.
Special thanks to Shorpy for use of the great photo of a 1921 middle school shop class.
Loctite calls this goop 30534 liquid thread sealant with PTFE/Teflon. The sheer amount of oxygen required to say that could keep several people alive for a month, so I’ll take a page from Smitty’s book (the oldest mechanic I ever worked with) and call it “pipe dope.”
Essentially, PTFE thread sealant is an improved, liquid (but very viscous) version of Teflon tape with a few noteworthy advantages. It’s not direction-sensitive, so the new guy won’t wrap pipe threads backwards, and it provides a better seal thanks to its anaerobic hardening properties (much like regular Loctite). You don’t need to keep different thicknesses around for different pipe thread sizes, either. The only major disadvantage is that Teflon tape has no set time, whereas this needs to be left alone for a few hours before use. This can be inconvenient, since an awful lot of repairs are done on pipe threads.
If you can let the assembly sit for a while, a $5-$7 can is a good idea. I’ve found it’s much more reliable than Teflon tape and does a very good job making up for pipe threads’ shortcomings. Larger hardware stores and industrial supply houses are your best bet if you’re trying to lay hands on a bottle, but if that chair’s just too comfortable, there’s always the Internet.
Loctite PTFE Pipe Thread Sealant [Google Products]
(TV Tonight, Monday, October 12th, 2009) Another Monday night of nothing.
All times are central
(TV Tonight, Sunday, October 11th, 2009) As always, Sunday night is best spent in the shop.
All times are central
(TV Tonight, Saturday, October 10th, 2009) Another Saturday, another Dirty Jobs marathon…
All times are central
At some point, every one of us has heard this yarn: take a torch and a block of ice, heat a dented piece of bodywork, then apply ice to the center. Supposedly it pops the dent right out, but I’ve never met anyone who claims they pulled it off. I’m contemplating filling a dented motorcycle fuel tank with water and chucking it in the snowbank, but that’s an entirely different principle, and it might be roughly as sane as trekking through the lion pen in flank-steak briefs. Can the contraction from slapping an ice pack on a hot fender straighten it out? Or is it just a way to wind up with a burnt headliner and nothing to cool your beer?
High-voltage gloves are normally reserved for linesmen, ballsy sons-of-guns who service powerful electrical systems. They’re designed to prevent all but the highest voltages from causing any trouble, usually insulating up to 10kV. With high-power electronics creeping closer every day (hybrid vehicles, anyone?), mechanics will likely find themselves faced with a dangerous system at some point. Salisbury (manufactured by Honeywell) is the gold standard, manufacturing gloves in many sizes for five different voltage levels.
These are pricey. “Low-voltage” class 00 gloves rated for 500V start at around $70, and go upward to class 3 gloves with a 26,500V rating suitable for everything shy of high-tension wires. Those bad boys retail for around $120, but if you run into the nervous work of diagnosing high-voltage systems, suddenly the price becomes trivial. It’s worth mentioning that the gloves are fragile, usually requiring separate leather outers for protection, and they shouldn’t be stored folded or brought into contact with oil. Replacement is recommended every six months, since the compound gradually dries out. Quite a list of caveats, yet worth peace of mind. Lab supply stores online stock the full range of sizes and ratings.
Salisbury High-Voltage Gloves [Lab Safety]
Electrical Gloves [Safety Supply America]
To get a piece to fit an irregular wall, you can scribe the contour of the wall onto the work piece, make the cut with your jigsaw, touch it up with a belt sander, and check it against the wall — then repeat the process until you get it perfect or you give up and call it “good enough.” Rather than go through all that trouble, the QuickScribe lets you cut the piece with a router in one step.
The wheel on the QuickScribe attachment precisely follows the contours of the wall while the router makes the actual cut. If the piece is too thick to cut in one pass, you can make a shallow pass with the QuickScribe and follow it with a jigsaw.
The QuickScribe 300 works with the Bosch 1609 and Porter Cable 321 and 7312 offset routers. The QuickScribe CD works with the Bosch Colt router with an offset base and DeWalt laminate trimmers using the DW6707 offset base. Either QuickScribe will run you $80.
QuickScribe [Corporate Site]
I run a coolant mister on one of my benchtop CNC mills. The mister provides cooling to the toolbit as well as clearing the chips away from the cut, reducing the chance of the bit jamming (I use small end mills) in deeper cuts. The problem is, I have an old horizontal air compressor in my attached shop supplying the air. When the thing kicks in (usually every 15 minutes or so for at least 5 minutes, and programs typically run a half hour to an hour) the noise is deafening, even in the house. So I figured I’d ask what fellow Toolmongers suggest. I need around 60-80 psi and a relatively good flow, although I sometimes run the mister through a timer system. I also like to use it with an air gun to blast chips from finished parts, dry things off, etc.
If I had an unlimited budget I would likely buy a Jun-Air, Silentaire or Apolloair but my budget is just that — budget. So that leaves me wondering about compressors like the Campbell Hausfield Quiet Compressor, the Husky that was reviewed here a while back, or this All-Power compressor.
So for a guy on a budget, what do you guys suggest? I know I could rewire and plumb my air compressor to run in a little shed outside, but I prefer to keep things inside, this being Oregon and moist. My current compressor is definitely on its last legs anyway, so I’ll need to find a replacement eventually.
Campbell Hausfeld Quiet Air Compressor [Air Compressors Direct]
Campbel Hausfeld Air Compressors Street Pricing [Google Products]
Campbell Hausfeld Air Compressors Via Amazon [What’s This?]
All Power Quietzone Air Compressor [All Power America]
All Power Quietzone Air Compressor Street Pricing [Google Products]
OK, so I poo-pooed hand stretchers previously, but they do have their place. These chain link tensioners from Malco can be used to stretch fabric and then hold it in place while you fasten the chain link to the post. They work with either T-section or round posts.
A set of two tensioners runs about $43 before shipping.
Fence Tensioning Claws [Malco]
Fence Tensioning Claws [1st Source Products]
If you ever need work done on your brakes, it’s best to avoid brake shops for a variety of reasons — not the least of which is that they’ll often use a Jesus wrench (the biggest Channel Locks in their box) to compress the pistons, a procedure capable of cracking cheap calipers, and almost guaranteed to mar the piston. The right way is a brake caliper compressor, a sort of high-powered caulk gun designed to slip into the pad recess. Lisle’s model 25750 is a perfect example, and pretty inexpensive at just over $32 before shipping from Amazon.
It’s also possible to make your own piston compressor. This version from Hinode is a good concept, but generally poorly made in the Far East. Some good steel and a few hours will produce a very nice home-made compressor, but it’ll be hard to beat the low asking price of Lisle’s version. It probably won’t fit high-performance calipers with more than three or four pistons, but those are scarce enough to be ignored unless you’re a Ferrari mechanic.
Right now you can find the RoboToolz RT-2210-20 20 x Magnification Builders Level for $69.99 at Amazon.
The Builder’s Level is a transit, albeit a cheap version of a professional transit. It features accuracy of +/- 1/4″ at 100′ with a magnification 20x and an advertised range of 200′. It should be good for any light duty surveying such as fence lines. It doesn’t come with a tripod or a graduated rod, however, so you’ll have to get those elsewhere.
RoboToolz RT-2210-20 Builders Level Via Amazon [What’s This?]
(TV Tonight, Friday, October 9th, 2009) We get a new How It’s Made tonight on many exciting topics. We wonder if the Pizza Cutter and Peeler segments are shot at the same factory?
All times are central
I’m one of those horribly old-fashioned types who prefers using cash over plastic money, but here’s one bit of processed petrochemical I wouldn’t object to carrying. The Swisscard Lite has the same footprint as a credit card, and is about as thick as four of them — it doesn’t take a Nobel laureate to note that it’s perfect for wallet carry.
The surprising part is the number of functions Victorinox packs into the Swisscard. Knife, scissors, tweezers, a pin, a pen, light, and a small mirror, which is pretty much a list of things I don’t remember until twenty minutes into the morning commute. Okay, maybe not the mirror.
The cards come in a variety of colors and retail for around $20. Not a bad price for the convenience they bring to the table. It’s slightly cheaper than similar versions [What’s This?], and the steel Victorinox uses is some of the toughest available.
Swisscard Lite, Red Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Swisscard Lite, Black Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Swisscard Lite, Blue Via Amazon [What’s This?]
The biggest tire I ever had to change came from a Massey-Harris 44 and was just a few inches under five and a half feet tall. Let’s just say that the experience left me with a healthy respect for heavy-equipment mechanics. Something like Ken Tool’s Serpent might have been a saving grace. Designed for mounting and de-mounting tubeless truck tires, it’s a simple but elegant twist on the usual flat pry bar, as shown by a Ken Tool product demonstration that found its way to YouTube.
Serpent tools are priced for pros and shops, carrying (at Amazon) a hefty $154 price tag for a mounting bar, de-mounting bar, bead holder, and rim protector. The individual parts from the set can be purchased one by one if you look around, but the price for one component often exceeds the price of Amazon’s bundle.
Malco’s duct folding tool doesn’t look like much, but it allows you to evenly fold sheet metal for forming various duct parts. It’s simply two steel plates joined together at the center. You insert the sheet metal in the gap between the plates until you see it through the diamond site holes, then twist the tool to form the bend.
Malco sells five versions of the folding tool: 8″ and 12″ long folding tools that make 3/8″ and 1/2″ bends and 12″, 18″, and 24″ tools that make 3/8″ and 1″ bends. The longer the tool the more uniform the fold; the 24″ version can even be used as a mini brake for flashing and siding.
You can pick up one of these folding tools for between $10 and $15.
Folding Tool [Malco]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
A few day ago some commenters expressed concerns about how you’d load and unload the Fatmax Portable Truck Box if all 42 gallons of stage space was filled with tools. One way would be to use a lift cart like this one from Northern Tool.
This lift cart will raise 300 lbs from 8-1/4″ to 28-3/4″ by pumping a foot pedal. To lower the load there’s a handle-mounted pressure release. The platform measures 27-1/2″ by 17-3/4″ and is 1-3/8″ thick.
Northern has several inexpensive hydraulic table carts that can handle from 300 to 1000 lbs in the $200 to $300 price range. The pictured lift cart runs about $190, but it’ll cost you $75 to ship so I’d recommend going to one of Northern’s brick and mortar stores if there’s one close to you or find a different source.
Lift Cart [Northern Tools]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
In some cases, it’s easier to remove the alternator to release serpentine belt tension than to get a wrench or ratchet on the belt tensioner. Ignoring the lamentable decision-making process that spawns such folly, there is a workaround. I first saw very low-profile bars like these at a Tuffy where I worked, and everyone in the shop borrowed it almost every time they had to release a serpentine belt on a transverse-mounted engine. The owner probably wasn’t too happy with us, but the photo above shows why the pseudo-thefts were necessary.
In essence, these are just strong steel bars with 3/8″ or 1/2″ square lugs near the ends. Double-ended versions like the Schley Products model 63200 below provide the best flexibility for the most common size, placing a 1/2″ lug on either end, and at a 45° offset relative to one another. ToolSource.com has them for $39 before shipping, but the cream of the crop comes from (you guessed it) Snap-On. Their YA9350B set covers just about every style on the market, adds a ratcheting mechanism, and is actually priced pretty competitively against units with similar compatibility ranges.
Schley 1/2″ Serpentine Belt Tool [Schley Products]
Schley 1/2″ Serpentine Belt Tool [Tool Source]
YA3950B [Snap-On]
Let’s get the negatives out of the way: “pulley puller” sounds like a character from a kid’s cartoon, and the hefty $200+ price tags units like these carry makes them a less-than-intelligent purchase for most of us. Only garage mechanics or tuners with supercharged engines are ever likely to need one of these. But they are the only way to go if you need to remove a supercharger pulley. I rebuilt an Eaton M90 a few months ago, didn’t use one of these, and wound up needing a new pulley.
As you can see from the photo above, there’s no reason a competent machinist couldn’t make one of these in an afternoon. It’s basically a two-prong puller, but the prongs are bolts grabbing a nice, wide flange to keep the considerable force from deforming your nice, expensive ‘charger pulley. Since Eaton’s basically the only widespread supercharger manufacturer, and they have only a few offerings (the M45, M62, M90, and M120 are most common), it should be possible to make a nearly-universal puller without much trouble.
The kit above is manufactured by SLP Performance, retails for $255 before shipping through Summit Racing Equipment, and is designed for GM’s supercharged 3800 V6s. Other kits are available for Mustangs of many flavors, but about $30 in raw materials and a few hours with a Bridgeport should land you something just as functional without the wallet pinch.
GM 3800 V6 supercharger pulley remover [Summit Racing Equipment]
Ford supercharger pulley remover [Summit Racing Equipment]
I’m going to break two of my normal tool tendencies with this one. This is a crow’s foot (which I normally think is a pretty pointless invention), and it’s from Harbor Freight (who I have trouble trusting). But I make these exceptions because this tool, especially at Harbor Freight’s admittedly excellent prices, will save you a contortionist’s act whenever you need to install or remove an oxygen (air-fuel ratio) sensor.
Manufacturers seem to compete amongst themselves to place these in the least convenient places possible, with the wiring arranged so that removal is nigh-on guaranteed to twist or crush the conductors to breaking. Some types of O2 sensor sockets are just deep-wells with a slot, and will (repeat WILL) torque the wires right in two.
The crow’s foot version sidesteps that problem neatly and pairs well with a flex-head socket, since manufacturers like to place their sensors on top of the exhaust pipes, forcing you to reach up top where rigid wrenches and ratchets can’t get. This $4 Harbor Freight crow’s foot will settle their hash. There’s another version made by Performance Tool and retailed by Northern Tool available for a little extra ($7.50) if Harbor Freight makes you nervous.
O2 Sensor Crow’s Foot [Harbor Freight]
O2 Sensor Crow’s Foot [Northern Tool]
(TV Tonight, Thursday, October 8th, 2009) We get a new Ultimate Factories tonight showing us how they handcraft a Rolls-Royce Phantom. There’s also a new hot, drunken sailor of an episode of How Do They Do It?.
All times are central
Little Giant’s work platform can be used with any of their ladders. It fits over any rung and folds out of the way while you’re climbing up and down the ladder. When you do need it, you can just move it into position with with your foot.
Made from aluminum, the platform will support up to 300 lbs. It runs about $40.
Work Platform [Little Giant]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
This books tracks the 11-month construction of one Steinway Concert Grand, K0862, from the cutting of lumber in British Columbia to the final tuning and finishing. I found it fascinating to follow all the handwork and craftsmanship Steinway still uses in the various rooms of its old factory in New York. It takes approximately 12,000 parts and up to 450 people to assemble a concert grand.
The paperback version of the book is $11; a Steinway Concert Grand will set you back a bit more (~ $100,000 new, and $50,000 to $200,000 or more for a used model).
You’ve used a pole saw to trim a branch, but it’s still stuck in the tree — now what? Using a tool like Wolf Garten’s Tree Hook you can grab the branch from the ground rather than climbing into the tree to get it down. You can also use it to shake fruit tree branches or hang Christmas lights in trees.
The S-shaped hook works with any Wolf Interlocken handles, the cheapest of which run $12. The Tree Hook itself runs $16.
Branch Hook [Wolf Garten]
Via Amazon
Want to record a video of that new shop or construction project, but your assistant took the day off? Well, slap this “wearable” HD camera on your workshop goggles — or helmet, if you’re really careful out there — and shoot away. While designed for the outdoor sports market, the ContourHD1080p has uses in other hands-free applications. Its Dual Laser Alignment will make sure you’ve got the shot lined up. Weighing in at a mere 4.3 oz, the 1.3″ W × 2.1″ H × 3.7″ L camera offers two frame rates (30 fps and 60 fps), four resolutions (1080p, 960p, 720p, and WVGA), an internal microphone, one-button recording, and a rechargeable battery for up to three hours of video. It comes with a 2GB microSD card (and can take up to a 16GB card); depending on the frame rate and resolution, record time is 15-60 minutes per GB. One can be yours for $330.
VholdR [Manufacturer's Site]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
From Flickr via Charles & Hudson comes this beautiful staircase part of the restoration of a San Francisco Victorian home. The homeowners began by removing a wall that had been put up to separate the upstairs and the downstairs when the house was split into two units several years ago. They then duplicated an upstairs banister that was original to the house, and, after several long days of work, completed the staircase shown above.
The Flickr link has additional pictures and details.
Right now you can find the Empire Level 27088 Magnetic Base at Amazon for $10.52.
The base is no frills — it has an adjustable arm, no fine adjustment, and a clamp that should fit most dial indicators with a stem (rather than dovetail mount).
This looks like a good deal but the two negative reviews leave us wondering. It seems that both reviewers didn’t know that most non-switchable mag bases ship with a keeper on the magnet. Compounding this is the illustration showing a 1″ dial travel indicator, when for a small base like this it would be better to use a test indicator or much smaller dial travel indicator. It would also be nice to know how much holding force the magnet has.
(TV Tonight, Wednesday, October 7th, 2009) Finally the second half premier of Mythbusters starts tonight with more ballistics and an attempt to remove socks with extreme prejudice. We also get a new Disaster House, we think.
All times are central
One of my uncles loves to tell the tale of how he acquired much of his impressive collection of fine Snap-On tools and the four-foot-wide roll cab they came in. As he tells it, back in the sixties he purchased the full cab from a dealer who was going out of business, and had somehow wound up with the full chest, no key, and apparently no idea about the value of its contents. Price? $200. He bought the cab, dragged it home, popped it open with one of the few tools he owned (a lock pick set from working with a towing company), and was the proud owner of a fully stocked dealership tool set at about a 97% discount.
Whether that’s true or not, I don’t know, but he does use a pick set to open his tool box, claiming he’s nostalgic and never saw the point of getting it re-keyed. Picks are useful little devices, if you can get a set that isn’t from a shady dealer. Look for stainless steel pieces with good metal handles, which should cost around $30, and you usually won’t go wrong. Johnny Law may frown upon owners, but in the right circumstances, they can save some serious headaches. Practitioners claim that lock picking is as much an art as welding, so maybe it’ll morph into a hobby as well as a practical skill.
LAB 11-piece Mini Pick Set [Lock Picks by Brockhage]
Clear Practice Locks [Lock Picks by Brockhage]
Professional Picking Tools [Lock Pick Shop]
Halloween is coming up fast; it’s time to scarify your lawn in more than one way. Fertilizing, aerating, de-thatching, and raking are some of the tasks you can do in the fall to get your lawn ready for winter. Wolf Garten’s new Scarifier Rolling Rake will at least help you de-thatch and break up the topsoil.
As you pull the rake toward you the sharp blades move in an oscillating motion. They are hardened so they don’t require resharpening. The wheels keep the rake at a consistent height while you work over a 11.8″ swath.
Pricing for the Wolf Garten Scarifier Rolling Rake starts at around $50. However it comes without a handle (that’s scary too) so you’ll need to purchase one separately.
Scarifier Roller Rake [Wolf Garten]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Constant-tension hose clamps are fast becoming ubiquitous on mass-produced cars, courtesy of their stone-cold reliability and automatic adjustment. Worm gear and T-bolt hose clamps should be re-torqued after installation with the hoses hot, since the clamping force squeezes rubber out from underneath the band (a tendency called cold creep), but constant-tension clamps keep themselves properly adjusted. They are, however, one of a mechanic’s knuckles’ worst enemies, and very difficult to detach without the right tools. Additionally, factory installations aren’t always the easiest to remove, which is where flexible hose clamp pliers come in.
Capable of reaching into incredibly tight spaces and securely compressing clamp tabs, the pliers are nearly a must if you service late-model cars or use constant-tension clamps in any application. Personally, I like them more than worm-gear clamps; simpler and maintenance-free, they’re well worth having another piece in my collection. Astro Pneumatic makes a good set you can find for $29 before shipping from S&J’s Discount Tool, which seems to be one of the best prices online. Not many auto parts stores will have good-quality versions, though you might get lucky at your local NAPA.
Astro Pneumatic flexible constant-tension hose clamp pliers [S&J's Discount Tool]
Street pricing [Google Products]
Forget stethoscopes and bolt cutters; this is the 21st century. This modern piece of safe-cracking equipment is simply a sensitive microphone, amplifier, and headset designed to work together to make Hollywood’s beloved by-ear safe crack a reality. Apparently, it includes some kind of noise cancellation, since the manufacturer claims you can “tune out distracting noises and hone in on the signals you are listening for,” and it’s sensitive enough to allow a skilled user to determine the type of mechanism he’s cracking.
It’s probably a bad idea to use this for anything other than its intended purpose. Odds are that the amplification is strong enough to blow out your eardrums with any noise beyond the usually-inaudible ticking of a lock mechanism. But if you need to get into a safe, this is one of few non-damaging methods. Lockmasters makes two versions: a $138 base model, and the pictured $315 Pro edition.
Lockmasters Incorporated [Lockmasters]
Lockmasters’ Lock Amp [Lockmasters]
Lockmasters’ Pro Amp [Lockmasters]
While delving into some metal working sites I came across these cool-looking tools for forming sheet metal: forming stakes. The above catalog picture shows some of the many shaped heads that are available for creating different shapes.
These Pexto sheet metal forming stakes from Roper Whitney are made from forged steel or cast iron. They fit into a socket on either a free-standing stake holder or a bench plate.
Forming stakes don’t come cheap — you’ll see a variety of stakes or heads individually priced from $100 to $400. Sets with holders are available, but given the individual pricing, the set pricing is going to be steep.
Forming Stakes [Roper Whitney]
Bench Dollies [TM Technologies]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Forming Stakes [What’s This?] [Amazon Search]
The Stanley® FatMax™ Portable Truck Box (part number 036800R) is a 42-gallon capacity storage system that’s 22-1/4″ H × 44″ L × 19″ W. It has a water-resistant seal, a security system with alarm and code panel, heavy-duty 8.5″ wheels, and locks into a docking station that can be bolted to any truck bed. Pricing and availability information is a bit sparse: the only price estimate I’ve been able to find is $290, which is in the same ballpark as crossbed boxes, and apparently only Lowe’s carries it.
Does its roll-around portability make it more useful than a crossbed or other truck bed box? What do you think?
Stanley FatMax Portable Truck Box [Manufacturer's Site]
Update: The people at Stanley gave us a quick ring with a little more information. First, this will sell for right at $200. Second, this is actually a security box. It locks to a docking station in the back of your truck and is unlocked with an electronic keypad. Basically, the idea behind this product is to keep people from ripping off your stuff while you’re parked at Home Depot, Lowe’s, or a quick stop at the jobsite. You’ll hear more about this product soon — we’ve got one in for test.
Welding Supply currently has the Tweco SMGC200 Magnetic Ground Clamp for $22.95
Used in place of the typical alligator clamps, the SMGC200 Magnetic Ground Clamp allows you to quickly place the ground clamp on any flat or round surface. The top handle actuates the magnet and is rated for 200 amps and 176 degrees F.
Tweco SMGC200 Magnetic Ground Clamp [weldingsupply.com]
(TV Tonight, Tuesday, October 6th, 2009) Dirty Jobs returns with the likely disgusting recycling of used mattresses. The premier of Disaster House does horrible things to an abode and then fixes them. We can hardly wait for the “my parents are out of town, let’s party” episode.
All times are central
OK, so the title is a lie. You could easily under-price this jewel of an ass-rest by picking up a Snap-On keychain, or even a single socket (or two if you chose carefully). But then you’d be stuck standing, wouldn’t you? Seriously, though: everyone needs a shop stool — or a couple if you plan on inviting your friends over for shop fun. And unless you plan on building your own, $100 flat isn’t really that bad for a fancy seat like this one.
“But is it really heavy duty,” you ask? I gave it the quick test of sitting my own fat ass on it (briefly), and it didn’t fall to pieces. So there’s that. It’s certainly shiny. Anyway, if you do want one, you’ll probably find it at your local Costco. That’s where I found this one.
Do you hear the theme from Raiders of the Lost Ark when trying to navigate your workbench, shelves, or cabinets? Whether it’s the garage or shop, chances are you’re running out of storage space. An under-shelf organizer like this one from Grayline Housewares might be one way to reclaim some unused space in your otherwise-packed storage areas.
While the picture shows the basket holding towels in a closet, we envision using it to hold sheets of sandpaper, boxes of nails, or other stuff that usually clutters the top of workbenches.
This model measures 12″ long by 10″ wide by 6-1/4″ high and is made from wire coated with white vinyl. There are a ton of different sizes available from different manufacturers, both online and in brick and mortar stores starting at $6. Just watch out for the giant rolling ball when you do the installation.
Under Shelf Storage Basket [Grayline Housewares]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Why use a brass pin punch? Well, for one brass doesn’t spark, so if you ever need to drive out a pin in a flammable environment, you’d probably want one. Secondly, they are less likely to leave a mark on steel surfaces.
This brass pin punch set by Solid includes a 6″ center punch and pin punches sized 3/32″ x 4-1/4″, 1/8″ x 4-3/4″, 5/32″ x 5″, 3/16″ x 5-1/4″ and 1/4″ x 5-3/4″. It runs about $26 shipped.
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
The Complete Book of Pocketknife Repair: A Cutler’s Manual by Ben Kelley is a short, somewhat flawed, basic book on the steps you need to take to restore an old pocketknife to its former glory. The first two chapters cover tools needed for basic repairs, including special hand tools specific to knife repair. Chapter 3 is a complete how-to guide on restoring a Case pocketknife that is seemingly beyond repair, although the author replaces the blades with new ones.
We get a two-page chapter on buffing, then a chapter on blade repair which oddly misses the reshaping of the tip. Following that are chapters on handle repair and dying and “jigging” bone for handles. You can skim over a couple of throwaway chapters on maintenance, heat treating, etc. The final section of “general information” has great details on angling blades and “cutlering” (bending the blades so they fold together neatly) blades on an anvil.
So the good: the book covers a bunch of operations in knife repair that may be hard to learn on your own, such as spinning rivets, working bone, and getting the knife to operate smoothly.
The bad: the book skips some important info such as where to get replacement blades, blade tip reshaping, and information on the making of blades. It isn’t a book on making knives from scratch but that info would have been useful.
The worst thing is that the book is out of print…so copies on Amazon are priced in the insane $60-$200 range. The good news is that a copy just sold on Ebay for $12, so there are cheap copies out there, possibly sitting in your local used bookshop. The book isn’t worth much more than that, so it’s probably best to get a copy through your library.
TM has had recent posts about both soldering and desoldering. If you’re doing either, the Edsyn FXF15 FUMINATOR can help to remove the potentially toxic fumes. You can get one in blue, green, or red from Edsyn for $27 (a 75% discount according to their website). Shipping costs seem a bit high, but maybe you can find some other things you need to rationalize the shipping. This bench-top fume extraction system draws fumes away from the operator, and comes with front and rear charcoal-impregnated filters, a 12 VDC wall transformer, a single adjustable arm, and is ESD safe. The FXF15 weighs 1.09 lbs, and is 5.5″ W × 9″ H × 5.5″ H. It appears to have a fan system similar to the Edsyn FXF11 (available from Amazon), but without the solder-peg stand and dual adjustable arm.
Instructables has several DIY alternatives (here’s a filtered version, for example).
Edsyn Fuminator FXF15 Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Not many screws are long enough to merit a 1:4 gearing to help tighten them more quickly, but the little buggers get frustrating fast if they are. This is the Skew Products Fastdriver, a screwdriver with a little (extra) twist. There’s a gear set in the body which turns every handle rotation into four shaft rotations. If you need more torque, the gearbox can be disengaged for normal 1:1 operation. It comes with two Phillips and two slot drivers and is compatible with 1/4″ hex inserts, the same type you’ll find in just about any interchangeable-head screwdriver, so this should work with your existing collection.
The Fastdriver’s pretty cheap, too — just $12 before shipping from SJ Discount Tools. I’d imagine it’s roughly as fast as a ratcheting screwdriver, but a little easier to use — no rapid back-and-forth nonsense making the tip slip out of the screw head.
Fastdriver [SJ Discount Tools]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Qual-Craft’s ladder hooks attach to a ladder and then hook over the ridge of a roof to provide a secure foothold on steeper-pitched roofs. The pictured model also has a wheel which allows you to roll the ladder up the roof rather than slide it.
The Ladder Hook hooks around the second-to-the-top rung; a rung clip which can be tightened with a wing nut secures it to the top rung. It’s adjustable and works with wood, fiberglass, and aluminum single or extension ladders with round or D-rungs. You’ll need two of these ladder hooks per ladder.
QualCraft doesn’t recommend using their ladder hook on roofs with ridge vents. Pricing for the ladder hook with roller starts at $21 each, but remember you’re going to need two.
Ladder Hook (pdf) [Qual-Craft]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
(TV Tonight, Monday, October 5th, 2009) Another lame Monday — hard to compete with House and Heroes, I suppose.
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(TV Tonight, Sunday, October 4th, 2009) There are more than a few reruns but it’s still a better idea to head out to your shop…
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(TV Tonight, Saturday, October 3rd, 2009) Yet another Mythbusters marathon…
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Why heat the outdoors? To assure you don’t, you’ll need to track down hot air leaking out of the house. You could drop megabucks to have a pro bring out a $5,000 infrared camera and perform a home energy audit. But hey — we’re talking about saving money, not spending it. Black & Decker offers a cheaper (and somewhat simpler) solution: their Thermal Leak Detector. And it’s just $40.
Starting with the pro’s camera, Black & Decker’s engineers asked “What don’t you need to get the job done?” First to go: the camera’s expensive CCD chip. Do you really need to see a thermal picture of the house just to find hot air? Instead, they replaced the CCD with a simple laser pyrometer — and a brilliantly simple interface.
When you turn on the TLD, it shines a green spot wherever you’ve aimed the pyrometer. It also displays the temperature of the spot on its LCD. The temperature of this initial spot becomes the standard, and as you move the spot around, the TLD changes the color of the light when the temperature climbs or drops. Red indicates hotter, blue colder. You can select the sensitivity — 1, 5, or 10 degrees F — via a switch.
It’s incredibly easy to use. Point it at the floor and turn it on. Walk around the house shining the light on various spots, and you’ll quickly discover whether or not, for example, the electrician pulled all the insulation out around outlets on exterior walls, whether windows leak, or whether your heater is venting into your attic, heating it instead of your house. Try it outside on a cold day to look for hot air escaping, or indoors to find cold air leaking in.
The TLD isn’t new. It’s been out for quite a while now, and I’ve written about it for multiple publications. But as temperatures finally start to drop I couldn’t help but bring it up again. We use ours around the office regularly, both for its intended purpose and for fun. $5,000 is way too much cash to blow on maybe finding some spare dough this winter. But $40 isn’t bad at all.
Thermal Leak Detector [Black & Decker]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Here’s an oddball — a protractor designed for setting an aircraft propeller’s pitch angle. Apparently these large, high-precision protractors and levels are used for dialing in propeller settings. You set the hub to vertical, the blades (initially) to horizontal, then adjust until you reach the desired angle. Given how critical wheel balance is on a car, I can imagine you’d need a pretty special tool to dial in faster-spinning propellers. They’re not exactly a failure-tolerant par, and neither are control surfaces, which this device can also be used to adjust.
As evidence of how important propeller settings can be, there are versions of this tool available for as much as $1,470, though the swanky transparent body may have something to do with that. Warp Drive manufactures the plastic model above, and retails it for a much more reasonable $39 before shipping from Aircraft Spruce. It’s a niche tool, but probably a crappy thing to be stuck without.
Warp Drive Prop Protractor [Aircraft Spruce]
Warp Drive [Warp Drive Props]
Readers who’ve already seen these will have to forgive my enthusiasm for finder this clever combination of shaving and inspection mirrors. My own inspection mirror hasn’t left the drawer in ages, largely thanks to my idiotic selection of a small one just 1.5″ across. The thought was that it would be easier to get into tight spaces, which it is, but once it’s there, it’s like diagnosing through a pinhole. A magnifying version would provide the best of both worlds - a compact mirror with a wide field of view.
Craftsman has a version for just under $13 which telescopes from 12″ to a pretty ridiculous 51″. Regardless of where the offending, invisible problem is, that length bloody well better be enough to find it. A zoomed-in view will add increased speed to that annoying right-is-left, up-is-down hunt for the problem, but once you find it, you’ll definitely be able to get a better view.
Magnifying Inspection Mirror [Craftsman]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Besides shop uses like examining sharpened edges and getting a closer look at that splinter in your finger (TM 7/03/09 post), I think small handheld microscopes are just plain cool. The Celestron 44306 is a Handheld Digital and Optical Microscope, with adjustable brightness LED illumination, a 20X eyepiece for optical viewing (4X to 8X on the LOW setting; 50X on the HIGH setting) and a USB 2.0mp digital camera for snapshots and video on your computer (20X to 40X on the LOW setting; 200X on the HIGH setting). It’s 2″ × 1.25″ × 3.5″, weighs 2 oz, and includes a USB cable and ArcSoft Photo software. The user has to supply two AAA batteries for the LED.
There are lots of fun things to look at with the microscope, like fountain pen writing on an index card, a cat whisker — it fell off, honest — , coins, wood grain, random garage bugs…
I find the 44306 especially appealing because you can use it either standalone or interfaced to your computer. It can be yours for around $85.
Celestron [Manufacturer's Site]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Not that I’m gonna trade in my trusty old pickup anytime soon, but it’s nice to know there are interesting alternatives. The Bloodhound SuperSonic Car, or SSC — it’s the one on the left above, in case you were wondering — is designed to do better than 1,000 mph (faster than a speeding bullet: specifically, a .357 that plods along at 971 mph). Its jet engine will take it up to 350 mph, and then its hybrid rocket engine will ignite to crank it up to 1,000 mph or more. Cost estimate is $15M.
On the other hand, both speed and money wise, there’s the Wheego Whip, which kinda looks like a Smart Car, but — IMHO — has a much better name. For $19,000 — ouch! but at least the payments will be lower than on $15M — you’ll get an all-electric, street-legal LSV (Low Speed Vehicle) that can be charged from a standard household electrical outlet and go 35-40 miles on a single charge (the 2010 model is expected to increase the range to 100 miles).
Bloodhound SSC [Manufacturer's Site]
Wheego Whip [Manufacturer's Site]
We’ve covered faucet lights that change color with water temperature before, but what’s even cooler about Sylvania’s ECOlight is that it provides both temperature indication and shower illumination without batteries or electrical wiring — water pressure provides the power for this self-contained unit.
The ECOlight has an LED that glows blue when the water is cold and red when the water gets warmer. It uses Sylvania’s high power golden dragon LED to provide light so you don’t need to turn on any extra lights on when you’re showering. There’s an on/off switch if you don’t want to use the light.
The ECOlight body and the shower head can pivot up and down and left and right. You can install the ECOlight in any shower or other fixture with 3/4″ standard shower pipes. Pricing for the ECOlight starts at $20.
ECOlight [Sylvania]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Amazon has a #61-#80 set of drill bits for the low price of $3.95.
These bits are definitely not high quality, but it’s worth keeping a set around just in case you have to drill a tiny hole from time to time. Bits this small are also handy for cleaning out small orifices by hand or even gauging holes if you don’t have a set of wire gauges that small. The description is confusing as it labels the size in mm, but we’re reasonably sure they’re number gauge bits. The case is definitely a throwaway, though, compared to the small metal indexes sets usually come in.
(TV Tonight, Thursday, October 2nd, 2009) Some much-deserved newness tonight, with Factory Made on Discovery and How It’s Made on Science.
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Chances are if you’ve owned a dishwasher for a few years, there are spots where the plastic has worn through and the metal rack is rusting. Products like ReRack and Uber Goop are designed to fix this damage before it becomes more of an eyesore or even a danger to your dishes. You can also use these products on shower racks or other bathroom racks that are showing signs of rust.
Available in white and gray, ReRack is a flexible synthetic rubber that sticks well to most pre-coated vinyl racks and is heat and water resistant. What exactly Uber Goop is made of is a mystery, but it too can be used to coat any metal product except sheet metal and wires. Uber Goop also comes with vinyl caps to cover tines rather than re-coat them, which may or may not be more durable. It’s sold in white, light blue, and gray.
Uber Goop comes in more colors, but looks like it’s only sold at Amazon, whereas you might actually find ReRack at your local hardware store. ReRack runs about $6 a bottle and Uber Goop with 25 caps runs about the same price.
ReRack [Plasti Dip]
Uber Goop [Corporate Site]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
ReRack Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Uber Goop Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Sometimes the time-tested methods work best; sometimes they work even better with modern technology. A broom has no cords or hoses to catch and will reach every corner of your shop. Instead of tripping over the vacuum or dust collection hose, just connect Woodstock International’s floor sweep to your dust collection system and sweep the debris away.
The floor sweep works best when used in conjunction with a gate — that way you can just open the gate when you’re sweeping and close it when you’re done. It measures 24″ wide by 3-1/2″ high by 7″ deep and is made from 3/32″ thick plastic. It connects to any 4″ dust collection hose and can be attached to the floor using double sided tape.
Pricing for most plastic floor sweeps start at $4.
Floor Sweep [Woodstock Int]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Keeping work cool is a sure-fire way to improve accuracy during machining, but every method has drawbacks. Liquid cooling is very effective and lubricates well, but it’s messy and the hardware’s expensive. Air cooling, while cheap, doesn’t do the job as well. A company called ITW Vortec markets a device which is advertised as combining the advantages of both, courtesy of a subzero air stream. Their Cold Air Guns take 100psi compressed air, spin it around a tube’s inner diameter at a million RPM, and the resulting air currents send hot air out one end and cold air out the other. Sounds like science fiction, but there seems to be good science backing up their claims.
Pricing is targeted at a middle ground between liquid cooling and conventional air cooling setups. A kit, complete with air filter, stand, and gun, runs for $364 from Vortex Air themselves, or $343 from Production Tool supply. They’re asking a hefty price for what seems to be a very simple product, but it’s a lot cheaper than a liquid cooling setup. With no moving parts, odds are they won’t need any servicing, so the price should be a one-time deal.
Cold-air guns [ITW Vortec]
ITW Vortec Cold-Air Guns [Vortex Air]
ITW Vortec Cold-Air Gun [Production Tool Supply]
A few days ago, I heard an interesting little tip from an old racer while discussing the best way to put a riveted assembly together. In response to my concerns about high vibration loosening the fasteners, he said the answer was simply dipping the rivet shanks in epoxy prior to installation. While blind rivets are already a pain to remove (and this wouldn’t make life any easier), it does provide an excellent backup. No dead space means less fatigue, and the epoxy would provide secondary retention for the leftover stem.
A clever fabricator could probably combine this technique with strips of epoxy or RTV in an assembly’s seams to create a liquid-tight container without needing a welder. It’s a good way to improve reliability or sidestep the need for high-dollar equipment.
(Thanks to Flickr user Illetirres for this cool CC-licensed photo)
Replacing the head and top-end gaskets, transmission cooler lines, and radiator on my 1990 Olds took about forty hours. In that same time frame, the Patron Highcraft endurance racing team stuffed their ARX-02a prototype, collected the bits after three full midair revolutions and a hell of a hard landing, assessed the damage, and rebuilt the car from scratch. The actual rebuild took just over 20 hours, and the team took an impressive time-lapse video of the process.
Race vehicles must be designed for straightforward service, and it’s obvious that the Acuras are pretty well-done in that department. Many a production car could benefit from some of the techniques used for race vehicles, and it’s always something designers should have in mind.
Patron Highcraft’s Acura rebuild [YouTube]
News courtesy of Motorsport.com
Veritas® flush-cutting saws have teeth that are set only on one side of a thin flexible blade. This allows them to trim protruding plugs and dowels without damaging the surface. They cut on the pull stroke.
The single-edge saw is $20, and the double-edge version is $25. Both saws are about 11-1/2″ long with 4-3/4″ blades and 22 tpi.
Lee Valley [Manufacturer's Site]
“Wow, that looks stupid. Who would use that thing? I’m never going to use this.” We said all those things at one point about the right angle attachment. Then we dug it out of the drawer about five times and had to eat our words. If you have a Dremel, get smart and buy in now — Utopia Tools has the Dremel 575 Right Angle Attachment for $16.99.
The right angle attachment, um…, attaches to your Dremel and provides a relatively compact 90-degree drive to the tool for getting into smaller spaces. The right angle drive doesn’t provide any speed reduction/torque increase, just a 1:1 drive at 90 degrees. It certainly means the body of the dremel can be held well away from the cut, when using smaller cutoff wheels and such.
Dremel 575 Right Angle Attachment [utopiatools.com]
(TV Tonight, Thursday, October 1st, 2009) Science has reruns of Junkyard Wars. This is somewhat bittersweet as the show that started reality/DIY hybrid programming also reminds us what a dearth of it we’ve had lately. It also planted the seeds of destruction when it abandoned teams of amateurs for teams of “professionals.”
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