BuffaloFeeds » Toolmonger » February 18, 2010

Toolmonger (8 unread)

Win A Camaro SS, Courtesy Of Jegs

Posted: February 18th, 2010, 3:28pm MST by Chuck Cage

We’re not sure whether this is just business as usual or an indication of how rough the auto aftermarket business has fared in the tough economy, but the folks at Jegs are giving away a brand new Camaro SS. And the geeks out there among you may recognize the paintjob as the one closest to the one featured in the recent Transformers movies.

As per usual with these contests, you’ll have to cough up some personal information including, at bare minimum, your address and email — presumably so you’ll begin receiving Jegs catalogs and email promotions. They also encourage you to pass on some details about what vehicles you own and work on.

The contest runs through July 4th.

Camaro Giveaway [Jegs]
New(?) Lenox Site Commander Contest

Posted: February 18th, 2010, 3:17pm MST by Gordon DeWitte

I don’t know if this is the same contest that TM noted in 2008 (TM 10/27/08), another episode because they made three of these trucks for a national tour, or some glitch due to the economy — if it’s a continuation of the earlier one, they’re taking forever to pick a winner, or maybe this is turning into a perpetual contest.

In any case, if you’re “a professional contractor or skilled trade worker in construction and currently employed in the construction industry,” you can enter the Lenox Site Commander Sweepstakes before 5/1/2010, and you could win a pimped-out work truck. The basic truck is a 2008 Dodge Ram quad-cab, four-wheel-drive 5500 HD with a 6.7L Cummins turbo diesel engine, a 6-speed automatic transmission, and a Reading Spacemaster Classic II service body.

This truck comes complete with all kinds of goodies, including its own 7,500-watt Kohler diesel generator to provide both power for the Site Commander and heating and cooling to its mobile office.

Three Dell Latitude XFR computers provide plenty of computing power; there’s one in the “mobile office,” one in the “command center” (next to which is the on-board coffee maker), and one on the Segway x2 Adventure (which has its own storage compartment, or “garage,” with an electric lift). If I were a professional contractor, I’d want to win just for the Segway x2 alone, but then I probably wouldn’t get much done at a work site except to ride it around and “supervise.”

The Site Commander site has many more pictures of the trucks’ construction, their features, and the tour.

Entry Form [Site Commander Sweepstakes]
Segway x2 Adventure [Manufacturer's Site]
From The Flickr Pool: A Better Cheap-o Caliper

Posted: February 18th, 2010, 3:15pm MST by Chuck Cage

Toolmonger Simon rightly points out that even if you’re willing to deal with the potential inaccuracies of cheap-o calipers, you’re still stuck with the fact that they don’t turn themselves off correctly, meaning that pretty soon you’ve got a useless plastic stick in your drawer. He’s found one solution: a solar powered model, pictured above.

I can’t see a brand on it, so hopefully he’ll comment here and let us know who makes it and where he found it — for just $10. I actually wouldn’t mind owning one.

Of course a friend of a (shop) friend found another solution: He’d cut his up and carefully install a tiny switch, allowing him to manually shut ‘em off before putting ‘em away. I noticed Simon’s has a switch, but it’s the kind that you just know will get bumped in a drawer/bag and turn the thing on.

A Better Cheap-o Caliper [Flickr]
Dealmonger: Gerber 3-Blade Stag Stockman for $20

Posted: February 18th, 2010, 3:09pm MST by Chuck Cage

If you’re looking for a nice, daily-carry Stockman, you might enjoy this Gerber. And Amazon’s currently offering it for just $20.10 — about $5 to $10 less than we find it normally priced elsewhere. Like virtually all Stockman-pattern knives, this one includes a large clip-point blade, plus a smaller drop-point and sheepsfoot. Unusually, this Stockman includes a lock-back, though we suspect only the clip point locks. (If you own one and know for sure, drop us a line.)

Though originally meant for trimming sheep hooves, the sheepsfoot blade works beautifully for slicing open boxes or performing surgery on a model decal. We’re particularly fond of the clip-point for cutting a hot-dog in half at the stadium. And everyone knows how useful the drop-point can be. Plus, the stag gives it a rustic appearance, which often appeals to us for general-use knives.

Of course, Sean will disagree. He’s not a fan of multi-blades for common carry, preferring instead a simple single that’s smaller, yet offers a larger blade. Incredibly, he’s convinced me to do the same. (I commonly carried a Stockman for years before I met him.) But I’ll still always picture a Stockman when I think “pocket knife” because my father carried one.

Gerber Stockman Lock-Back Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Reader Question: What Air Tools Do You Use At Home?

Posted: February 18th, 2010, 3:02pm MST by Chuck Cage
Recently we were shooting the bull with some friends in the tool business when the following topic arose: Do DIYers (or pros not at work) use air tools — non-fastener tools, like impact wrenches, air ratchets, air chisels, etc. as opposed to nailers or staple guns — at home? And if so, which ones and for what purposes? If you’ve got a sec, drop us a line via email or comment below with a bit of detail about the following:
1. Do you use air tools at all at home?
2. If so, which ones?
3. What type of work do you do with them?
4. What kind of air compressor do you use?
5. What’s the minimum tank size, in your opinion, for home air tool use?
We appreciate it, because all of us sitting around the bar had dramatically different views on the subject. One of these days we’re going to set up a full survey engine here on TM. I’d love to be able to do a detailed poll among readers. I’d say we have a hell of a knowledge base here.
Who Buys An $18 Bent Piece Of Wire?

Posted: February 18th, 2010, 2:58pm MST by Benjamen Johnson

When you get some weeds stuck in your tiller’s tines or axle, do you go out and purchase an $18 specially bent piece of wire or do you make one yourself out of some scrap wire? If you’re not a Toolmonger, you might go buy Mantis’ tiller tine detangler.

Mantis fashions their 10-3/4″ detangler out of what they call strong, solid steel and then they dip it in some sort of plastic. Rather than spend the $18 for this overpriced piece of wire, drop $10 for a wire bender like we’ve posted before, and with the leftover cash you save you can pick up some Plasti-dip to coat the handle.

Tiller Tine Detangler [Mantis]
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
7 Issues: $35. 208 Issues: $150

Posted: February 18th, 2010, 2:41pm MST by Chuck Cage

I know we’ve mentioned Taunton’s Fine Woodworking magazine archive before, but as each year’s updated version comes out and we receive the inevitable promotion emails, we always wonder: How does the magazine stay in business when you can buy the huge archive so reasonably?

Seriously. 208 issues would include enough projects and tips to keep you happy in the wood shop for many years, if not the rest of your natural life. And though $150 can be hard to dig up, consider this: A single year’s subscription (in the US and Canada) will run you $35, and that gets you just seven issues. That’s just under $5/issue as their real price is one of those just-under-the-dollar numbers we automatically round up on Toolmonger.

Order ‘em in digital form on DVD and you’re looking at less than $0.75/issue. Plus, you can perform searches without digging around in a pile — or wondering if you finally threw out that issue because you needed the shelf space back.

Anyway, regardless of the future of paper magazines, this still seems like a killer deal to us, especially for the younger crowd which probably won’t get access to the December 1975 issue any other way.

2009 Fine Woodworking Magazine Archive DVD [Taunton]
Ever Wonder What Others Buy From Garrett Wade?

Posted: February 18th, 2010, 2:38pm MST by Chuck Cage

So did we, until we noticed the feature on their front page that allows one to view all the products in the catalog which customers rated five stars. (OK, we’re assuming that if they rate the product five stars they bought one.) The items — and their prices — were, well, quite surprising.

First up; a set of seven gimlets for $12.

So that’s not so surprising as the price is low enough to fall within many woodworkers’ free-spending range. But that must indicate that many Garrett Wade customers are pretty experienced woodworkers, ’cause most of the people I know don’t have a clue what a gimlet is. (And no, it’s not a cocktail — at least not in the world of wood. A gimlet is a small hand-powered drill used to drill small holes without splitting the wood workpiece.)

Next: A pretty chrome-plated, solid brass push drill for $45, on sale from $58.

I’ll admit I can probably see this one, as I have a fondness for push drills since my father put two of ‘em in my kiddie tool set back when I was too young to handle power tools. I’d say the number of times I need a push drill in a given week is probably zero to zero point one, but then I’m not an avid woodworker. So if I were to buy one, it’d probably be more for nostalgia than anything else, and that chrome looks mighty fine.

Read on to page two for more.

Third: a “special German chisel set” for $112, on sale from $128.

Chisel aficionado Toolmongers may disagree, but $112 seems like a lot to pay for a chisel set, especially one where the brand name is cleverly not mentioned much on the catalog page. Though they sound nice — chrome vanadium steel, sharpened and polished blade, hardened to Rc61, oil-finished ash handles — I wonder if you couldn’t score an equally functional set for a lot less.

Skipping down the page, I noticed a couple of overall trends: customers seem to rate clearance items with five stars quite often. (Either that’s true, or the folks at Garrett Wade are pumping us up by either placing five-star items on clearance often or listing clearance items more often. We did, however, sort by “best selling.”) And it seems like sharp-looking items at lower prices — though still often high for the item in question — run to the top.

Could Garrett Wade be the Brookstone (or Sharper Image, RIP) of the woodworking world — the source for “gift items” meant to stand out among the tool chest via bling?

Customer-Rated Five-Star Tools/Best Sellers [Garrett Wade]