5 Essential Tools? - Page 3

I think I ment to say think

Knowledge is the most important tool.

The other four will be dictated by it.

There are five tools with me on every job. My multi tool (I prefer Leatherman but also own Gerbers and lesser know brands.) On everyone I have a magnet (1 inch long, 1/4 wide, and 1/4 thick. My third and fourth tools are my partners, Labs. They keep the varmints out of the way and have saved me from being attacked several times. The fifth tool are my guns. Every vehicle is loaded with an arsenal for varmints. This may not seem important to those in the city, but if you take down a grain bin you need to ready for skunk or raccoon that has considered that home for many years. One skunk made the 60 mile trip to the scrap before jumping out of a car.

Beyond these my favorite and most valuable tool is my torch. I have six sets of torches with 100 lb. propane bottles, gages, torches, hoses, and K tanks. On big jobs I use liquid oxygen. The reason for so many is because I have three tool trailers, four pickups, a shop, and a shed. The real reason for so many is I never know which project I will undertake at any given time. To much room, to much scrap, and no where to sell it.

i addition to the already mentioned tools.. i will add the 2 i use when i scrap electric motors, i use a 20 inch long flat blade screwdriver,mine has a square shaft,, grind the narrow sides on the flat end at an angle ,almost to a point,,and where it gets wider, grind that same to the same width as shaft,just great to prying out copper windings out of laminated steel motors.usually furnace or ac coil motors.after i cutoff end of copper first and put it in vise letting the cut end set on bottom and pry away , easy and fast..now for those long ones out of tall ac compressors, DONT cutoff one end of copper,,i use a AXE head to cut them in half,, NOT a hatchet head,most hatchets are worthless, they are thick like a chisel all the way to the cutting edge,, find a axe where it tapers thinly to the edge,and it will go in between the laminates and use a 5 pound hammer..never gets stuck, ,once in half put in vise an pry out copper windings.