Tips, Tricks, and Tools

Here's one your power tools will thank you for





Most any power tool has a gearbox which is generally fairly easy to access. A few screws or bolts, and some fresh grease, and it'll be hummin like new

Originally Posted by KzScrapper

To keep the noise down, I will use a Shot Filled Rubber Mallet to feat the buck out of things.

Haha, I've got one of those from I don't know where, probly a yard sale or something. For awhile I'd hit something with it and shot would go everywhere, then I saw one end of it was busted, which brings up another of my world famous fixes. Duck Tape! ; )

Duct tape...it'll fix anything.





Sirscrapalot - Has a wife who makes purses an wallets out of duct tape.

Originally Posted by Bear

Here's one your power tools will thank you for

[IMG]http://i.imgbox.com/acfy5Cyz.jpg[/IG]

Most any power tool has a gearbox which is generally fairly easy to access. A few screws or bolts, and some fresh grease, and it'll be hummin like new

Make sure those 4 bolts are tight all of the time, if they loosen it will wear out the gears in a few minutes.

Originally Posted by eesakiwi

Make sure those 4 bolts are tight all of the time, if they loosen it will wear out the gears in a few minutes.

Allways! Check the lugbolts on your cars too, haha ; ) I did that one over a year and a half ago Eesa and it's still hummin like new : )
Here's a 50 year old Craftsman sander I did just a couple days ago
That's some 50 year old grease there

Dug most of it out with a small flat screwdriver

Filled it up with new grease on a putty knife

Here's one from an old VCR motor, not real strong and never had a use for em. One day I had a bench top covered in drill cuttings, didn't wanna put em on my screw holding magnet and get em in my hand when I cleaned it off into the screw bucket, and didn't want to brush em off in the floor to vacuum up with the rest the dirt and rust, or risk the dog getting in to it, so I just used one of those worthless magnets to "collect" it with, then tossed it all together in with the screws

Had a fan in back the shop last summer that would sometimes get to vibrating too much. I thought of tying it down with a string, or trying to find a long spring to hold it down with. Then I took a magnet from the Microwave stack ( them things will grab on and hold on tight! ) Stuck it on there and presto, no more bad vibes ; )

Here's one from an old 5.25" floppy disk drive, real thin but large diameter, it might be rare earth, not sure, but it's pretty stout.

I screwed it onto a wood block and tried to pick up a 21lb tractor wheel weight, but it wouldn't quite grab that. It didn't have any problem with an 11lb transformer tho ; )

Very fine steel shavings and metal dust quickly accumulates on the magnetized screwdriver tips and prevents a good tool to slot contact and can strip screws and mess up screwdriver bits.

I recently stuck a very small powerful magnet near my work area. Now I just touch the magnet with the screwdriver tip to remove the shavings and dust. Works better than a wipe on the shirt.

That's a cool idea Erewen

Thanks Pnut, that's pretty cool

Originally Posted by Pnutfarmer

Hey Bear, hope you don't mind an addition. I have a nice old 15 gal Shell "trash can" scrap yard purchase complete with bullet holes beside my chair in the shop. It doubles as a screwdriver holder with the drivers grouped in standard, Phillips, drill bit, and nut drivers. The trick is the hard drive magnets stuck inside the barrel that are strong enough to easily hold the screwdrivers without anything else on the outside.

**** thats a good idea

I just learned today that the clear plastic panel in a flat screen monitor is very tough. I'm not sure what it's made of, Lexan maybe?, but I now use one to protect my shop floor when I'm chiseling transformers off circuit boards. I use a sharp chisel that would gouge the floor if I didn't have something under it. The panel is a good size for this and is very resistant to hammer blows and even a hard strike with the chisel. Another plus is that these things are lying around free so if you manage to break one, just toss it and grab another.

Why ain't you got a bench to do that on Pnut?

That's a very good question. I got a bench to put up when I got my shop about 10 years ago. Then everything kept getting piled in until I covered up the space for the bench with computers and such. One of these days, I'm going to throw everything out into the yard, install the bench and go again. These panels would also work well to protect your bench top.

haha Pnut, I've built so many shelves and benches and table worktops it would take it's own 2 page thread just to post the pictures. Trouble is, they're so covered up with junk I'd be ashamed to post em ; )