home made tools and equipment...

This photo might help. If you need a specific detail, just ask and I will take a photo, or give you a description.

 

The counterweights hold the jaws open until you press the pedal?

 

I use those bread clips on my spark plug wires or to identify any wires when working on an engine. Keep a whole bag of them in my toolbox.

 

Yes, they do the same thing that the springs do on the commercial foot operated stands. I did not like the feel of the springs. The farther you pushed the pedal down, the springs had more resistance, and you could not feel the point when the metal started to move easily. The counterweights eliminated this and gives you the ability to have more control. The purpose of the weights or springs is to return the pedal and open the jaws of the tool.

 

I whipped up a wheeling machine to make some fenders and widen the tank on my fat bike. The wheels were just some old kart wheels my brother lathed true on a brake lathe at work. It seems to work

 

Great idea on the wheeling machine!
I have access to an expensive machine of that size and use it occasionally, but I’m not gonna spend the $850 for one.
I love your simple design and ingenuity.

 

wonderful job!

 

I recently bought a mag drill and annular cutters to drill a bunch of holes in a snow blade (original blades were an older style and new cutting edges had different holes. I wanted to keep them neater than a torch job. ). The drill is a beast and the cutters did a great job (30 seconds for a 5/8" hole compared to 15 to 30 mins / hole with twist drills) but for small jobs around the shop, it just isn't very handy at 30 lbs. I had a dead radial arm saw so I thought I would strip the old saw attachment off and use the height adjustment to hold the mag drill. It has some limitations and I still haven't decided if it's getting a 6" cross slide or a 4" x/y vice but It's a great way to store the drill and be able to use it in a heartbeat.

 

I’ve been doing that for years. We used to buy powdered detergent from Costco which had clips about 2.5 times of the bread ones. Numbered them 1-8 for plug wires and a few other things...

 

3 position shop stool. Seat is from an old implement, has a leaf spring from a Chevy 1.5 ton for cantilever.

 

Great idea and execution. Any more photos showing how it works?

 

Looks like a great idea. Can you please show us some more views?

 

2 holes in leaf spring, allthread inside steel tube, each tube has 1/4” round stock to catch holes in spring. Just lift seat and pull out. Move it up or down, slide spring into frame and push down over pins on tube

 

It has been decades since I have done much transmission work. So I am building a Torqueflight and needed a spring compressor in a hurry. A couple pieces of plywood and some threaded rod and done.

 

View attachment 6076708 View attachment 6076708 Here is what I use to polish aluminum rims.
Brake Lathe with a lathe chuck welded onto the end. I cut axles to fit into the chuck. This one is a Ford 28 spline turned down to be the same diameter. over the depth of the chuck jaws. Once mounted I use various sanding grits normally starting at 320 then up to 1500. Polish after that with angle grinders. Cannot do the spokes but is handy for the rim. The lathe turns at around 45 RPM so I can carefully hold the sandpaper in my fingers. The brake lathe was free. Not sure why the backside picture posted twice
Movin/on

 

I've been making these for about half a year. They're awesome. Shop stand for Ford flathead 3-speed transmissions. Hit me up if you want one.
Andy

 

like it

 

Very cool!

 

I built this sheet metal brake about 30 years not expecting it to work all that well. I just used it last night again. Built quite a few floors over the years with it. It doesn't give a sharp bend but I kind of like that. Bought a set of barn door hinges and the rest was scrap steel I had laying around. Its not pretty but it works for as little as I use a brake.

 

Darn my images rotated on me after I posted them.

 

Perfect, thanks Sporty

 

Didn’t realize this thread existed. Made my own pedal operated shrinker/stretcher stand. The pedal arm pivot is a 1/2 -13 bolt and nut setup that threads and unthreads 1/8 turn during operation rather than using a bearing and shaft.

 

I just used this today. I marked the positive and negative wires to the coil I was replacing. Sharpied + and - on the bread ties.

I also keep 8 clothespins (Sharpied 1 through 8) near the bench to mark sparkplug wires when needed.

(mostly I just posted this because I wanted to bring this thread back to the top; I love to see the creativity herein)

 

I made this a couple weeks ago. It was finally nice enough and no wind today to spray my wheels.
This is my "wheelie go round " or maybe it's a "lazy jethro" .....I don't know why Susan was so lazy , I had a couple beers while the paint was drying s , so "Lazy Jethro" it is.
I used the end from a bent axle and a pellet stove auger motor to turn it. I stuck a drum on the axle and it worked like a dream. The auger motor turns at 2 rpm , just about right.

 

Had to change a broken valve Spring on the car.so I made a tool.filled the cylinder with air and voilà.

 

Two 5tb external hard drives I am updating on a bi-weekly activity. When I type a story I want to keep or take some family photos, it goes to the laptop hard drive. Then within a couple of weeks, the “emergency take” hard drives get an update. Old photos, stories, and journal entries take up a lot of space, so I try to keep my built in hard drive less than half capacity for a good running situation. The older ones get moved to the portable external hard drives for safe keeping.

So, if we have to evacuate, the latest saved materials and home information is saved from a week ago. The small hard drives can go with me in the car, too. If I am waiting for my wife, it can be uploading information from the laptop hard drive to the small portable 5tb emergency hard drive. The larger bread clips nicely curl and hold the short connection wires.

larger than normal size photo for clarity

They are the best for longer cords and for shorter ones, as pictured above. The clips are simple, come with each loaf of bread, rolls or English Muffins and can be used over and over. If left out in the sun all day for some reason, they tend to get brittle. So be aware. But, who leaves bread loaves out in the sun?


Hello,


In my research and our bread usage, the healthy, Dave’s Killer Bread has used the larger of the tabs. Oroweat Bakeries and other name brands still use the smaller hole “mouse ears…”

My wife sticks with this brand of bread and it is one of the only ones that comes with a larger opening plastic clip. Now, the popular brand of bread is the only one to stock at any store with the clips that work better for larger wires or smaller, but more loop wires for accessories.

I have also found out that out in the garage, where some of the thin corded items only get used a couple of times a month, the larger clips keep them rolled up without kinks well. But, my wife has used her small hole bread clip and larger hole clip for her earbuds that have wires. The smaller ones fit several rolled up cords, but unless you keep them on one portion of the wire, they tend to get lost easily.

Well, we have a ton of both sizes and they both work, the larger ones work the best.
Curled accessory wire holders for all small computer cords, recharging cords or phone accessory cords. Notice the above plug in head is for an Apple phone. But, it still has the twist tie wrapped around the cord, as it recently got taken out of the “cord” drawer for getting put back in use.

Now, those twisty ties are no more for the thinner wires or accessory cords.

Jnaki

How does one lose the clips? Remember, they are small and if left sitting around, they will get lost. Find the best place on your curled wires and clip the colorful plastic part on and if straight, it should stay on, even while using the wire during charging, etc.

Note:

In our daily drivers, we have portable chargers that are small format (candy bar size) and hold a couple of full phone charges. But wait, you say, some cars come with USB outlets and the phones can be charged by plugging them in to the built in rectangular holes. Yes, that is true. But, in comparing both choices, the small portable battery chargers are faster for any charge.

The car USB is handy due to it being built in, but if and when one forgot to charge a phone prior to work or play, by the time you get to work or beach, it will not be charged very well. The portable batteries are far superior for this type of charging. YRMV

As for older folks that cannot do twist ties for some reason, these little thingy clips are relatively free with bread loaf purchases. When used, the simply clip onto the curled wires. But, after many used and lackadaisical care, they will slip off due to the plastic taking twist shape after each removal of the wires and putting them back in place, once curled.

 

I wish you luck with the external hard drives. I had one set up with automatic updates to store all my pictures and large files in a "safe" place outside of my computer. The external hard drive was the first to crash and lose it's info, and also caused the main frame to crash. I currently have about 30 yrs of picture files on a dead computer...

 

@whtbaron , there may be hope. My brother's old PC died, but I was able to remove hard drive, and power it up then read it through a USB port. Got all of their pictures, and with some dinking around, saved their Outlook Express mail folders, to open and get the notes and pictures they wanted . hard drive was slow to boot up, but we got the stuff they wanted.

 

Quite often, especially with older external HDs it's less likely that the drive failed and more than the interface card in the enclosure failed. For the older ones that require external power sources, check those power adapters first to make sure they still work. There are plenty of universal drive reader kits that will allow you to connect hard drives outside of their original cases and quite often allow them to be connected via USB and saved.

If the actual drive failed, there are plenty of data recovery businesses that may be worth the effort/cost, depending on what the value of data on the drive is (to you).

One final note, if you use an online storage site for your backups or otherwise encrypt your data, ensure that your password or authentication mechanisms are sufficiently complex to protect the value of the data you have stored.

Best of luck!