Toolbag Tales-Homemade and improvised tools

[myglaren]

I have a strap wrench that has a socket on it, as the chain wrench above - a chain wrench too, somewhere
Neither any use as access is too awkward for either.

I find this very useful, more to remove the fuel filter locking ring as the oil filters are easily removed by hand after the first oil change.

Won't shift spheres of course.

[Peter.N.]

Excellent. I bought a custom made one for the Mk 1 XMs off ebay - not much good to me now, these have steel springs.

Peter

[ksanturion10]

I'm sure it will.

Yup, turned out to be right .
Kind of clumsy, as it is one roll chain, but just OK for the space provided (around 30 deg of a turn ).
Still, this is the best type for my engine. It seems the prices of this type has fallen sharply these days, but this was in my "to do" list since I had to puncture the old filter for the removal, so didn't kept an eye on the market.
But hey, DIY is DIY

BR
Martin

[Gibbo2286]

Take a wander around my very untidy workshop.

[mickthemaverick]

Take a wander around my very untidy workshop.

It may not look like a professional workshop Gibbo but I bet you know where everything is!! (Or at least you used to )

[Paul-R]

Take a wander around my very untidy workshop.

Doesn't look all that untidy to me. I see plenty of plastic bins holding stuff in the right place. And it looks like you can walk from one side to the other - what more do you want?

[bobins]

How many of the spanners are Whitworth ?

[Gibbo2286]

Quite a few Bobins but there are a lot of AF BSF BA MM etc. and other home made stuff too, I think most of it will end up in a skip when I snuff it.

[bobins]

I've got quite a few old Whitworth spanners myself. I mainly use them for weighing the toolbox down

[myglaren]

My 'workshop' isn't much better. I tidy it up and then look for something and reduce it to chaos again.
I tentatively put my new router to use today - I say new, it has been here unused for 18 months.
There was a cutter fitted so used that, couldn't find the others despite searching for an hour.

Discovered them while looking for a pencil - under the router box

Then there is the dreaded cupboard under the stairs, the utility room, utility cupboard and the cupboards on the upstairs landing and best avoided the attic.

[Peter.N.]

Look at the socket sizes and guess when when I installed this!

This is where my small tools are now, one of the best investments I made, cuts the time for some jobs by 50% - providing I have put them away!

Peter

[ksanturion10]

When you bought your first citroen?
If I have the chance to arrange a workshop, it would be something like Gibbo's one - everything has its own place

[Gibbo2286]

Pop a 5/8 AF on that empty 16mm hook Peter.

[Peter.N.]

You are quite correct Ksanturion, that would have been the CX in the mid 80s. I amazed that my original chalk writing is still on there!

Gibbo

You will notice that the 11/16th is missing, in the metric draw - 18mm. There are others that fit or nearly anyway, a 1/2 inch is slightly smaller than a 13mm, good for removing damaged nuts, and the 7/16 is near enough 11mm - but I'm sure you already know this.

Peter

[Richard_C]

Looking at the impressive kit in these pictures takes me back to 2CV days. You could walk out to the car and carry out a service with the starting handle/wheelbrace, a plug socket that also fitted the oil drain plug and a couple of tools that you could fit in your overalls pocket. Two ring spanners and a screwdriver if I recall. If the spanners won't fit, you are trying to unscrew the wrong thing.

My main complaint (about myself) is that all horizontal surfaces tend towards fullness. 2 medium sized work areas, one just an old kitchen worktop across 2 filing cabinets and one more substantial. But - looking for an odd bolt you get the tin out onto a bench, then the box of washers, then...then...then you need to saw or drill something and find all the useful spaces full. For speed you balance it somewhere and bodge it so you have to start again. A good tidy up is needed which you put off as long as possible - cycle repeats.

So my contribution to workshop design would be a spring-loaded absence-sensing self-tipping benchtop triggered electronically at frequent but random intervals. That would impose the discipline of 'put it away or lose it on the floor'.

I did solve the pencil problem. When I refitted the kitchen I was making up sub assemblies in the garage/workshop and then fitting them indoors. After a couple of days I realized I was wasting ages looking for a pencil, even though I had 2 or 3 in use. So I bought a box of 12, left them everywhere I was working, and after 3 weeks I still had 12. You would think that the more you have the more you lose, but no. That led me to the 1st law of the pencil: "Number of pencils mislaid is inversely proportional to the number of pencils in use".