Shop Tricks

[Sprocket1]

Did you know that a 2750 psi power washer with a 0 degree tip will very effectively remove slag from a weld? No ding marks from the chipping hammer either. Also, a 2750 psi power washer with a 40 degree tip will blow those pesky leaves in the yard from here to next Sunday.
Removing slag with a power washer is incredibly easy and fast. Just remember to wear goggles and keep your mouth closed.

 

[Iplayfarmer]

Great thread!!

For those looking for even more tips and tricks there was a similar thread a few years back...

http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/parts-repairs/88697-repair-mechanic-tricks-tips.html

Most of the tips in this current thread are new, though. Thanks for posting.

 

[BearKiller]

>> 12-VOLT BENCH POWER <<

Some years ago, I had a Group-31s battery to become just a little un-trustworthy; it was getting draggy on cold mornings and just not as dependable as I like.

Instead of swapping it in as a core, I put it in the shop and hooked one of those little HF float/trickle chargers on it.

I routed a pair of wires from the battery over-head to a pig-tail that hangs close to the work-bench.

I have made up various handy mating pig-tails, some with alligator clips---both large and small, etc.

When I need to test anything 12-volt, such as various lights/bulbs, blowers, buzzers, horns, motors, etc., a 12-VOLT power source is as close as the pig-tail.

Since then, I have acquired a bank of three of these batteries.

I routed wires to various points in both the shop and house, connecting them to 12-volt marker-lights and adding a few pig-tails here and there.

Now, when the 120/220 power goes out, as it does about weekly, I can plug in the pig-tail to my 12-VOLT lights and at least be able to navigate around the house and shop without having to use up flash-light batteries.

If I need more light, I can plug a spot-light or dome-light into one of the pig-tails.

 

[mbohuntr]

If you don't have the puller and need to remove a pilot bearing, fill the inside with grease and place a bolt or dowel that is just a bit smaller in the hole and hit it with a hammer.

 

[BearKiller]

>> BOLT SCAVENGING <<

When you go to a junk-yard, take a pocket-ful of wrenches and a big can/bucket/sack.

When you are removing whatever it is you are after, scavenge as many easy-to-get bolts as you see, especially if you are parting out a foreign/metric vehicle.

Plain old low-grade Metric bolts are exhorbitantly expensive when you have to buy them at the hardware store; you can get plenty of good-grade ones free for the taking from a junk car.

If you don't get them, they usually end up gravelling the ground at the junk-yard and flattening fork-loader tires anyway; if it makes you feel better, you can offer to pay for them.

 

[BearKiller]

>> FEED SACK HOLDER-OPENERS <<

I accumulate a lot of those white woven plastic feed sacks; they are pretty tough, so I use them for all sorts of things where a tough sack is handy.

I keep one hanging on the shop wall as a super-duty garbage sack.

I suspend seasonal and seldom used stuff from the rafters in them; their being white makes it easy to identify what is in them with a marker.

The one aggravation of these sacks is the difficulty of keeping the top open so you can dump stuff in.

For a different project, I needed the bottom 2/3s of some five-gallon buckets, easily cut off with the jigsaw.

This left me with some bottomless bucket tops, complete with bail.

A fifty-pound feed sack fits over these bucket tops like it was purpose-built for it.

I modified eight links from some of that chain like you see on suspended shop-lights, making little fish-hooks on one end and using the other end/loop as a screw-hole; I spaced these eight hooks evenly around the bucket top's perimeter and screwed them on about two-inches up from the bottom.

I can slide a sack onto the open-ended bucket and it will hook itself.

I did this fix to my garbage sack that hangs on the wall and now I can toss stuff into it from plumb across the shop.

 

[Mattlt]

"
A large amount of heat is released when strong acids are mixed with water. Adding more acid releases more heat. If you add water to acid, you form an extremely concentrated solution of acid initially. So much heat is released that the solution may boil very violently, splashing concentrated acid out of the container! If you add acid to water, the solution that forms is very dilute and the small amount of heat released is not enough to vaporize and spatter it. So Always Add Acid to water, and never the reverse. "

This goes for other chemicals (pesticides, insecticides, caustics, etc.) as well. Good advice: Always add the chemical to water.

 

[whitedogone]

One of the very best penetrants is wintergreen oil....a little goes a long way

 

[BearKiller]

>> NO MORE STUCK RECEIVERS <<

Not wanting to get into some of the sledge-hammer episodes that I have witnessed others who are less quick in their thinking partaking in, I like to coat the shanks of hitch receiver tongues with a generous layer of anti-sieze.

Though, at about seven bucks for a little skinny bottle, that soon quits being so much fun.

There is a better way and I stumbled on it; Alemites in the receiver.

Lacking a welder, you can simply drill/tap the receiver in several spots to accomodate the thread size of the Alemites you intend to use.

If you can weld, then drill the holes and tap them for threads, then thread a nut of the same caliber onto a bolt and screw the bolt into the tapped hole, until the nut is against the receiver.

Weld the nut to the receiver.

Lubricate and remove the bolt, and install the Alemite into the welded-on nut.

Doing thus prevents any possibility of the Alemite bottoming against the hitch tongue and gives the grease a little driving room to better spread in all directions.

Seeing as how one entire side of the receiver is usually inaccessible, I would install SIX Alemites, one each side, centered between the pin-hole and end of the receiver, both fore and aft.

Now, every time you are greasing anything else, be sure and give all of your receivers a squirt also.

If you live in salt or sand country, the grease will help to purge any grit that may try and migrate into the receiver.


Follow these instructions and you will never be the one swinging that nine-pound hammer and singing the Spike Driver Blues, trying to get the tongue out of the receiver.

 

[Iplayfarmer]

>> NO MORE STUCK RECEIVERS <<

Not wanting to get into some of the sledge-hammer episodes that I have witnessed others who are less quick in their thinking partaking in, I like to coat the shanks of hitch receiver tongues with a generous layer of anti-sieze.

Though, at about seven bucks for a little skinny bottle, that soon quits being so much fun.

There is a better way and I stumbled on it; Alemites in the receiver.

Lacking a welder, you can simply drill/tap the receiver in several spots to accomadate the thread size of the Alemites you intend to use.

If you can weld, then drill the holes and tap them for threads, then thread a nut of the same caliber onto a bolt and screw the bolt into the tapped hole, until the nut is against the receiver.

Weld the nut to the receiver.

Lubricate and remove the bolt, and install the Alemite into the welded-on nut.

Doing thus prevents any possibility of the Alemite bottoming against the hitch tongue and gives the grease a little driving room to better spread in all directions.

Seeing as how one entire side of the receiver is usually inaccessible, I would install SIX Alemites, one each side, centered between the pin-hole and end of the receiver, both fore and aft.

Now, every time you are greasing anything else, be sure and give all of your receivers a squirt also.

If you live in salt or sand country, the grease will help to purge any grit that may try and migrate into the receiver.


Follow these instructions and you will never be the one swinging that nine-pound hammer and singing the Spike Driver Blues, trying to get the tongue out of the receiver.

I just keep my stingers in the cab of my truck under the back seat.

I will occasionally put a little grease around the outside of the portion of the stinger that slides into the receiver, but that's more to keep rust and corrosion down than to ease removal.

If it's not in the receiver to get stuck, it can't get stuck in the receiver.

 

[BearKiller]

>> HITCH PIN PULLERS <<

I was at TSC today, buying 30-pounds of bolts/nuts/washers to replenish my jars.

I saw that they had hair-pin hitch-pin retaining clips made with a "wing"-like handle, to facilitate a much easier removal of the clip, in tractor-matching color schemes; about eight bucks a pair.

I can do better than that for free.

Whenever some concern or the other is giving away key-tags, I grab a hand-full (a pocket-full if nobody's looking).

Put the hair-pin clip on the key-ring, as if it were a key.

Now, when you want the clip out, just grab the key-tag and give her a yank.

The key-tags work equally well on those finger-pinching linch-pins.


Those key-tags also make excellent zipper-grabbers; just thread the key-ring into the little hole in the zipper tongue and let it hang there.

I have one of those Harbor Freight tarp "garages" that has zippers on the doors; I put key-tags on them and they are now a lot easier to zip/un-zip.

 

[BearKiller]

>> SHARP BITS <<

Probably the one single most appreciated tool to ever grace my shop is the DRILL DOCTOR that my wife got me for Christmas several years ago.

It is the big one, Model-750 or somesuch, capable of sharpening up to 3/4-inch bits.

Before the Drill Doctor, drilling a hole in metal, even a small one, was a much dreaded task.

Often, when I knew that I had holes to drill, I would arm myself with several new bits that would all be dull by the time the drilling was over.

Now, every single bit on the place is razor-sharp and ready for action.

I am adamant about immediately re-sharpening every bit as soon as it comes out of the drill, before putting it away.

Seeing as how I had a large collection of broken bits of various sizes, I also bought one of those 25-dollar H-F drill-bit sharpeners.

After first getting the profile close with the grinder, I roughly sharpen the broken bits with the H-F machine, before putting the razor's edge on them in the Drill Doctor; this saves wear on the diamond wheel of the Drill Doctor.

It sure is a good feeling to watch those long shavings curl around a nice sharp bit, instead of smoking and squealing.

 

[Gem99ultra]

>> SHARP BITS <<

Probably the one single most appreciated tool to ever grace my shop is the DRILL DOCTOR that my wife got me for Christmas several years ago.

I also bought a DD 750. Had about 400 bits, all dull Spent the better part of a day sharpening up every bit. Later I discovered that I had not seated some of the bits correctly. If not done right, they're like drilling with a stick!

But - re-sharpening is definetly a great money saver. I need to adopt your habit of touching the bits up before putting them aways though. That way, they'll always be ready to work.

 

[larryccf]

this might serve some - probably like a lot of folks, back in the early 90s when all the box stores had those $8-9 twin 48" tube flourescent light fixtures i bought quite a few. Had 19 of them hanging from the ceiling in the shop.

when the new CFL bulbs (with the squiggly pigtail bulb tubes) came out, i bought a few to see what they were all about. Interesting to me was that the 60W rated bulbs showed a current draw of only 13 watts.

For the hey of it, i put two in a double socket light fixture and with my el cheapo watt meter measured the draw at 21 watts for the two 60 watt CFLs. Did the same with the twin tube 48" 40 watt fixtures and one of those fixtures showed 132 watts.

I then built a 4 socket light fixture and with 4 of the 60 watt CFLs actually had more light than from one twin tube flourescent fixture - so basically more light from 42 watt consumption than from 132

I know the electrical engineers will step in here and tell me that flourescent fixture ballasts skew a watt meter that isn't capable of compensating for the ballasts like my "el cheapo" watt meter isn't, but i assumed i'd get the same or approx same skewing for comparison purposes, on both fixtures.

all i know is my electric bill went down about 45% from same billing periods the year before - but those 19 fixtures burn 8 - 10 hours a day. Still 132 - 42 = 90 watts per fixture, x 19 fixtures = 1710 watts per hour savings

here's what i ended up building from scrap lumber, including "surplus center" sourced industrial white paint. Total cost was about $22 per fixture plus the labor. Most of the cost was for the exterior boxes and the cast alum sockets from external light fixtures (the ones that hold two PAR floodlamps). When i made these, per bulb costs was approx $4, and i recently saw them just under $1 per bulb at one of the box stores. I've heard some folks complain they burn out irregularly - in two years + i haven't had one burn out yet. And i got a chance to use all those electrical cords with plugs that i'd saved over the years, from equipment that had gone bad. These fixtures plug into the same receptacles the twin tube flourescent fixtures did, so no need to call in electrician.

Like an idiot i applied aluminum tin foil to the inside upper surface BEFORE painting. the plastic lenses were simply those 2X4' plastic lenses for accoustical ceiling tile replacement - i ran them through a table saw to narrow them down to 11 X 36" size (and btw, paid $3 each as i asked the manager at local Ace hardware did he have any cracked in shipment that he wanted to salvage some value from)

lenses slide in on a groove i routed in, and at the end, there's a foam sealing strip to keep dust from traveling in

only suggestion to anyone considering this, buy a few of each "color" bulb, ie soft white, bright white, daylight and try them out at the very location you'll be using them, as they are different to your eye - the bright white bulbs were "whiter" but much harsher to my eyes - ended up going with soft white bulbs.

But the beauty is, at some work stations, where we needed stronger light (over a bench), rather than adding bulbs to the fixture, we could simply screw in 75W or even 100W bulbs, as needed.

iirc, four 75w bulbs kicked the current draw up to 54 watts on the el cheapo meter

 

[tatra805]

just a piece of advice on the lamps used by larryccf

These are here called "saving lamps" which are now standard issue in europe as by end of next year the normal bulbs will not be sold anymore (goodbye Mr Edison)

In our production we have these bulbs in overhead lights and on individual table/machine mounts.

these bulbs hate being switched on and off and lasted about 2 weeks on the individual places where operators switched them on and off depending on daylight, breaks, etc the overhead ones are now 3 years running 16 hours per day and besides a single failure, still working.

So, dont switch them on and off too often, if you have to use energy saving bulbs in such situation look into LED bulbs, still a bit more expensive but these dont bother the switching.

The saving bulbs are not cheating the watt-meter. Dont ask me the exact theory (too long ago) but the cos fi correction is not necessary on these. (if so, THAT would have been the biggest political HOAX of this century, as power stations would still have to produce equal amounts of energy as with the edison bulb and polution would be equal)


just 2 cents




PS: you can find these saving bulbs from 4 up to 45 watt (250 watt conventional) these are just tripple size of a normal bulb

 

[Danno1]

.


Another piece of advice: the cheap flourescents don't like to start up in an unheated shop. You need a certain ballast (which I forget the name of ! ) .


.

 

[larryccf]

actually haven't noticed any difference in start up between these and the twin tube flourescent fixtures
both seem to take a minute or two to warm up and hit full light output

 

[BearKiller]

As for lights, at our nine-bay, two story tire shop, we started with 100% 8-footer flourescent lights, lots of them, with one big addition being completely lighted with the twin-bulb four-footers.

It kept one guy busy constantly monkeying with the lights.

They hum, flicker, go out for a couple hours and come back on, take forever to come to full brightness, bulbs cost a small fortune.

We have worn out two ladders servicing the lights and I personally took one bad fall when a ladder kicked out from under me on the concrete floor; I rode it to the ground, falling amongst the tire-changers.

For the last few years, I have been string by string replacing EVERY flourescent with plain old hangs-straight-down 100-watt incandescents.

I have a telescoping pole that I can reach and change the highest bulbs with ease.

I have seen no increase in the electric bill that I can notice.

It is no longer dark as Mammoth Cave where we are trying to work.

I am stock-piling plain old bulbs for the day that they decide to force that other junk on us.

I will never pay my money for another flourescent light.

It takes a long bed truck, handling-eggs care, and a sack full of money to go after a few flourescent bulbs; whereas, I can send a kid in a Pinto to the Dollar General with five bucks and he will come back with a sack full of bulbs and don't even have to be careful with them.

I can kind of get along with those screw-in worm-tube flourescent bulbs, but I have yet to have one last six months.

I can see no economy in using them.

 

[mgtd]

Need to remove a broken key from a cylinder lock. Take a coping saw blade and break off one end pin, then grind a slight taper on the back side of the blade. Insert into the cylinder so that the blade's teeth grab the notches on the broken key and pull out the broken piece.

If you need to limit access to someone whom you trusted with a key--purposely break of a key that fits the lock and push into the cylinder--no other key can be inserted--the above tool lets you remove it when you want access. We used this trick to "lockout" tenants (illegal of course) when we needed to dunn them for overdue rent. Whose to say how a key got broken in the lock.

 

[larryccf]

As for lights, at our nine-bay, two story tire shop, we started with 100% 8-footer flourescent lights, lots of them, with one big addition being completely lighted with the twin-bulb four-footers.

It kept one guy busy constantly monkeying with the lights.

They hum, flicker, go out for a couple hours and come back on, take forever to come to full brightness, bulbs cost a small fortune.

We have worn out two ladders servicing the lights and I personally took one bad fall when a ladder kicked out from under me on the concrete floor; I rode it to the ground, falling amongst the tire-changers. ....(END QUOTE)

had the exact same experience with 8 ft flourescent - don't remember why, but we tried the twin tube 48" tube fixture and had much better luck but still they seem to burn a bulb every year or two

and those 8' flourescents are not in anyway efficient - heck, you probably saw a drop in your bill going back to incandescents - but you might want to really stock up on those incandescents as congress last year voted to ban them, i think the ban goes into effect, either 2011 or 2012