Friday, September 30, 2011

Tool porn

I has it.

-- Badtux the Porn Penguin

10 comments:

  1. That strap is going to do you no good hanging on the wall. I will presume it's a spare.

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  2. Dude, that video needs some background music:

    http://www.comfortstand.com/catalog/049/


    And OMG, you sure are from the south aren't you? wow.

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  3. Me thinks I heard a CA Cajun accent in there somewhere. LOL

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  4. Whelp, the blue tupperware bin on the shelf to the right of the toolbox actually is full of auto electric stuff (wire, connectors, heat shrink tubing, heat gun, soldering irons, etc.), but there's a bin just like it that is the recovery gear for my Jeep, which, yes, has a strap in it just like the one hanging on the wall.

    Lynne, this was shot really quick with my iPhone and uploaded directly to YouTube with no editing. Adding music sounds like it would have been, like, work, heh.

    Dave, could be, could be :).

    - Badtux the Well-tooled Penguin

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  5. Looks like the toolbox of a guy who works on cars a lot. :-)

    The thing with tools, like most other collectibles, is that they hang around even when they're not useful anymore. My husband sold his Norton Commando years ago, but I'll bet he still has all his English (not metric, English) special wrenches.

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  6. Oh, and do something about keeping your brand-new toolbox from going on a trip during the next quake.

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  7. My tools used to look spanky new like yours... When I lived in Idaho.
    Now that I've been in Floriduh for 14 yrs. Not so much ! Sure do miss the dry air of the west.

    That box is about the size of just my machinist setup.

    Ya wanna understand why we can't compete anymore ? Just walk into a Harbor Freight store, Then walk onto a Snap-On truck. Nuff said.
    Sure glad that I bought all my Snap-On 20 yrs. ago...

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  8. Spud, I'm with you on being glad I purchased Snap-On's & Mac tools years ago. I spent about $5k back then and now it would be 4 times that much for the same tools. I may have to do me a tool porn vid one of these days.

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  9. Spud, most of my tools spent a couple decades in the Deep South before moving west with me, they just got WD-40'ed and wiped down regularly to keep'em from rusting (the exception being the tools I inherited from my father, like the rusty pipe wrench or the rusty file). About the only thing shiny in this toolbox is the Harbor Freight SAE combination wrench set on the left. I don't usually buy wrenches from Harbor Freight because they suck, but note that this is my *overflow* toolbox, my good Craftsman set is with the tools I actually use to work on my Jeep in another toolbox that usually lives in my Jeep. Every time I need a tool to work on my Jeep that isn't in that toolbox, it migrates to the Jeep toolbox so that I have it on the trail, probably where all my screwdrivers have migrated to :). That's also why the socket selection looked a bit lame, the sockets I regularly use are in the Jeep box. The only tools I regularly use out of *this* toolbox are the torque wrenches, or specialty tools needed for repairs I am *not* going to be able to do on the trail.

    Uhm, yeah, I have a fair number of redundant tools. I inherited my father's tools when he died. So it appears I have three Craftsman metric combination wrench sets, for example -- one he bought, one I bought, and I have no idea where the third one came from :).

    Also note that the *big* tools are hanging on the wall or are on the shelves in the garage. You might have caught a glimpse of the 48" long crescent wrench or the electrical fish tape or etc. as the camera panned. There's also a large selection of prying, cutting, drilling, and grinding tools hanging around.

    Dave: I don't work on cars for a living (I'd be mighty poor if I did, I'm the world's slowest mechanic) so I couldn't justify spending money on Snap-On tools. I had some that I inherited from my dad, but they got stolen when I was on vacation and somehow the garage door got opened by a drive-by troller (sigh!). I had to replace a lot of tools after that, for example the reason the big C-clamp looks so shiny is because my old big C-clamp (mostly used to compress disk brake pistons for brake changes, duh) got stolen. Everywhere that quality counts, I buy Craftsman. For example, my 3/8" ratchet was a Snap-on, that got stolen, I bought a Craftsman 3/8" ratchet to replace it and gosh darn it, it seems to work just as well as the Snap-on did for 1/3rd the price.

    Regarding Harbor Freight, the metal they use in their tools is crap. No way I'd use their tools for anything important. I once needed a tie rod end remover quick, and tried one of theirs. Damn thing just snapped into pieces. The metal looked *sintered*, it was crystallized, not solid at all. Ended up special-ordering one from an American manufacturer, it cost ten times more than the HF one, but at least it ain't a hazard to health and safety.

    That said, I do have some HF stuff for backup purposes. I won't put those HF SAE wrenches onto a bolt I care about, I'll use the Craftsman wrenches I bought in 1988, but if I need a wrench to, say, assemble my futon with, or to keep a bolt head from moving while I unscrew the nut with one of the Craftsman wrenches, I'll use it. Still kinda embarrassing having that shit in my toolbox, but I can't justify buying another set of Craftsman wrenches just for backup use.

    And now you know far more about my tools than you ever wanted to know ;).

    - Badtux the Tool-wipin' Penguin

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  10. The reason I have 99% Snap-On or MAC is not because I have ever worked on autos for a living. Several years ago I was a purchasing agent for a large govt agency and was in charge of purchase premium tools for about 300 heavy equipment mechanics. Needless to say, the industrial tool reps made me happy with a great pricing structure to stock my own box. Couldn't just outright accept them free, but paid cost for them. When I do my tool porn I'll show you my sign on the top of my tool box that says "Please don't ask to borrow my Snap-On Tools". I don't even load tools to my son. If he wants to use them he comes here.
    That being said, older craftsman tools were great tools. The newer ones are marginal as to quality. My wife has a craftsman ratchet in her toolbox that stripped the gears. Went to Sears to exchange and they tried handing me a rebuild kit, told them to put it in, they said cust has to do it. Raised hell, got mgr who gave me new ratchet to get the ole loud fart out of the store. Seems Sears don't like cust cussing about their piss poor service. Go Figure. LOL

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