Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => The Roundtable => Topic started by: Kingcreek on October 21, 2019, 04:33:07 PM
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We sometimes post fondly about various tools and things. (My wife and some others wouldn't understand.)
I was gifted an oxy/acetylene torch set from an old family friend who also left me my first welder when he died at the age of 92. He started gas welding in the 1930s and later built a nice shop and did welding jobs for neighbor farmers and others. When he insisted I take his very old victor torch set he told me how that was all he had for cutting, brazing, welding when he started out.
His old victor set has worked fine for the 4 years I've had it, until 2 weeks ago. A seat in the oxy reg failed and it "barked" hard when I tried to set the torch pressure. I have enough respect for the system to be a little scared. I sent both regs off to Regulator and Torch exchange, inc.
Got them back today and golly I can't believe it but they look like new! Totally cleaned, refurbished with new springs, diaphragms, lenses, seats, etc. they were almost black before and now are beautiful gleaming brass.
Cost me $125 for both with shipping but I wouldn't trade them for a new set, even in the condition they were in before.
Even tools can have sentimental value. Old Howard would be proud. Now I wish I had sent the torch body in with them, and I still might send it to them.
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I understand completely.
While none of them are worth any real money some of my most treasured possessions are the old tools handed down from family members.
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I absolutely understand.
I cherish an old carpenter's claw hammer I got from my first wife's grandfather. He was going to toss it because the handle was broken. I took it because it was his, and I replaced the handle. It's basically useless -- the head apparently wasn't properly hardened, so it's badly chipped and mushroomed, and I think it would be dangerous to use it. But I appreciate it as a memento of the man.
And then there's my father's Estwing hatchet. One of the ones with the stacked leather washer handles. My father had managed to damage it even before I was born, so it was always missing about three or four leather washers, and the handle has a slight bend. (Note: How the heck can ANYONE bend the handle on an Estwing?) I would cheerfully pay whatever price they wanted to have Estwing rebuild the handle ... but they won't. "Liability issues," they say. So I bought a bag of leather washers and one of these days I'll do it myself. Don't need it -- I have three other very serviceable hatchets. Sometimes you just want that tool to be made right.
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Seconding (and thirding) the above. Sentiment is a big thing for me, too.
I still have, and use every day, the Challenger (Proto value line) wrench and socket sets my parents gave me for my 16th birthday. Wouldn't trade them for anything, much less money. The Kennedy box they came in is still in good shape, too.
Brad
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My grandfather recently gave me a huge amount of various hand tools. Most are redundant to what I already have... but each of them has his Oregon Driver's License # etched into them. It was evidently something he did as an anti-theft measure. Nevermind he hasn't lived in Oregon for 15+ years. Tickles the feelz, it does, when I pick them up and think of myself at 8 years old, watching him work with the same tools in his old house in Oregon.
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My grandfather on my mothers side was a millwright at the local cotton mills and my father could fix anything with hardly nothing. I have tools from both in my box at work.. Both are gone now but I remember them fondly each time I use one of the tools they passed along
One of the tools my grandfather left me was a Snap On ratchet. It was broken but surprisingly the driver had a kit on his truck for it. He even looked up the date code for me...made in 1940.
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The more I think about it, the more I realized I have around here.
My paternal grandfather was an auto mechanic for 49 years and I have a few of his hand tools and a giant spade handled all metal beast of a 1/2" drill. My maternal grandfather was a Swedish woodworker that started as a pattern maker at a foundry. I have a few of his tools also.
When I was 16 and bought my first car (1970 Chevrolet Malibu) I saved my money for tools and bought craftsman at the local Sears store. Still have my early 70s tool box and wrenches, sockets, screwdrivers.
And then there are my axes and hatchets. I have too many but they have all been rehafted and edged and reconditioned, some with leather covers and sheaths. All are vintage from the little keen Kutter hatchet to the big Gamble's artisan double bit axe. A few tru temper Collins and plumb axes in between.
Someday, they will probably all get thrown on a hay rack for grubby auction scroungers to paw and pick through...
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I have some floppy disks somewhere... they don’t make them like they used to.
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Four of the planes in this picture come from older family.
Two were from my grandpa, 1 from dad and one from my uncle (dad's older brother).
I use all of them at least a little
Bottom to top:
Stanley #60
Miller's Fall #8 -Grandpa
Stanley #4 -Grandpa
Wood River #4-1/2
Stanley #5 -Dad
Stanley #7 -uncle
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48285410116_20058e0af7_c.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2gyPmbY)
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I have a lot, soon a metric whole lotta more.
My dad gave me my first anvil, excellent specimen for its kind, not a heavy user for how it's constructed, I keep it for light hammers.
And he gave me his first hammer when I was five, he got it at about the same age.
And I now have his beast of a drill press, weighs more than most Mills I think, cloth belt, stepped pulleys, made in the late 19th or early twentieth century when we still made tools beautiful.
Not sentimental, but I often watch junk sales for antique tools. My daily use cold chisel has been beaten with a six pound hammer and the back hasn't begin to mushroom, just can't buy steel like that anymore.
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I think I might have a weakness.
I just heard about a person I know whose father went into a nursing or assisted living facility. He used to have a Christmas tree farm but also used to go to every farm auction or estate sale and bring home truckloads of old tools of every kind. Apparently he has a barn and 2 or 3 buildings full. The family doesn't want to have an auction yet because he still likes to have them drive him out to the farm so he can poke around and check on things.
Im going to figure out how to tactfully ask about it or atleast be kept in the loop for any upcoming opportunity. I spose it's more likely somebody will steal it all and sell it for scrap before I get a shot at any of it. A vacant rural property is pretty vulnerable around here. I have a neighbor about 2 miles away that came home from a mission trip of all things to find his shop cleaned out of all his tools and power equipment. They even stole his trailer to haul it away on!
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We got a 1950s McCullough chainsaw running tonight. To my knowledge the way time it was fired 44 year old me wasn't around, or a toddler. The saw is not light.
Also fired the newer of two Maytag motors up for the hell of it.
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You should take the power saw to buckinstock.
If you don’t know about buckinstock look buckin billy ray smith videos on the YouTube. He is funny as hell, a Vancouver logger and tree man that has a bunch of vintage McCullough and hotrodded saws. He has an annual power saw get together for his followers.
I finished refinishing repainting my vintage stihl “fuel and tool” can. Now I need to find some stihl decals for the sides.
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My Pop had one of these Black and Deckers around for a significant portion of forever. So I inherited it along with a bunch of his tools and musical instruments. I had to leave most of it in NY when we moved out here, but I made sure I brought that drill. Mine's in much better shape than this net picture and I mounted a 3/8" chuck on it.
Not mine but identical except for the chuck:
(https://i.ebayimg.com/images/i/182373894556-0-1/s-l1000.jpg)
Terry
Pic credit in properties.
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My Pop had one of these Black and Deckers around for a significant portion of forever. So I inherited it along with a bunch of his tools and musical instruments. I had to leave most of it in NY when we moved out here, but I made sure I brought that drill. Mine's in much better shape than this net picture and I mounted a 3/8" chuck on it.
Not mine but identical except for the chuck:
(https://i.ebayimg.com/images/i/182373894556-0-1/s-l1000.jpg)
Terry
Pic credit in properties.
I remember my grandfather (a Linesman) had one of those with probably a 1/2" chuck. I just recall him boring out big holes in a post for a mailbox or something with it.
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New old treasure uncovered today. Any Amish here?
I have a brace (twisty crank hand drill thingy) and a box (maybe 8 pounds worth?) of bits and accessories of all sizes. The brace is a ratcheting type with selectable direction or lock position. Working condition with some rust. Wood parts are good. I soaked the wood w BLO and will work on the metal parts. It’s not bad.
The bits were all in a wood box full of dirt and mouse nest and most are significantly rusty but some have price tags from a hardware store and are hand labeled keen kutter and some are craftsman with old rubber point guards and many appear rusty but unused. Some are in excellent condition. There is probably 40-50 of them including some odd types I’ve never seen before.
I’m trying to decide do I soak them all in white vinegar or diluted muratic to remove the rust (and labels and price tags)? Or sell as is on garage forum or evil bay?
Or do I keep it all for the post apocalyptic off grid back woods cabin? Nah. Probably don’t need it and it has no sentimental value. I found it in an old farm building that was about to be bulldozed. I was scrounging junk farm steel and tools for my welding art. There was an old blacksmith shop but the owner took the 150 pound anvil. I think the hoffstetter bender and a wood crate full of fixtures are still there as is the forge.
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I've got a couple of braces like that. I brought them out to Commierado mainly because they were useful tools for me at the time.
I would say that if yours are not going to actually be used, leave the patina alone. The next owner can make that decision.
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I helped the owner load the 150 anvil in his truck. I tried to buy it but he said his son wanted it. He said there was a bigger one, possibly over 400 pounds that he took home earlier. He didn’t want anything else. The big bender was set in concrete. I might go back for the forge. It was in pieces but all there including the hand crank flywheel blower.
The new owner bought this place for the farm ground. It was so overgrown he didn’t even know what was there. They found 2 non running bulldozers, a school bus and 8 vehicles. One old Ford Explorer had a bunch of brand new tools in the back still in the packages and a new log chain and binders. The shop had been mostly looted.
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KingCreek said,
One old Ford Explorer had a bunch of brand new tools in the back still in the packages and a new log chain and binders. The shop had been mostly looted.
Maybe that's why he kept all that stuff out in the truck. =D
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https://lostartpress.com/products/the-anarchists-tool-chest?variant=443606189
I bought a digital copy of this just for fun awhile back. Its mostly old tool Pr0n, and a bit about designing a tool chest.
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I spent a good part of the day at an estate auction. Tons of stuff but I was after a drill press and anvil. I got the drill press. Anvils are now made of forged unobtainium.
Very happy with the drill press, craftsman USA cleaned up great and I don’t have a runout gauge but everything is tight. $65 with a drill vice and some clamps.
I was bidding against tool scalpers.
I have never seen a drill press on auction that didn’t have mice in the power head.