Tools of the Trades

laborers! what tools ya? nerds included!



i always have a flashlight and a pocket knife on me. i also carry a pen: the ultimate tool

It's a hammer, a wrench, a vice grip, pipe wrench, pry bar and cracks all kinds of nuts. It's also very useful for removing teeth, fingernails and toenails or so the movies tell me. If you ever NEED to have an answer right now from somebody who's holding out a little, it's a nice little icebreaker to have in the bag (say hello to my little friend). Keep one of these in every tool box, bag, chest and have a couple in the tool drawer, workroom and garage.

ah yes, the good ole channel grips. a definite classic.

I was using this multimeter today to try to track down problems in my vehicle's instrument cluster. In my case a faulty speedo and tach.

It's a 1989 BMW E30 318i. Part of the breed unfortunately - the clusters all go to hell.

It's real needle in a haystack stuff, but I'm learning and strangely enjoying it, doing some soldering work as well. Today I was checking for continuity of all the pins and traces of the main board - something a short while ago I wouldn't have dreamt of doing - but now I'm doing it.

I am constantly perturbed by the sheer (that wasn't intentional) number of essentially single-use garden tools I end up needing.

We finally gave up and now we have a "lawn guy" who brings his own tools every week. Much easier!

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In a pinch, this transforms into a screwdriver, a tiny hammer, a scraper, or even a knife if necessary.

These things, I think the tools are called human men:




There are no men in our house, so when it comes to garden and any diy/building work I try to do something first but if it's too dangerous or need a professional then we get someone in.



I hate heights for example so getting on the roof is a no no, so man please!

Tools we have are the normal stuff, nothing big. I do like my extension tree cutter, cordless hedge trimmer, and axe though.

I was one of the last in my field to do this.



Retired from the automotive design world a couple of years ago. Around '88 it all just disappeared moving to CAD work stations, starting with CGS, Prime, Catia and Applicon. Then on to Unigraphics, Alias and SDRC. Today, it looks like:



From '75 through '88, I amassed at least $2k in drafting equipment. Ended up donating it all to our local high school.As for "Tools of the Trade" it went from this:



to this:

I’m loving all these posts, y'all!

here’s another tool i use quite regularly

Is that a crimper? Are you an electrician?

@beelzebubble: yeah, it's a RJ45/RJ11 crimper. i am not an electrician, but we occasionally have to follow up on electricians work and fix their screw ups.

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"This is that human freedom, which all boast that they possess, and which consists solely in the fact, that men are conscious of their own desire, but are ignorant of the causes whereby that desire has been determined." -Baruch Spinoza

I am always amazed by how often I need a palm sander =\

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"My Dionne Warwick understanding of your dream indicates that you are ambivalent on how you want life to eventually screw you." - Joel

"Ever try to forcibly pin down a house cat? It's not easy." - Captain Steel

"I just can't get pass sticking a finger up a dog's butt." - John Dumbear

I've burnt through four of those palm sanders by now. But they got their revenge, they fried my tendons in both of my elbows.

I fulfilled a lifelong dream yesterday and bought my own San Angelo bar. I have to trench out about 48 feet to a width of 8 inches and a depth of two feet (barf) in very rocky soil, so I decided to splurge.

The man at the hardware store was like "I don't think that's a thing," and so it was somewhat gratifying to finally locate it in the tools section and have it labeled that way.

I always have a pocket knife in the truck, and at least a short and stubby flathead and phillips head. This flashlight is always in my truck door pocket offering two flood modes and a hanging hook:




If I'm travelling long distances, I'll carry a larger knife, such as the Gerber LMF II





But for MOST of my tool needs, I use this Logitech MX Master:



This is the second most comfortable mouse I've ever owned. The MOST comfortable was discontinued years ago. This is the closest I've found.

I also carry in my purse a recorder.

No, not a tape recorder.



I started carrying it one year when my students were stressed about forgetting them for music class, and it's been in there ever since. Once someone found it when they were doing a bag search at a concert. I was like "It's for work." . . . "I'm a teacher." . . . "I promise there will be no recorder solos."

I also always have tickets in my pocket, because children will go above and beyond if they think they can get a ticket for it, even if they don't yet know what the tickets are for.

So, they DON'T know about the cobra yet?



Should have put that in spoilers...

This is on my key chain.

The ones i use most often are the knife (amazingly sharp), scissors (amazingly useful) and built in pen (incredible when you need it).

i don't know if you can pick it out but I'm pretty sure it has a "bump" spoon on the bottom right, that's what a friend said, i don't partake i just take their word for it. Don't ask me who my friends are, but when you got to get s**t done, ya know.

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