What Are Your 3 Favorite Tools?

I had a neighbor who bought a moped and I saw him turn it into something unrepairable in just a couple of weeks with one of those drills sold as screwdrivers. Every Phillips screw was transformed into a hopeless conehead. But when I was helping with pipe fitting during the oil rush one of them was always in the 5 gal. bucket of tools we hauled to the job site. It was like jump around and do the pipe flange and then jump back with your arms out and click the stopwatch. Calf roping style. But those were big bolts holding flanges together, not screws. We had the most expensive drills sold as screwdrivers, Makita, pretty blue color, Like the John Deere 10x ripoff price of electric wrenches. I was an electrician but if I helped them, then I could get a big hulking mechanic to lift a 300 lb motor where I needed it. Don't know what the hell I was thinking, Yeah I do. I wanted to experience a New West boomtown. Needed a 4WD monster truck instead of a MC though.
 
Mine has to be the HF 3 in 1 Mill drill lathe.... don't know how I got along without it all these years !
the Lincoln 225 AC stick welder
and the Vice
......
Bob......
 
Lathe cost me £270 second-hand and has paid for its self time and time again - Repaired the catch on my wife's £4000 designer handbag.
Circular saw with homemade bench gives me any size timber I need from new or scrap timber.
Center punch.

............. Still to get a milling machine!
 
.Dude,
First of the 3 favorites would be my HF angle grinder. So useful, and surprisingly tough. Second, I got one of those "anniversary gifts" from work too. For 30 years of service, I got a Milwaukee sawzall. I probably have as much invested in good blades as the saw is worth... And third is a Black & Decker cordless drill. I seldom have any brand loyalties, but when something works above and beyond, and still kicks ass, I will buy another one if it dies...
 
Brands get better the longer they are in the game.......veey personal thing

The cordless drill needs to have the screw option with increments of weight for the screw, as long as you have a drill with those features; i have marked, then you will never have to have to use a hand held impact diver again.
s-l1600 1 a Text Marked.jpg

Have a 10.8 volt drill and impact driver as a kit covers a good range of things.

Shame the guy down the road wasn't helped.
 
650Skull said:
Brands get better the longer they are in the game.......veey personal thing

The cordless drill needs to have the screw option with increments of weight for the screw, as long as you have a drill with those features; i have marked, then you will never have to have to use a hand held impact diver again.
View attachment 102989

Have a 10.8 volt drill and impact driver as a kit covers a good range of things.

Shame the guy down the road wasn't helped.
Click to expand...
Looks like a Makita.
I am still using my Makita which I used to build my house 25 years ago. Still going strong.

more.tools 001.JPG
 
image_25251.jpg
I have a 3" diameter cutoff tool similar to this that I paid less than $10 for. I have cut so much steel with this, and thick stuff too, bolts, sheet, tube, angle, etc., even works great for a grinder. It has great control, doesn't kick back, doesn't overheat the metal. I can nibble away inside curves and touch up with a file. I can do anything that can be done with a bandsaw and other cutters. After cutting close to lines I use a 12" disc sander on my Shopsmith to square the parts or finish to lines. I've made some really complex shapes this way. I buy the discs at Harbor Freight in 10 packs and they last pretty long, I've never had a disc shatter, nick or break. I would never be without one of these.
 
Hay ! another shopsmith owner ! KOOL ! I have 2 older mk1 shopsmiths what is yours ?
....
Bob.....
 
650Skull said:
Brands get better the longer they are in the game.......very personal thing

The cordless drill needs to have the screw option with increments of weight for the screw, as long as you have a drill with those features; i have marked, then you will never have to have to use a hand held impact diver again.
View attachment 102989

Have a 10.8 volt drill and impact driver as a kit covers a good range of things.

Shame the guy down the road wasn't helped.
Click to expand...

Cordless impact's are invaluable in my industry as we do practically all our metal framing with them. 10 years ago everyone was still dragging cords around and it was always a PITA. It does take a bit of finesse to use them properly where you aren't snapping screws off but for what I do it works so much better than a drill.
 
mrtwowheel said:
View attachment 103016 I have a 3" diameter cutoff tool similar to this that I paid less than $10 for. I have cut so much steel with this, and thick stuff too, bolts, sheet, tube, angle, etc., even works great for a grinder. It has great control, doesn't kick back, doesn't overheat the metal. I can nibble away inside curves and touch up with a file. I can do anything that can be done with a bandsaw and other cutters. After cutting close to lines I use a 12" disc sander on my Shopsmith to square the parts or finish to lines. I've made some really complex shapes this way. I buy the discs at Harbor Freight in 10 packs and they last pretty long, I've never had a disc shatter, nick or break. I would never be without one of these.
Click to expand...
I use that same model CP cutter. Love its versatility. Now, I gotta get me one of those sweet Shopsmiths.
 
Bob Kelly III said:
Hay ! another shopsmith owner ! KOOL ! I have 2 older mk1 shopsmiths what is yours ?
....
Bob.....
Click to expand...
Bob, I have two Shopsmiths too, one circa '80 and one from '85. My dad was a custom cabinet builder, like Duncan Donuts fixtures. When he passed I got all of his machines, so I have two of everything needed for a well equipped woodwork shop. He was not one for regular maintenance, so he glued imitation marble melamine on the top of his Delta Unisaw table saw, looks really cool and no more cleaning and waxing. What he didn't have was the bandsaw that was stolen just before he died.

One Shopsmith is almost always a drill press and the other is usually a disc sander. Pretty expensive drill press and sander. I may have only used the tablesaw modes 2 or three times. I've dreamed up many things to use the lathe mode for, on many different materials too. Particle board discs charged with different buffing compounds spun by the Shopsmith are great for quick sharpening of chisels, plane blades and knives, I strop with the back side of a piece of linoleum. I wouldn't ever use it for buffing metal, too much stress on those quills.

Scott
 
I suppose I overlooked my ShopSmith MK1 as one of my favorite tools because I do use it every day, Mostly the table saw Mode
I modified it and have room for a 10" carbide tipped blade in it and added a Camper Jack to raise and lower the table, the other is a Drill press
all the time , just wish I could make it slower ! but don't have the pulleys and needed Jack shaft ....yet.
I have a 2HP motor on the ShopSmith I always use, which changes the 3500 RPM motor down to a reasonable RPM. its a noisy contraption
but works wood very well.
I had a MK 5 with the Variable speed and Jointer and bandsaw but they went up in smoke , so I made my Bandsaw and it works very nicely
used it to make gunstocks for crossbows and other thick cuts and had no trouble with it !
.....
in my experience contrary to what you hear, I have found that the Multifunction tools like the 3 in 1 and Shopsmiths do work very well
but you loose allot of time in the setup ...but being retired I have allot of time ! LOL
....
Bob......
 
650Skull said:
Chainsaw......Axe...............

Chainsaw....................Ever spent a few of days where you fell a tree, cut it into rings and split the rings with an axe for winter wood............A good weighted saw with the grunt, combined with a properly sharpened chain, will slide through the timber in front of you, done right the saw will pull itself through with little more than its own weight.........

An Axe...............The handle's shape becomes a part of your hands then the weight of the head becomes your arm, shoulder and back.............Hard to explain the difference between a good shape and bad..........when you feel a good one, then you know................The shape of the blade tells you if your going to make hard or easy work of cutting/splitting.

Something primeval sitting in a forest sharpening your own saw and axe.

3rd love my cordless set of drills......Throw away the impact driver, the drill does it easier. No more damaged screw heads when getting out those stuck ones, well 99.9% of the time, better than 80% or less before. Done right those phillips/JIS screws don't get damaged.
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C'mon Doug,

Winter Wood???

In FNQ??

GW
 
nj1639 said:
Three favorite tools......
All good displays I'm seeing. I particularly like Skulls take on the chainsaw and ax, as wood heating has been our main source of heat since the blizzard of '78. In the vein of voluntary simplicity and subsistence farming I'll go with
Ruger Standard 4.75"
New England .410 single
.58 cal. Octagon to round smooth bore swamped barrel "bastard" Fusil flintlock......built with the Tunica Hoard in mind. Early English lock, French buttplate, serpent side plate, 1st model Bess trigger guard with a sling, and no front sight. Esoteric?
Click to expand...


Ah the days of being able to be responsible enough to own firearms aithout government intrvention.

GW
 
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