Garage Hangout

tell elroy that skfarmer has his dads little browning rifle.

it isn't perfect but the flaws remind him of his father and shooting stripey gophers as a kid.

i have one of them.  a pretty sweet pipe wrench.

any day tinkering is a good day, definitely better than just sitting in a recliner watching old reruns all day.
I haven't been doing much lately, but the other day I did clean up and rehandle my old 25oz HART framer.
my dad gave it to me when I was 12 and it was the very first tool I ever rehabbed.

Elroy has performed a few blue jobs over thhe years.
Here's an example for your viewing pleasure:

https://smith-wessonforum.com/threads/the-chief-gets-a-new-uniform.257163/

Elroy would encourage you to work additional projects.

Quote from: jabberwoki on Oct 22, 2026, 01:36 PMAre you going to find some  "AG Daytons" to put back on?

Maybe one day they are on the rarer side and quote pricey.

Blueing relates to guns hence my putting it here. I started cold blueing tools about 3 years ago. Blueing opened a whole new world to the restoration of select tools for me, especially things like machinists parallel clamps and a host of other tools.

I have one really good tip if you blue, or intend to blue tools, guns, whatever.

Instead of simply wiping oil on a freshly blued surface totally submerge the freshly blued item in a tub of new motor oil and leave it there overnight. Doing that will result in a deeper blacker blue finish than a simple oil wipe.

Quote from: skfarmer on May 06, 2025, 08:28 PMi have heard of mirrors on the ceiling to  keep an eye on your tool but never on the toolbox lid.........

I use plate mirror i buy cheap at the restore. I remove the mirror from the frame, then cut to size on the glass machine at my local hdw.

Next step is epoxy a piano hinge along the bottom edge of the mirror. Drill holes on the side of the hinge where it meets the underside of the lid and through the lid itself, then pop rivet in place. If you don't want to drill holes apply a generous length of velcro to the back of the hinge and bottom of the lid.

At the top corners of the mirror epoxy very small chain. A small hook and eye type setup or similar can be secured on the underside of the lid to match the mirror corners.

This setup will allow the mirror to tilt down/away from the underside of the lid and reflect the contents. A good light above doesn't hurt either!

Getting the hang of picking tools by guiding your hand using the mirror was a bit of a learning curve for me.

A month or so back during a site safety inspection at a scrap yard in western KS. I found and took home a WW II Oxygen  tank that was heading for the crusher!

A few here will recall seeing such tanks frequently years ago converted to air bubbles. Back then I had no clue what they were but I thought them bloody ugly as sin. I could have had a mountain of them had I bought every one I encountered at swap meets.

Once I realized what they were only a few years ago I wanted one. These tanks were installed in the B-17, the B-24 and the B-25, all unpressurized aircraft. These tanks supplied the breathing air to crews during missions. The B-17 had either 17 or 18 such tanks located throughout the plane.

The significance of these tanks is great. Men's lives depended on the oxygen these tanks contained. When considered like that for me, the two I now have are worth saving and hopefully at some point restoring. I would like to wall hang them once preserved and integrate them into a plumbed compressed air line system for my shop.

Ya, I do like some oddball stuff for sure. If you have never seen one they are roughly 12" diameter. X 24" long. Most of the length of these tanks are wrapped in thin metal straps spaced 3-4" apart. Finding one in bright yellow or a lime green like color with their original black words and marking is unlikely. A few traces of color may be found but most wear other colors, or no colors except the metal on the tank.

When new, the tanks were designed for pressure exceeding 300PSI. And were called low pressure by the military! Designed not to burst and throw shrapnel  if hit by flak during combat. That was the purpose of the described rib strips.

So there ya go, more worthless info I share that has no relevance in 2026 to most everyone except me!

Over the last year I got sidetracked and  have tumbled down a rabbit hole! I have steered myself into tool restoration. Not to display, primarily to use. Once or twice i have restored a tool simply to display. Most notably I poured hours of research into a late 1940's 14 Craftsman Streamline pipe wrench. Very unique design and the only one of its design ever made and sold for only 3-4 years by Sears. Sears actually ensured no one else would ever produce exactly the same wrench by somehow making sure it cannot be found in a patent search! I would not call it rare because it shows up routinely on eBay. That said I have yet to find one cheap.

While eye catching in design, I believe it would be lousy in hard use. There are  clearly weaknesses in its design which may account for it only being sold for a couple of years.

Several restorer/wall hanger collector guys have You Tube videos showing them restoring these wrenches. Primarily most restorations of these wrenches are left as bare steel with no paint which is very tempting to do once the rust and nasty has been removed.

I chose instead to research the colors these wrenches wore when new. Once I determined that I closely duplcated the color scheme of a dark navy blue and highlighted the cast letters in a close match to John Deere yellow using a paint pen. My only deviation was cold blueing the movable jaw.

It came out stunning. A coworker that is big into 3d printing made me a stand made in the reverse color scheme of the wrench. The stand is a yellow that matches the color of the words on the wrench. In the base a title block matches the blue color of the wrench.

Ya, odd, I know. But I like it and it sits on a windowsill at work. BTW, I bought it as a rusted hulk and paid $3 for it.

Other oddities I have found and restored include a babbit scraper. I didn't even know what it was when I bought it for a quarter. I have many restoration projects ahead of me now, among them a number of hammers, hatchets,axes, and a few sledge hammers as well.

Like I said before, I mainly restore tools for use, if not by me, then someone else. Virtually all of them start out rusty, cracked handles etc. All cheap and only quality tools. I dont waste time on import stuff.

Anyway, at least I am routinely back to tinkering in my shop which is a good thing.

WOW,Ford must have had the dummy engineer that little prize eh!