What did you do today?

[PStechPaul]

My Casco tool kit probably is older than your antique Dremel. It belonged to my father, and I can remember him using it when I was a kid in the 1950s. It's probably 1940s-1950s vintage. The same unit is on eBay for $50:

Maybe 1948, a year before I was born:

https://archive.org/details/CascoProductsCorpPopSciFeb1948/mode/1up

[aostling]

10,000 uses! How many have you not tried out?

[ChazzC]

$15 in the late '40's: not a cheap kit.

[Guido]

Says ‘1,001’ uses.

[Tim The Grim]

Literature says 1001 skills. Box says Ten Thousand uses. Akcurasee is impordant in our hobdy.

Today I did my annual pull off all the switch plates and outlet covers and sprayed bug killer into the walls routine.
This time my pal hooked me up with some commercial grade stuff he used to use in apartment complex maintenance.
Desert bugs are tough and persistent.

[Tillie's in a bottle]

Silver soldered the fingers back on the reversing switch for the Reid grinder. Yeah I broke those too. The torch and I are getting to know each other quite well

[ChazzC]

Finally had a project for the drill-mounted nibbler I got a couple of years ago – needed to remove part of the lip on my monitor stand for a new home for my SuperDrive:



Cut better than I remember from my test cuts when I first bought it, very smooth cut, but then I was guiding the head along the underside of the stand(click & look at the enlarged photo of the cutoff piece):



However, I forgot how much mess it makes:



Cleaned up the cut edge with files & emery, then touched up with some bronze model paint (not a great match, but no one is really going to see it):


The Thunderbolt Dock will be on the desk to the left and partially under the SuperDrive.

[junkaddict]

I made a 5c collet rack that will fit into a tool drawer.

[Dan Dubeau]

Finally got out for the first round of golf this morning. Struck the ball well, but putted terrible. It's machining related because I used my home made putter. It's too light for the slow sloggy green conditions right now, I should have brought my old mallet. Or maybe it's time to make a heavier mallet.....

[ChazzC]

This is actually a 4 day adventure, with two lessons that should become evident by the end.

Day 1, Tuesday
Besides this and a few similar forums, I do not participate in social media, other than giving Facebook a quick look once a month to see what my screwy family is up to. Tuesday evening I "checked in," didn't see anything worthwhile in my feeds, so checked the Market Place. Low and behold, there was a listing for 2 "Kennedy Tool Boxes:"


(not my hairy knee, it belongs to the seller)

Now these "Tool Boxes" were a little banged up, dirty and as it turned out the outside bottom of the riser was rusty. However, they were for sale at $50, and only an hour away. After confirming that the drawers all worked and other than dirty, a little dented & no lock on the top box they were fully functional and yes, the $50 was for the pair, I sealed the deal. The same combination of boxes was listed by a couple of other local sellers in similar condition, ranging from $250 — 600.


Day 2, Wednesday
Made the 2-hour round trip, gave the guy's wife $50, loaded the merchandise in my vehicle and got out before they could come to their senses. My haul was an MC28B Intermediate Chest and a 526B 8-Drawer Top Chest, current total price on Zoro $950 delivered. 40 +/- years ago I purchased this same set, plus the 11-drawer top chest, 26" Intermediate Chest, 5- & 7-drawer rolling cabinets and a cart & side chest for the 7-drawer cabinet, on sale & employee discount, all for less than $500 (maybe even less than $400) delivered.


Day 3, Thursday
Set about taking the drawers out of the "boxes" and cleaning everything up. The intermediate cabinet got a scrubbing and 2-coats of black (the end of a can) Rustoleum on the bottom. A little judicious panel beating took care of the dents. The top chest just needed a damp brush and a good vacuuming – apparently I'm doing something wrong with how I treat my tool storage, as this was typical of the drawers (my old ones still look almost new):



Due to space constraints, my plan was to place the intermediate chest under a Craftsman top box and locate the 8-drawer chest on top of a set of metal shelves next to the Craftsman stack. I cut a piece of 3/4" project board to go under the intermediate chest ( the Craftsman rolling cabinet is 26-1/2" wide and the intermediate chest is 28-1/4, so I needed something to carry the load down to the rolling cabinet) and a piece of 1/2" plywood to go between the chest and top box (top box is deeper, so again needed something to distribute the load). Coated the wood with one-coat poly, and waited 24 hours.


Day 4, Friday
With the paint and poly fully cured, I moved everything into my shop, put things where they belonged, lubed the drawer slides and reassembled the chests; since the chests are now resting on the wood fillers and not constrained by the lips on the cabinet/chest below, I used 1/2" lath screws (stubby screws with large diameter, mushroom-like heads) to secure the chests to the wood (which is constrained by the lips) so things can't "go sideways" as my long-ago friends across the Pond were wont to say:



This view shows most of my tool storage (I have a Mechanic's box on the other side of the shop, and the smaller intermediate chest and 7-drawer rolling cabinet/cart/side box are in the garage):


I am officially out of room, plus I'm going to need to re-label a lot of drawers once I redistribute tools. You will note that the top box now has a lock – when I got my Kennedy collection in the '80's I ordered a couple replacement locks so that everything was keyed alike (the cabinets and side drawers were different), and so used one of the pull-outs to replace the missing lock.


The two lessons? 1) Never throw anything out (like I have to tell anyone reading this): the lockset would have cost more than the two boxes. 2) Maybe social media isn't so bad after all: keep an eye out in the market place listings, and try not to hate me too much for my good fortune.


ADDENDUM: I forgot the "bonus" items that were included with my purchase, at no extra charge:


I can understand all of these being misplaced in the deep reaches of the boxes, with the exception of the 16d nail; there were also dividers for one of the small drawers and the deep full-width drawer, and a 9" (!) Starrett flexible rule (now having the rust removed); I'll post a photo once it is cleaned up so that we can discuss its heritage.




Charlie

[mattthemuppet]

modified a backplate to fit a Pratt Burnerd 6" 3 jaw set tru chuck I bought at auction a while back. Even better, the key I made for the chuck it's replacing fits this one too

[Cenedd]

The two lessons? 1) Never throw anything out (like I have to tell anyone reading this): the lockset would have cost more than the two boxes.

Nah, you have to throw things out otherwise you'll never need them. What we all know is that you only need it shortly after you've chucked it out!
Don't hate you for the find. If nothing else, the only reason they're jealousy-inducing is the work you've put into restoring them. I bet they're out together better than the modern ones I bought that are just pressed sheet metal with friction slides - the price and dimensions were right though.

mattthemuppet What's the lathe? Looks sort of pared back, almost skeletal. I'm guessing that's more the angle and there's a load of back gearing hiding behind.

[ChazzC]

[QUOTE=Cenedd;n2000619]

Nah, you have to throw things out otherwise you'll never need them. What we all know is that you only need it shortly after you've chucked it out!
Don't hate you for the find. If nothing else, the only reason they're jealousy-inducing is the work you've put into restoring them. I bet they're out together better than the modern ones I bought that are just pressed sheet metal with friction slides - the price and dimensions were right though.

Actually, even the early '80's chests all have friction slides, even the rolling cabinets (although the cabinets and side drawer unit do have beefier slides than the chests and all are better than those on the Craftsman chest/cabinet).

[DennisCA]

Worked on a miter station for my new to me miter saw:




Since the thing is made from MDF I will have to varnish all the parts, multiple times. Plywood is too expensive nowadays.

[ChazzC]

Just got off the phone with Starrett Tech Support: the No. 323, No. 13 Graduation, 9" Flexible Rule was manufactured between 1902 — 1918! It seems that a customer had gone to the trouble of creating a short list & long list of item numbers, descriptions and what catalogs they were in (the long list is all items!). Here are the photos after de-rusting:







Stained where the rust was worse, but it cleaned up reasonably well; I didn't want to get too aggressive and need to re-ink the graduations. I may put this one in the walnut Gerstner chest with my Father's tools.