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1. DRILL PRESS: A tall upright machine
useful for suddenly snatching flat metal bar stock out of your
hands so that it smacks you in the chest and flings your beer
across the room, splattering it against that freshly painted
part you were drying.
2. WIRE WHEEL: Cleans paint off bolts and then throws
them somewhere under the workbench with the speed of light.
Also removes fingerprint whorls and hard-earned guitar calluses
in about the time it takes you to say, "SHIT!!!"
3. ELECTRIC HAND DRILL: Normally used for spinning pop
rivets in their holes until you die of old age.
4. PLIERS: Used to round off hexagonal bolt heads.
5. HACKSAW: One of a family of cutting tools built on
the Ouija board principle: It transforms human energy into a
crooked, unpredictable motion, and the more you attempt to influence
its course, the more dismal your future becomes.
6. VISE GRIP PLIERS: Used to round off bolt heads. If
nothing else is available, they can also be used to transfer
intense welding heat to the palm of your hand.
7. OXYACETYLENE TORCH: Used almost entirely for setting
various flammable objects in your shop on fire. Also handy for
igniting the grease inside a wheel hub you're trying to get
the bearing race out of.
8. WHITWORTH SOCKETS: Once used for working on older
British cars and motorcycles, they are now used mainly for impersonating
that 9/16 or 1/2" socket you've been searching for the
last 15 minutes.
9. HYDRAULIC FLOOR JACK: Used for lowering an automobile
to the ground after you have installed your new disk brake pads,
trapping the jack handle firmly under the bumper.
10. EIGHT-FOOT LONG DOUGLAS FIR 4X4: Used to attempt
to lever an automobile upward off a hydraulic jack handle.
11. TWEEZERS: A tool for removing splinters of wood,
especially Douglas fir.
12. TELEPHONE: Tool for calling your neighbor to see
if he has another hydraulic floor jack.
13. SNAP-ON GASKET SCRAPER: Theoretically useful as a
sandwich tool for spreading mayonnaise; used mainly for removing
dog feces from your boots.
14. E-Z OUT BOLT AND STUD EXTRACTOR: A tool that snaps
off in bolt holes and is ten times harder than any known drill
bit.
15. TWO-TON HYDRAULIC ENGINE HOIST: A handy tool for
testing the tensile strength of bolts and fuel lines you forgot
to disconnect.
16. CRAFTSMAN 1/2 x 16-INCH SCREWDRIVER: A large motor
mount prying tool that inexplicably has an accurately machined
screwdriver tip on the end without the handle.
17. AVIATION METAL SNIPS: See hacksaw.
18. TROUBLE LIGHT: The home builder's own tanning booth.
Sometimes called drop light, it is a good source of vitamin
D, "the sunshine vitamin," which is not otherwise
found under cars at night. Health benefits aside, its main purpose
is to consume 40-watt light bulbs at about the same rate that
105-mm howitzer shells might be used during, say, the first
few hours of the Battle of the Bulge. More often dark than light,
its name is somewhat misleading.
19. PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER: Normally used to stab the lids
of old-style paper-and-tin oil cans and squirt oil on your shirt;
can also be used, as the name implies, to round off the interiors
of Phillips screw heads.
20. AIR COMPRESSOR: A machine that takes energy produced
in a coal-burning power plant 200 miles away and transforms
it into compressed air that travels by hose to an Pneumatic
impact wrench that grips rusty bolts last tightened 70 years
ago by someone at GM, and rounds them off or twists them off.
21. PRY BAR: A tool used to crumple the metal surrounding
that clip or bracket you needed to remove in order to replace
a 50 cent part.
22. HOSE CUTTER: A tool used to cut hoses 1/2 inch too
short.
23. HAMMER: Originally employed as a weapon of war, the
hammer nowadays is used as a kind of divining rod to locate
expensive parts not far from the object we are trying to hit.
24. MECHANIC'S KNIFE: Used to open and slice through
the contents of cardboard cartons delivered to your front door;
works particularly well on boxes containing upholstered items,
chrome-plated metal, plastic parts and the other hand not holding
the knife.
So there you have it: a complete description of the tools all
men need, and occasionally use correctly.
Special thanks to Noah for sending me this
gem... |
