Although flare connections are very reliable, people don’t use ‘em as often as they could because creating them requires special equipment. Fortunately, you really don’t have to make a huge investment in tools — General Tools manufactures an inexpensive flaring tool to get you started making solid flare connections. Their flaring tool makes smooth 45° flares in soft copper, aluminum, brass, and other common, thin-walled tubing.
(Monday, February 25th, 2008) It’s a night of reruns, but in great quantity and quality!
All times are central.
Enjoy.
(Sunday, February 24th, 2008) We’ve got a Dirty Jobs marathon, as well as tons of other stuff to keep you glued to the set. The CO2 cartridges segment of How It’s Made will bring joy to all you airgunners.
All times are central.
Enjoy.
(Saturday, February 23rd, 2008) Saturday is all about factories, on the Science, Discovery, and Military channels. DIY has their woodworking shows, and Modern Marvels shows us sharp stuff in a rerun.
All times are central.
Enjoy.
Bosch has added a new halogen shop light to its line of 10.8V lithium-ion tools. Back in June we had Bosch’s ear, and we asked Toolmonger readers what you’d like to see in this line of compact yet powerful tools — Big Brother Bob seems to have listened. A compact light ranked high on the wish-list; now that we’ve got one, we have eight more tools to look forward to in 2008.
The FL10 compact halogen light features a six-position neck and an adjustable-focus beam. The 10V batteries give it some heft. You can buy the light at Amazon for about $15 without a battery. Also, some stores are offering it as a freebie when you buy the Bosch PS20-2 pocket driver kit.
With a free light and the promise of eight new tools this year, this might be the time to go out and get yourself a new toy.
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Via Amazon
Mowing the lawn is about as exciting to me as watching it grow. Some folks are wired to savor the earthy enjoyment of a well-manicured lawn that’s carefully cultivated by its loving homeowner. I’m not that guy. I hate yard work. That said, with a mower like the F1, I could change my view on the subject.
The article on Slipperybrick says the F1 will bring the neighbors to your yard to help mow. I say screw ‘em — they didn’t want to help when it was crappy, so why let ‘em help when you’re setting up your very own Backyard 400?
Of course, this isn’t really available anywhere we can find yet — but if it was, we’d look into it before buying a boring-ass model from the local big box.
F1 Lawn Mower Makes Lawn Care Fun Again [Slipperybrick]
Toolmonger has covered both flexible claw pickup tools and lighted magnetic pickup tools, but Neiko Tools makes a pickup tool that can retrieve items either magnetically or by using a claw. In situations where the magnetic retrieval won’t work, like an object in a metal box or a non-ferrous object, you can unscrew the magnetic head (unfortunately taking the light with it) and expose the retractable claw tip.
Sanding work ranks up there with having a root canal done in most people’s book — it takes about as long, and it’s almost as painful. But the fact is, any project you attempt to finish without sufficient sanding will wind up looking as beat-to-hell as the picnic table at the park. You know the one: it stands alone off to the side, and the kids call it the Splinter-Master. Ray Travers at Skil wrote a great article on basic sanding tips and what to steer clear of.
I could almost hear the collective groan as I wrote the title for this article.
“Sanding…ugh!”
But the truth is, with the proper attitude, the right tools, and the correct techniques, sanding doesn’t have to be a grind. I’ve got a few ideas on each of those topics that should help your sanding time sail by.
The thing to remember about sanding in general: The amount of time and care you put into sanding directly corresponds to how good the project looks when you’re done. You can rush it and half-ass the job, but in the end you’re only hurting yourself.
If you’ve ever had to lay a curve over and over again, you probably made a template from whatever you had around — a piece of cardboard, a piece of paper, maybe a moldable French curve. Woodcraft recently added a flexible template to their inventory. It’s cool because you can mimic a curve up to 37″ long. Even cooler: You can lock it to keep that curve no matter how many times you transfer it.
The locking template sells for $40, and Woodcraft appears to be the only place offering it.
Curve Template [Woodcraft]
It’s been a busy week here at Toolmonger. If you’ve been spending time in the shop — you should! — and you haven’t had a chance to keep up with Toolmonger this week, we suggest you start with these posts, which our readers helped to select:
Dress Up Your Projects With Isoloc Joints
Dovetail joints are sturdy and beautiful to look at, but if you really want to bake someone’s noodle, show ‘em a box held together by these Isoloc joints. We’d be surprised if you manage to convince ‘em you did the joints yourself before their head explodes. Then again, that’s half the fun.
Flextension Caulking Tube Tip
Remember those bendy straws from when you were a kid? They made it easier to get chocolate milk out of your Batman cup. The Flextension caulking tube tip works on the same principle, only it fits over a tube of caulk and helps get your bathroom watertight and looking good. Batman cup not included.
Whole Hole Saw Kit In One
Believe it or not, this is a hole saw. To be more specific, it’s around six hole saws in one. The three blades located in the middle adjust to cut a hole 1-1/8” to 2-1/2” in diameter. It looks pretty handy, but Toolmonger readers warn that you must possess a light touch to get it through some materials.
Make Your Drill More Flexible
Convenient access is the name of the game for the super-creatively named Flexible Extension. Even if you couldn’t guess what it did from the description, the centipede looking construction clues you in to the purpose of this contorting drill attachment.
Hobart’s Handler 210 Is Now Available
If Mr. T and the rest of the A-Team could have packed a welder to bring with them to whichever underprivileged farmhouse they were protecting that week, they would have brought the new Hobart Handler 210. The 230V portable welder features a 30 percent duty cycle and flux core wire already loaded out of the box — which is handy if you have to turn a ‘52 Ford into an armored assault vehicle in a three minute montage.
Help us choose next week’s Top 5!
We’d appreciate your help in choosing next week’s Top 5, which’ll be featured here, elsewhere, and in the podcast as well. While you’re reading TM this week, look out for the “Interesting Post” button at the bottom of the article:
When you see an article that piques your interest, click the button once. You’ll return to the same page, but TM’s software’ll score your click for future reference. We’ll check in on the totals before selecting next week’s Top 5.
The latest Craftsman Club flyer, out this week, contains a load of slashed pricing on goodies like the C3 Cordless System. We have a few products from the C3 line in the Toolmonger shop, and we’ve always liked ‘em.
For those of you who might need a good portable light, they’re selling the 19.2V work light for only $10, and a two-pack of 19.2V batteries is $50. Granted, the batteries aren’t much of a sale, but having that light handy is sweet. We’ve beat the living tar out of the one we have in the shop — it’s a great unit.
Craftsman Club [Sears]
(Friday, February 22nd, 2008) On a night with no surprises, Home, DIY, and Science do their best to keep you entertained as you plan for the weekend’s projects. Don’t forget to catch Forge and Anvil as well!
All times are central.
Enjoy.
This does seem a little strange, but the multi-angle drill attachment adjusts (and locks) at any angle between 180 and 90 degrees so you can drill in all sorts of odd locations. At least that’s the idea — it looks cumbersome and unwieldy to us, though.
The site says you just hook this thing to your drill like any other attachment, and off you go drilling holes at funny angles. However, even in the picture here, you clearly could’ve drilled that hole at that angle without the use of the funky contraption. Still, if you must have one, it runs about $38 from Garrett Wade. As luck would have it, they’re in stock and on sale.
Multi-Angle Drill Attachment [Garrett Wade]
Need a square hole in a brick wall? You can try to cut it with a circular saw, but what are you going to do about the corners — chip ‘em out? Why bother, when you can use the AS160 from Arbortech? The AS160 cuts so precisely, you can remove a single brick from a wall without damaging the surrounding bricks. If you find that hard to believe, watch their repetitive but informative video.
Moving in an orbital motion, two forward-facing blades provide a simultaneous hammering and cutting action, minimizing the danger of kickback. This arrangement also cuts cleaner, throwing no dust, so the work is more visible, and there’s less mess to clean up. Another advantage: The blades cut dry, so all you need is a standard vacuum to suck up the debris, and with an optional dust boot you can clean as you cut.
Everybody needs a good set of scissors/shears in their toolbox. I always keep around a pair of these EMT utility-style scissors, and you owe it to yourself to get a set. Any EMT or first-responder is familiar with these — they’re meant to quickly cut through fabric to get at wounds. The side benefit: They’re so tough, they’ll cut through most anything you can throw at ‘em. I’ve used ‘em to cut thin metal as well as to snip off extra lengths of wire — a great all-around tool.
The electric company pays you — that’s the urban legend that surrounds the idea of powering your home with solar-energy panels. The problem is, first you have to put twenty to thirty thousand dollars into a solar-powered system for your roof, and then it’s a slow burn back to where you started in the cash department. Still, you might come out ahead in the long run.
A recent article from Fine Homebuilding gives the rundown on sun-powered homes, and the news is good and bad. Yes, it does cost a ton — but the technology has improved drastically since the ‘70s, and it’s better for the planet. Just don’t expect a return on your investment in less than 12 years.
The New Age of Photovoltaics [Fine Homebuilding]
We’ve mentioned pint-sized dust collectors on Toolmonger before, but here’s an even tinier one. The Razaire Dust Management System measures a minute 11″ x 11″ x 6″ and weighs only 7-1/4 lbs — your first laptop computer was probably bigger than this. Razertip Industries even built in a carrying handle. They obviously meant for this dust collector to be portable.
What this little guy lacks in size, it makes up for in flow. With its variable speed fan it can achieve a flow rate up to 530 CFM in free air, and it does so quietly. While that’s impressive, its performance under load really tells the tale. The impeller will move air all the way up to 1-1/2″ static pressure. The best description of the Razaire 530’s power comes from this blurb at Chipping Away — “at high settings it can pull very fine dust particles right through the filter!”
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