The FF Communal Socialist Moonbat Toolbox

[Stephen Maturin]

Does anyone here have tools purchased for one particular job that are in all likelihood useless for any other job and thus may well be consigned to gathering dust for time and all eternity?

Cuz we do.

A few years back one of our showers was dripping. It got to the point where torquing down way hard on the valve handles helped, but couldn't stop the dripping entirely. I was worried as hell, having many years before seeing some how-to show where a plumber had replaced a valve assembly for a tub-shower combo. The job involved busting through tile, sawing out part of the wall, cutting out the old assembly with a goddamn torch (after packing the whole area with fireproof material so you don't accidentally START A FUCKING FIRE INSIDE THE WALL), soldering a new valve assembly onto the pipes and (after checking for leaks) rebuilding the busted wall and tile. Fuck that noise. I had neither the skill to do any of that nor the ability or inclination to learn.

But I figured, hey, it won't cost anything to take apart what I can and at least look at what we're up against. So I took off the Hot and Cold handles and took a look. The next step in the dismantling process would be unscrewing the packing1 nut, which, oddly enough, is the nut that holds the valve packing material in place. Trouble is, you couldn't get to the motherfuckers. They're inside the wall, and the hole through the tile and plywood was just barely as wide as it absolutely needed to be. You couldn't get at the packing nuts with ordinary wrenches, sockets, pliers, channel locks or any of that shit.

So off to Home Depot I went, where I found and purchased a set of internal wrenches. Basically, they're sockets that fit through the tiny holes described above and have really, really deep wells for to accommodate the valve stem.

The internal wrenches worked like a charm. The packing nuts came off easily. After that it was a simple matter of unscrewing the valve stem and removing it. At the end of each valve stem was a small beveled washer. Ours weren't beveled any more on accouta they'd been smashed to hell from decades of use. I replaced the washers and everything was fine.

For a while.

Slowly the dripping returned, so I recently decided to replace the washers again. The repair worked for all of a day. There was clearly something else amiss inside the cold water valve assembly.

The Internet told me that the valve seat -- the small circular opening where the washer sits when the valve is closed -- might be worn. Okay, fine, but how do you fix it? It's not like you can get a file all the way down into that little hole to smooth out any imperfections on the valve seat or anything.

And that's where the valve reseating tool comes in. It's a specialty item designed especially for this job. Found one at Home Depot, used it to grind on the seat of our cold water valve, installed a new washer and thus far the operation seems to have succeeded.

So now we have two tools -- a valve reseater and a set of internal wrenches -- that I hope never to use again. I suspect some of y'all have similar shit lying around your homes.

Let this here thrad serve as a catalogue of the single-purpose tools owned by ers. Instead of going out and spending our completely unearned welfare checks on tools we may never use again, perhaps we can find an economically feasible way of sending the stuff we already have to other ers on an as-needed basis.

You know, like the socialist moonbat leftie whackadoos we are.

1 lol "packing"

[godfry n. glad]

This is why I often hire people who already have those things and are looking for a reason to use them again. Plus, they already know all this stuff; I don't.

[livius drusus]

This is a brilliant idea. I don't think I have any qualifying tools, but I'll check the shed.

[BrotherMan]

I can now be officially included in the communist socialist moonbat welfare teet sucker construct!

It's been a couple of years now, you know since I was employed for money. Part of my job then was to manipulate, arrange and manage various hazardous waste streams. This included, but was not limited to, the safe containerizing of discs of various metals that had been contaminated with the very deadliest substances mankind has ever devised and then cleaned with no-less deadly neutralizers. We would collect these still considered dangerous though "technically" not immediately life threatening discs for safe and permanent disposal into 4 liter plastic jars. One could collect hundreds of metal discs in these jars. Most of the discs were about 2" in diameter. And when you have a sufficient number of them they were quite heavy. And there were multiple jars (depending on a- what metal the discs were made of and b- what was used to decontaminate them which was based on what was used to contaminate them in the first place). Plus any liquid waste that was also involved in the process.

All of this hazardous waste was collected and stored on three shelves before being sent off to the major holding site on base. The shelves, sturdy as they were for regular lab and light-industrial use, were not designed to bear the weight of these items. After many many failures of the normal shelf-holding-up mechanisms (little metal tabs that fit in slots) I grew tired of having to worry if I was going to break a shelf or lift the shelf plus its items off of whatever was below it - and all that jazz that goes along with the feeling of embarrassment accompanying insufficient tools and resources I'm forced to use just to do my job. (Nevermind being angry that, although this was a relatively common occurance, no one previous to my engagement had decided it was worth trying to fix.)

I decided that I could rig up a support system that was a) cheap and b) effective with the minimal effort. After wandering around the Home Depot or a Lowes for a couple of afternoons I decided that I could use PVC piping. What I also needed then was a way to cut the PVC pipes to the custom length needed. I ended up purchasing a RIDGID Single Stroke Cutter .

I don't know that I'll ever again purchase any PVC piping. I mean, it's possible, but it'll be such a rare occurrence. I also consider that I may never use this single purpose tool again. There are plastic things around the house that I may need to cut but it's nothing so large as PVC piping. Just to note, the hole at the business end of the cutter can only accomodate a pipe of no more than 2 and 3/4 inches so even a for reals plumber man might scoff if I tried to offer it to him (or her).

[Dingfod]

I too have those valve seat remover and grinder tools somewhere amongst the stuff I may never use again, but needed at one time. Financial necessity kept me from paying the exorbitant, near-doctor's-rates fees that plumbers and auto mechanics charge. Also, I may have a universal automobile valve spring compressor that I used a total of 12 times (12 valves on a six-cylinder engine) during the overhaul and valve job on the engine in my 1975 Toyota Landcruiser FJ55 aka "The Iron Pig" and a bearing seal remover tool that I used once on my 1974 Ford F100 right rear wheel bearing somewhere in one my toolboxes or junk drawers in my shop building.

[thedoc]

My problem isn't having tools that I only use once, but in having tools that I don't yet have a place to put them. In that light, "If you find it easier to go and buy a new tool, that you already have but can't find, you might be a 'Red Neck'."

[roastelk]

My problem is keeping the tools in my tool box where i put it, The next guy to stick his hand in my tool box without asking me may find he needs to have that hand surgically reattached. Last month i had a kid leave my $6500 1.5" drive pneumatic impact gun on an excavator track and drive away. ie..this would be kind of like leaving something on top of a car tire and then driving away. except that said vehicle is the size of a 1000 sq foot 2 story house, and has a steel tracks instead of wheels.


also, with 60 grand worth of tools my tool box(s) at work, damned If I could find a 5/16" Allen key today. 5 sets of allen keys and every single set is missing the same size, so yep I just bought another set.

[JoeP]

Originally Posted by livius drusus

This is a brilliant idea. I don't think I have any qualifying tools, but I'll check the shed.

"I'll check the shed" would have made a great thread title.

Unf my surely numerous once-used never-to-be-used-again tools aren't in a shed they're in storage and I'm not going there to check...

[Janet]

I don't have many tools, but I still think we should do a similar thing for kitchen gadgets. Oh, and someone has been spying on me because they actually opened a kitchen gadget lending library in Toronto. Cursed idea-thieving Canadians!

[S.Vashti]

I have many tools, curtesy of my dad's demise and subsequent takeover of his tools on my part. I have things like spark plug gauges, torque measurer, battery (motorcycle) recharger, and probably some other auto-related tools I don't use.

I just have to find them all in the mess that is currently our garage.