What tool or set of tools would you not be without ?

[ukcol]

I have spent all my waking hours since I was about 20 wearing glasses. So for me the appropriate glasses and optical aids where appropriate are required. I am now 71 and starting to suffer age related sight deterioration, and so the right glasses and optical aids have become essential.

The right tool for the job is a rule I stick to and so in that sense I wouldn't be without any of them.

There is one tool I spotted at a tool sale about 25 years ago which I probably could manage without but has turned out to be incredibly useful. They are a type of surgical forceps or clamp and pictured below.

I use them for holding components or screws in place and because they lock, they allow both hands free for working. They are also useful for retrieving that screw you have just dropped into an inaccessible place.

[camtechman]

A slight deviation from the topic........"What tool or set of tools would you be without ? "

The reason for the change is I once bought a set of tools from Woolies (around 1962)

They were made by Marx and in individual miniature sets, right up to a full major set.

I thought they were "The Bees Knees" and bought Sets #1,2& 3.

The problem was most of them were chrome finished SPELTER and broke/shattered under even light pressure !!!

I still have 2 ring spanners left and they're never used.

[AC/HL]

As Marx are/were toy makers, it's unsurprising that these are useless as tools.

[camtechman]

it's unsurprising that these are useless as tools.

So I found out and I've just seen a FULL 31 piece set for around £80 !!

[RojDW48]

Some years ago my daughter's current boyfriend was a plumber. For Christmas we bought him a very realistic and 'rusty' looking pipe wrench made of....chocolate. Similar properties?

[Ancient Geek]

When I joined HP as a field service engineer in 1979, I was told to get myself over to Sarjent's Tools in Reading, buy all the hand tools I needed and claim them on expenses. Many are long gone, but the ones that remain are treasured, including needle-nosed pliers and side cutters, two sizes of each.

[dazzlevision]

Originally Posted by Ancient Geek

I was told to get myself over to Sarjent's Tools in Reading, buy all the hand tools I needed and claim them on expenses.

Ah yes, Sarjents Tools - sadly missed! I worked in Reading town centre for many years and was a frequent visitor to their shop.

One of my most used tools is one of those very small slotted screwdrivers with a transluscent plastic top, only a couple of inches long. They were usually on the counter in tool shops, in a variety of colours, sitting in something akin to a flower arrangers "oasis".

I have to keep gluing mine back together where the plastic top has broken.

[Nickthedentist]

Not really a "tool" but I find my little Canon Ixus digital camera with its Digital Macro setting invaluable for taking photos of things as I disassemble them, as an aid to putting them back together again. It's also fun to have before/during/after shots of everything I fiddle with (radios, clocks, phones etx.) on my computers, accessible in an instant.

It cost about £200 a few years ago but I picked up another in a charity shop the other day for £20.

[newlite4]

Always reaching for the ten coloured Maplin croc-clip leads, they have the uncanny ability to get me out of a tight spot.
Neil

[MrBungle]

Just a gotcha on them I found. You have to take them to bits and solder them properly. Turns out they found a cheaper way to manufacture the things which involves stripping the wire, then bending the frayed bit over and crimping and that's it.

Very useful though. I replaced all mine with Pomona clip leads in the end, mainly to top up the Farnell basket to avoid paying for postage

[PJL]

I am with ukcol, tweezers and surgical instruments are an essential tool for any work on Philips radios.

['LIVEWIRE?']

What I find useful is a set of Circlip grippers, made by ?Bonzing/ (The brand name is party worn off the handle of one I have here) They were given to service engineers who repaired Blaupunkt Casette Players by Robert Bosch UK many years ago. In my workshop I have several of them, fitting circlips of diameters from 1.5 -4.5mm, and make refitting circlips quite easy. The Handles on the current/recent range of Roberts Revival (RD50, RD60, etc.) Radios are secured by two small circlips inside the cabinet. These would be virtually impossible to refit without the above tool.

[SiriusHardware]

Originally Posted by Nickthedentist

Not really a "tool" but I find my little Canon Ixus digital camera with its Digital Macro setting invaluable

I love the metal-bodied compact Canon Ixus series and currently own two, an all-original Ixus 400 from around 2004 and a slightly more recent Ixus 750 which is an amalgam of the best parts from about three individual cameras - none of which I owned from new.

Like a lot of people here my short range eyesight is now quite poor. At work I have access to magnifiers and microscopes but in the field, I often can not read the numbers on components, glass fuses etc, even with reading glasses especially if the light is bad, but I nearly always have the 750 in my pocket so if I'm having difficulty reading something I just take a macro photo of it and then view the photo I've just taken, zooming into it on playback mode to make it more than big enough to see.

Like you, I always take lots of pictures of anything I'm in the process of dismantling.

[Ferguson 2000]

My neon screwdriver made by CK. I have clipped the smaller version into my right hand trouser pocket almost every day for fifty years until I retired last August. The larger version has been in my service case for a similar period of time and is still there.

It is a essential and much under-estimated tool which, if carefully used, can also remove the majority of cross head screws and give warning of impending disaster.

As an apprentice I was sent to disconnect and remove a wall light in a local hotel. After some discussion the mains was turned off............my neon screwdriver showed that there was still electricity present! After discussion the owners decided that as they had "free" electricity (from the property next door) they would retain the wall lights. I think they tried powering the kitchen via an extension lead!

Best wishes, Geoffrey.

['LIVEWIRE?']

Further to my post about circlip grippers (The tools to which I refer are not pliers, btw, but a device which has an end shaped to hold a circlip of the appropriate diameter. The clip is gripped & held in plce because the end of the tool is basically split so that you apply slight pressure to insert the circlip, then, using the tool, push the clip into the groove in the shaft of whatever it is to be used on, until it clicks into place, then pull off the tool, leaving the circlip secured in place. Googling 'circlip tool' only produces pliers, and I would like to know if such things are still available, but have had no joy so far,.

[The Philpott]

..Are we talking the circlip pliers whose tips are ground to two cylindrical shapes.?
4 different basic types, cranked or straight, expanding or contracting? If not what do they look like?

[Sparks]

I should also mention my Black and Decker Minicraft drill. I bought it just over 25 years ago and it's been so useful. Unfortunately it chose Sunday afternoon to conk out just when I really needed it. Luckily it was just a broken wire from the switch. Now rewired and ready for another 25 years.

['LIVEWIRE?']

I did specifically state that these tools are not pliers They are a single device which grips the circlip, so that, with one hand it can be fitted where it has to go. I'll post a photo of one ASAP.

[The Philpott]

Yes, you did. I was comprehensively stitched up by my employer today so am not firing on all cylinders.

For myself, i would not be without (plumbers) butane torches and my fine two-pinioned Stanley hand drill.

[Graham G3ZVT]

I'm recently retired, but the final 10 years of my working life was spent in IT hardware/software deployment, with no official component-level servicing element.
However, I never left home without a mains iron and a roll of 60/40 in my boot,
I would somehow feel naked without them.

It saved the day on more than one occasion, once a colleague who was working with me was a bit clumsy pulling a hard-drive out of a machine and wrecked it, or so he thought. I retrieved a small object that he hadn't noticed had fallen into the PC, it was a surface-mount crystal that had sheared off the hard drive PCB. I told him to wait while I got my tools and I will fix it. The look on his face suggested he wasn't confident, anyone with a background in electronics who works with IT people, will know what I mean.