[NJARC] Bet you can relate!

[Billoradio at aol.com]

Tools and their proper  use

*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 boats 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 Herreshoff's, 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.