Cool Tool of the Day. (CTOD)

[jfa.series1]

Nothing as exotic as most of the entries in this thread but here is a little paint accessory I made this week to help in refinishing my steering wheel. It is the top of a 2 liter bottle with a nice fat bolt installed in the cap. It served as a stand for painting the spokes and hub and then it provided a spinner base to rotate the wheel evenly while spraying the spar urethane.

[grannyknot]

Here's a tool I hope I won't need for a long time but when I do no one's going to f__k with this old man. The handle is 1/8th in. steel plate welded at the edges so it's not as heavy as it looks, the ferrule at the bottom is a spare 9/16" socket.

 

[mailnome]

It’s mostly Maui Wowie but it has a little Labrador in it.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[siteunseen]

1 hour ago, mailnome said:

It’s mostly Maui Wowie but it has a little Labrador in it.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[zKars]

Two submissions today

the first is a little “make a job easier” tool for testing manual transmissions or computing ratio’s in various gears.

Its just the center spline of a worn out clutch disk with a hunk-o-scrap welded on with a handle. Now you prevent yourself (ok myself) from clamping vise grips on the trans input shaft splines to make it spin.

[Captain Obvious]

LOL. I like it!! That's a great idea.

So what is it that opens your garage door now though? 

[zKars]

Ok here is the second tool I promised. Didn’t have pics last night.

It relates to loosening old rusty brake line nuts. How many of you have been forced into vise grips on a brake or clutch line nut because your fancy flare nut wrench spreads and slips around a really old and tight one? Come on, fess up, we all do it. You get it loose, sure, maybe with some heat, but the hex of the nut is invariably wrecked. When you go to put the line back on, now you HAVE to use vise grips to tighten it, and the hex soon becomes a circle……

I have tried MANY brands of flare nut wrenches, all are simply not good enough. So, I made my own! With a special feature.

Here is the standard heavy walled flare nut wrench.

My idea was to add some way of squeezing that wrench hex closed to tightly grip the hex of the line nut, so it CAN’t slip around. First approach was to dream of fancy levers and threaded things to apply the needed force to close down on that heavy open “C” and squeeze the nut, but even with my largest vise grips, I really couldn’t apply enough force to collapse the opening. Ok, so maybe grind down the wall thickness until its thin enough to give? Maybe, but why not find a thinner walled wrench to start with? Well there is no such thing. Unless….

So I just bought a cheap Amazon 10 mm 6point box end wrench and turned it into a flare nut wrench by using a thin cutoff wheel and making a 3/16 gap in the end!   My creation on the left, standard flare nut wrench on the right.

Now its easy to squeeze that gap with a 8” vise grip

 

So you just place the wrench on the line nut, then close the vise grips over the “C” and squeeze it shut. Then apply all the force you want with a hammer or pipe or whatever it takes to break the nut loose without fear of stripping the hex.

After extensive testing on several cars recently, this little jewel is working perfectiy! The only thing I need to do is make the handle longer so I can tug on it by hand without beating on it with a hammer all the time, especially when the room around nut is tight.

 

Edited November 3, 2021 by zKars

[Racer X]

On 3/11/2021 at 7:00 PM, Captain Obvious said:

How many joints in a lid?

Depends on how big you roll them.

[Yarb]

That bellhousing looks like the one I just cleaned and refurbished!! What a Job!!

[Patcon]

I have jad to do similar with an O2 sensor socket. Even the goods ones flex enough to strip the sensor. Put a hose clamp around the end and no more flexing

[Racer X]

5 hours ago, zKars said:

Ok here is the second tool I promised. Didn’t have pics last night.

It relates to loosening old rusty brake line nuts. How many of you have been forced into vise grips on a brake or clutch line nut because your fancy flare nut wrench spreads and slips around a really old and tight one? Come on, fess up, we all do it. You get it loose, sure, maybe with some heat, but the hex of the nut is invariably wrecked. When you go to put the line back on, now you HAVE to use vise grips to tighten it, and the hex soon becomes a circle……

I have tried MANY brands of flare nut wrenches, all are simply not good enough. So, I made my own! With a special feature.

Here is the standard heavy walled flare nut wrench.

My idea was to add some way of squeezing that wrench hex closed to tightly grip the hex of the line nut, so it CAN’t slip around. First approach was to dream of fancy levers and threaded things to apply the needed force to close down on that heavy open “C” and squeeze the nut, but even with my largest vise grips, I really couldn’t apply enough force to collapse the opening. Ok, so maybe grind down the wall thickness until its thin enough to give? Maybe, but why not find a thinner walled wrench to start with? Well there is no such thing. Unless….

So I just bought a cheap Amazon 10 mm 6point box end wrench and turned it into a flare nut wrench by using a thin cutoff wheel and making a 3/16 gap in the end!   My creation on the left, standard flare nut wrench on the right.

Now its easy to squeeze that gap with a 8” vise grip

 

So you just place the wrench on the line nut, then close the vise grips over the “C” and squeeze it shut. Then apply all the force you want with a hammer or pipe or whatever it takes to break the nut loose without fear of stripping the hex.

After extensive testing on several cars recently, this little jewel is working perfectiy! The only thing I need to do is make the handle longer so I can tug on it by hand without beating on it with a hammer all the time, especially when the room around nut is tight.

 

An ingenious idea. 
 

Although in all the years I’ve worked on vehicles and machinery repairing hydraulic systems, I have always been able to get stripped flare nuts off, no matter how stripped or corroded in place. I have used vice grips, cold chisels, a flat file to file the nut into a useable shape again, or when all else fails, cut the tubing, remove the part and drill out the nut.

[Captain Obvious]

8 hours ago, Racer X said:

Depends on how big you roll them.

Well actually, according to Bob Bitchinn, the answer is "two".

Apparently he rolls big joints.