A Two-Prong To Three-Prong Adapter Cord

This short (under four feet) extension cord has a two-prong plug, and a three-prong receptacle. Why would anyone make such a thing?

The answer to that question lies in an obsolete form of house wiring known as 'knob-and-tube'. My dad's house had that type of wiring, and the outlets that accompany knob-and-tube wiring are two-prong outlets, not three-prong as with modern wiring.

So, to plug in a three-prong cord, one would need an adapter such as the one pictured here.

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Gillette Safety Razors

Well, what have we here?

A couple of ancient Gillette safety razor kits, it turns out.

The one on the right is missing its blade box, and its lid is plain, except for the name "Gillette" embossed on it (now very faded).

The one on the left is complete and, as best as I can make out (it's very faded), says this on its lid:

"AVEC NOS COMPLIMENTS ALLUMETTES LAURIER"

Which translates to:

 "WITH OUR COMPLIMENTS

 MATCHES LAURIER"

The 'ALLUMETTES/MATCHES' bit makes no sense to me.^[1] Possibly I'm misreading it -- it's very faded.

Anyway, here's the razor out of its box and assembled.

And here's a view of it completely dismantled.

That was high-tech shaving gear back in the day. (The things were made in Canada, by the way.)

There's a Wikipedia article on safety razors here.

I guess I'll stash these on the shelf where I keep my spare disposable blades.

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Note:

[1] The "AVEC NOS COMPLIMENTS" bit seems to suggest that the kit was a promotional freebie, perhaps for guests at a high-end hotel in Quebec. Maybe "ALLUMETTES" has some obscure other usage, and doesn't only mean 'matches'. I just don't know.

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Two Honeywell Mercury Switches

There's a partial label on one of them, but all I can make out from it is that the maker was Honeywell.

The upside-down one at the left is in its open condition. The right-side-up one at the right is in its closed condition.

The bulbs are about two inches long, and there's a sizeable bead of mercury inside, so I imagine these switches have a substantial current rating. I don't know what they're from.

In the 1950s, my dad had a '55 Pontiac. I seem to recall that he used a switch like these to rig a rudimentary theft alarm in it.

He mounted the switch on the underside of the hood, and wired it so that if the hood were opened with the circuit armed, the horn would sound.

Mercury is a toxic waste bogeyman these days, so I'd be required to take these to the hazardous waste disposal depot were I to want to dispose of them. But I'm quite happy to hang onto them for possible use for something-or-other. I'll stash them in my 'miscellaneous switches' shoebox.

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Modern Gunsmithing by Clyde Baker

[This item wasn't really in the garage -- it was on my dad's bookshelf by his La-Z-Boy in his living room.]

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"A Manual of Firearms Design, Construction and Remodeling, for Amateurs and Professionals"

by CLYDE BAKER

SECOND EDITION, 1933

Published by the SMALL-ARMS TECHNICAL PUBLISHING COMPANY, Plantersville, South Carolina, U.S.A.

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It's quite a comprehensive volume.

Here's a paragraph from the opening chapter that can serve as an introduction to Mr. Baker's outlook:

"Work -- honest, decent labor, skill of fingers, accuracy of eye, -- somehow it seems to be beneath the present generation. The business man in his office sticks out his chest, holds "conferences," frowns and looks wise, preening himself on that thing he calls "ability." Then he sharpens his pencil by sticking it into a little machine and turning a crank -- or more likely screws down the point of an automatic gold one; has his finger nails cleaned by the blonde in the barber shop; calls a service man to change a tire on his car; wears a little useless penknife on his watch chain and sends it to a grinding shop to be whetted! -- yes, he does just that. We've been pampered now to the point of helplessness -- and if we don't watch our step, we'll find ourselves at the point of uselessness."

Bear in mind that those thoughts date from the early 1930s. What would Mr Baker think of today's automated world?

There's a brief  biographical item on Mr Baker here.

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A Paring Knife With A Really Cheap, Broken Plastic Handle

On the blade it says, "STAINLESS STEEL JAPAN". The blade actually looks pretty good -- it's very nicely ground.

The handle is another story. What a piece of junk.

Knife handle making is something I've never pursued, but this knife might be worth making a decent handle for. We'll see.

Meanwhile, I'll stash this in my spare tools drawer.

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A Burndy Wire-Mike

These are quite a neat electrician's caliper. It appears that Burndy still carries them.

I'll keep this in the cabinet where I have some other miscellaneous measuring tools.

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A Pair Of Nippers

They're in decent condition, and reasonably well made. There's a logo on each arm that says "18C", along with a tiny, indecipherable figure. I can find nothing to clue me in about the logo.

Anyway, nippers like these are not something I have much use for. I'll stash them in my spare tools drawer.

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A Wee Spanner

There's no maker's name on it.

It's very thin -- only 1mm thick. The wrench end is 7/32". The small end may be for turning some sort of dimpled screw head or the like.

Perhaps it's for something like drapery track hardware -- who knows.

Anyway, I'll stash it in the drawer where I keep things like odd little spanners.

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A Cheapo Pencil Compass From Hong Kong

It's not what you'd call a 'fine instrument', but it has a clever feature for gripping the pencil.

Note the little downward-pointing lever at the extreme right. That lever operates an eccentric that clamps the pencil into its barrel.

Here's the lever in its upward-pointing position.

The pencil is now quite firmly gripped.

The flaw in this design lies in the attachment of the pencil barrel to the pencil arm -- it's loose. That makes for a shaky, wobbly pencil arm.

Were I to super-glue the barrel to the arm, I might have a reasonably good, useable compass. Maybe some day when I'm really desperate to glue something, I'll do that.

Meanwhile, this can go in my spare tools drawer.

More To The Story

In the bottom of the small toolbox that the compass was in, I found this curious little loose part.

Hmmm. Might it be a radius or diameter scale that belonged to the compass? 'Sure looks like it.

Let's see if I can get this all back together. It might be interesting to see how accurate the scale is.

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And here we are.

It's a radius scale, alright -- an outrageously inaccurate one.

Setting it to 1" gives me a radius of about 1 5/16". One wonders why the manufacturer even bothered.

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A Straight-Handled Tap Wrench, Possibly

There's no maker's name on it. I can't think what else it might be but a tap wrench. It has a square-opening, two-jaw collet chuck on it. Here's a view of the chuck opened up.

And here it is fully closed. (By the way, the chuck's collar thread is left-handed.)

It closes down to about a 5/32" square.

Here it is holding a 1/4"-20 tap.

For light work like thread chasing, I've long preferred a straight handle to a T-handle -- a T-handle is needlessly clumsy when not much torque is needed.

I'll stash this in the drawer where I keep all my thread-cutting gear

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A TradeMaster Crimping Tool With Metric Screw Cutting

Yeehah! I've finally got a crimping tool that cuts metric screws.

As I find myself using metric screws more and more often, I've been wanting to acquire a metric screw cutting crimping tool, but they seem to be rare birds indeed. This fills the bill nicely.

The screw sizes it takes are:

• M2.5^[1]
• M3
• M3.5
• M4
• M5^[2]

As far as I know, TradeMaster is a Home Hardware house brand. I checked Home Hardware's website, and this tool appears to no longer exist.

Anyway, this can go straight into the drawer where I keep all my other crimping/screw-cutting tools.

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Notes:

[1] The marking on the tool looks like 'M2.6', but there's no such thing that I'm aware of. It must be M2.5.

[2] M5 is just slightly larger than inch No. 10, and No. 10 screws take a lot of force to cut. You'd really have to squeeze for all you're worth to cut M5 screws.

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Whitcher Lasting Pliers

I was able to learn that this is a boot and shoe maker's tool, and that was about all I was able to learn.

The thing leaves me somewhat mystified as to how it would be used. Given what I know about boot and shoe making, that should surprise no one.

I'll clean it up on the wire wheel machine, and stash it in my spare tools drawer.

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Sargent & Co. Parallel Action Pliers

This is an item I've never felt the need for, but it's been a successful design, so somebody must find them useful. Maybe if I keep them near at hand, I'll find uses for them, and come to appreciate the parallel action.

Sargent is still a going concern, and they appear to still be making these things.

I think what I should do is hang these on a toolboard, and keep them in mind. Perhaps then I'll come to understand their virtues.

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Something A Little Different

It appears to be a purpose-made wrench of some sort. Here's a close-up view of the business end.

That's a bent-over No. 3 (black) Robertson screw. So, what we appear to have here is a four-point socket wrench for turning something of No. 3 Robertson size. What on earth the application might have been eludes me.

I'll stash this in my spare tools drawer.

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A Combination Spanner

There's no maker's name on it. It looks like something that was purpose-made to go with something, but I have no idea what.

The thickness is 3.5mm. Measuring the openings, it's not entirely clear to me whether the thing is inch or metric; it may even be a mix. I'll list the opening dimensions (as best as I can determine them) in whichever system seems the most suitable for any given opening.

 From left-to-right, the openings are:

• 3/4" open end.
• 11/16" hex box.
• 10mm x 15mm oblong box.
• 3/8" square box.
• 13mm hex box.
• 5/8" open end.

Hmmm. It's surely the oddest, clumsiest looking combination spanner I've ever seen. I'll stash it in my spare tools drawer.

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Sears Mystery Tool -- U.S. Patent No. 2743046

Here's a curious bit of gear.

The left side end is a paint can opener. (It's identified as such on the inner, concave surface of the tool.)

The right side end looks to me like a bottle opener.

But the tabs/notches at the upper centre had me mystified.

On the inner, concave surface of the tool there's a patent number -- 2743046. I looked up that number and discovered that this is a device for carrying two big cans of paint by their bails simultaneously, like so.

The cans remain level while supported by the device, so they can even be carried when open.

Here's a link to the patent document.

I doubt that I would ever have figured the thing out on my own.

I'll hang this on a nail over by my paint bench.

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A 24" Folding Rule

Here's another real old-timer. It has no maker's name on it, and it's in pretty rough condition. It was broken off once at about the 21 3/4" point, then repaired. The hinging is still in sound condition.

I wonder if anyone still uses these -- they've long been obsoleted by steel tape measures. I imagine that in my grandfather's day, there was plenty of perfectly accurate work done with these.

Anyway, I'm unlikely to ever make use of this rule. I'll stash it in the back of my spare tools drawer.

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A Pair Of Forceps/Tweezers Of Some Sort

There's no maker's name on them, and they look cheaply constructed. The pivot is a bit sloppy, and the tips align poorly.

With a bit of work, I could improve the thing, and possibly have a useful tool for something-or-other.

I'll stash these in my spare tools drawer against the day that I feel like getting after them.

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A 12 Volt Car Battery

Hmmm.

I wonder what the odds are of this thing being fit for service -- slim to nil, probably. A voltmeter check showed me 5V open circuit voltage, so at least the thing is not completely open internally. 'Only thing to do is put my charger on it and see what transpires. I'll bring the battery over to the back of the house where there's an outdoor outlet, and try charging it outside. If it means to do anything obnoxious, it can do it outside, and not in my workshop.

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It's not looking good. I've had the charger on it for about an hour now. With the charger connected and powered on, the battery's terminal voltage reads normally -- about 13.2V. When I disconnect the charger, the terminal voltage falls off to just below 10V. That suggests a shorted cell that can't accept a charge. I'll leave the charger on it for the rest of the day and see if there's any change for the better, but it's probably futile.

So, it's probably off to the hazardous waste depot with it.

That's too bad, because a good 12V lead-acid battery can be a useful thing to have for experimenting with devices that draw a lot of current; not that I really have any such thing in mind at the moment

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Sure enough, this battery is past it. It'll have to go for a ride to the hazardous waste depot.

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A Corkscrew

Well, what have we here in among the garage gear?

A very nice Italian-made corkscrew. No garage should be without one. After all, one never knows when a particularly fine outcome of  some work on a vehicle will call for uncorking a celebratory bottle of wine.

This corkscrew is well made. The handle is securely pinned to the shank from one side, so the handle is never going to torque free of the shank.

The handle ends reveal evidence of the chucking method that was used to turn the wood to shape, like so.

Both handle ends are the same. It's a brilliant chucking method -- absolutely secure, with nothing to scar the end-edges of the handle. And the effect on the handle's ends' appearance is not unattractive.

I think this item deserves a place to hang on a toolboard, where it will be right at hand whenever need for it arises.

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A Stanley 'Sweetheart' 6" Try Square

Now here we have an old-timer.

It's a beautifully constructed tool, though a rudimentary squareness check shows it to be a tiny bit off. (God only knows what rough usage or accidents may have befallen it over the years.)

The blade very dimly reveals the Stanley 'Sweetheart' logo, like so.



I think that the 'S.W.' stands for 'Stanley Works', a corporate name from way back in Stanley's history.

What I ought to do here is get on with a little project that's long been on my mind -- devising a reliable, accurate squareness test apparatus from easily obtained materials. Then, I'd like to try truing this square; I'd be delighted to have it out on a toolboard and in actual use.

Meanwhile, I'll stash this square in my spare tools drawer.

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A Small Claw Hammer

It's fairly well made, though the hammer face is dead flat; it has no crown to it at all.

It weighs eight ounces -- for a boy's tool kit, possibly.

This might even be a relic from my boyhood. I seem to recall a boyhood episode when I went around the house tapping on things that looked tap-worthy to me. One of the things I tapped on was a fastening clip at the edge of a bedroom dresser's mirror. The mirror forever after sported a two-inch diagonal crack in its glass. That was probably the end of my unsupervised hammer wielding for quite a spell.

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An 8" x 12" Framing Square

This square is inch on one side.

And metric on the other.

That sort of inch/metric combination has always struck me as a poor one.

Whichever system you're working in, if you need to flip the tool over for the sake of convenience at any point, you lose the scales you've been using.

That aside, it's not a bad little framing square. It was made in Korea (South Korea, presumably).

The red label on the inch side says,

"8 x 12 SQUARE
Parkerized black steel with etched white markings. Scales in 1/16ths and 1/32nds. Distributed only through the wholesaler by Smith-Wolff Co., Inc.. Mt. Vernon, N.Y. 10553. Unconditionally Guaranteed"

There's also a partially obliterated catalogue number that may be "SW583", and a logo that may read "top-spec".

From what can get from the internet, it appears that the Smith-Wolff firm is no longer with us.

I still have space on the rack where I keep framing squares, so I'll stash this item there with the others.

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A General No. 1201 12" Steel Rule

General still listed essentially the same tool in their January 2014 catalogue, although it's catalogue number was 1201ME. There are slight differences in the scales between the 1201 and the 1201ME.

I already have all the 12" rules I need; this one can hang on the nail where I keep some other rules.

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Bates National Rule BNR-15 15" Steel Rule

It's a difficult subject to photograph well, but there it is.

It's quite a good steel rule, with a cork backing. I really don't care for cork backings on rules -- I can get by just fine without the alleged 'non-slip' feature of them, and the way that the backing raises the rule up off a surface is inconducive to accuracy because of the parallax effect that's introduced.

From what I can see on the internet, the Bates Manufacturing Company of Hackettstown, New Jersey has disappeared into the mists of time.

The rule has a hole in it at one end for hanging, so I'll hang on the nail where I have a few other rules hanging.

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