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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