Let's hear some overkill stories

[Bada Bing]

I spent a while shopping for a good corded drill and ended up with a Milwaukee. Halloween coming up, I was laughing to find the first use I found for it: pupil holes for a jack o' lantern!

Couldn't find my smaller drills, so out comes the bruiser...

That got me wondering: people on this site must have some great stories of outright tool overkill. Anyone?

[DougB]

I trim my fingernails with my compound miter saw...finally found a use for the compound feature :7

OK, OK that's not really true...I don't really use the compound feature :7

[cabinetman]

An upright 6"x48" belt sander works good too. You get a much finer edge with an oscillating spindle sander. I used to use a Stanley #5, but it's a bit bulky, especially on the pinkie nails.

[TDHofstetter]

I've found THAT to be an excellent tool for removing callouses from my hands & feet... :)

Also works fine for plantar warts.

-- Tim --


Why is
Basic normal psychology
NOT a mandatory
Grade-school class,
Like reading
And writing?

[cabinetman]

Tim

This thread prompted a confession. Thought I would clarify my other reply. I've got to preface this with saying that I'm a gambler and take chances that ordinary people don't or shouldn't. These ideas may seem a little weird and therefore shouldn't be tried at home.

I was handplaning an edge with my Stanley #5 and accidentally nicked my fingernail. Well, it just took the smoothest little sliver off that I have ever seen. So, I tried another part of my nail and WOW, trimmed it faster than any nail clipper I have ever used. It was a bit bulky, so I switched to my low angle block plane, and man what a difference.

When I got done, there were a bunch of tiny straight edges and some frays, so I went over to my stand up 6"x48" belt sander and smoothed out all the edges. I had on a 80x belt, which left some sanding marks even though I sanded with the grain. I finished up with a touch up with my oscillating spindle sander. Came out nice. I might give 'em a coat of water white clear lacquer, in case LOML wants to go to the Bistro De La Gastro Elegance, for dinner, a very exclusive dining experience, where your nails are checked at the door.

Then I thought, clear oil base polyurethane might be a better choice because it may take more abuse. If I did use that maybe a satin would look better than a gloss. It might be interesting to put that one to a poll.

My next revelation was one day while using the air hose to blow sawdust and chips off, I had this brainstorm to use the dust collector instead. Made sense to me. Why blow that stuff all over the shop. So I unhooked my pickup hose at the RAS and turned on my 7 HP cyclone. Immediately it tried to suck the shirt right off my back. So I took off my shirt. It did a fantastic job, but I gotta tell ya-all that stickin' the hose in my armpits made me laugh. I'm very ticklish. If a shirt was hanging on a hanger and someone walked over to it and lifted the sleeve and tickled it there, I would break out in laughter from the other side of the room.

Anyway, as effective as this was, I decided not to remove my pants because you never know what could happen. It did get all the sawdust off of my face, and I don't have to blow my nose for at least a week.

Not many people know this, but a 4"x24" belt sander with a 50x silicon carbide belt would be perfect for tattoo removal. DAMHIKT.

I bet there are many shop secrets out there.
.

[TDHofstetter]

:7
:7
:7

-- Tim --


Why is
Basic normal psychology
NOT a mandatory
Grade-school class,
Like reading
And writing?

[Bada Bing]

All the stories are hilarious.

I really thought there'd be some more down-to-earth tales. Another one from my genuine experience: I *have* hooked a cordless drill to the end of a pepper mill in order to grind tons of pepper for grilled steaks.

All your tales are great to hear.

David

[TDHofstetter]

I've used a half-inch corded drill to make up twisted-pair cable from 20-guage stranded wire...

Werx the NUTS, though. :)

-- Tim --


Why is
Basic normal psychology
NOT a mandatory
Grade-school class,
Like reading
And writing?

[CajunRider]

I don't know if you would call this an over kill or not but I once built a set it and forget it fishing rod for catching red snappers. I took a used huge starter for a Catterpillar diesel engine, connect that to a large reel with a hefty drag set, use a small leaf spring for a rod with a stainless pulley at the end. The pulley is rigged with a kill switch so when the line reached the end where I put a pingpong size brass ball the whole thing stopped. At the other end of the brass ball is the steel leader and a strong circle hook. All I had to do was to go to the fishing reef, bait the hook, lower the line, when I see a strike, I flipped the on switch, fish would be reeled in. When the line stopped automatically, I just gaffed the fish and brought it in.

In another case more woodworking related, I used the table saw to cut styrofoam sheets - Faster than hot knife going through butter.

[rrich]

>I've used a half-inch corded drill to make up twisted-pair
>cable from 20-guage stranded wire...
>

B T D T

[rrich]

Really...

I will use the main blade of a SAK to trim my finger nails when clippers aren't handy.

My BIL and I have used duct work for fishing. Ya see, he has this secret place that we go to. What we usually do is use worms to catch bait. Usually all we do is do is throw the hook and line out onto the water. The fish will fight over the worm and in a minute or two we have half a dozen each 12" to 16" bait fish.

Now if all we want are 24" top 36" fish we'll use a 12" in diameter duct pipe about 20 feet long. We'll slide the 12" duct pipe into the water and straight down. We'll then lower our lines with larger hooks and the previously caught bait fish through the duct pipe. Within seconds we'll hook a real 24-36" beauty and haul them up through the duct pipe. The duct pipe prevents the smaller fish from hooking themselves and allows our baited hooks to get down to where the big'uns are. There are some 60" to 84" fish down deeper but we don't have big enough or long enough duct pipe to reach them. Besides they don't have that much flavor.

My BIL says that the size of the fish is related to the cooling water from the nuclear power plant.

[TDHofstetter]

Still got the shirt? :)

-- Tim --


Why is
Basic normal psychology
NOT a mandatory
Grade-school class,
Like reading
And writing?

[rrich]

Tim,
Yeah. It was no big deal. I put one end of the wires in the bench vise, stretched the wires out over the driveway and then into the drill chuck. With a bit of tension and a very slow twisting speed it was done in a minute or two.

[TDHofstetter]

Yep. I made up a bunch of them for power leads for muffin fans to cool laser devices. Gotta' watch 'em a bit so they don't do all the twisting in one spot sometimes... :)

-- Tim --


How very ODD.
Why would a t-shirt manufacturer
Put the pocket
on the BACK???
:)

[TDHofstetter]

http://www.woodworking.com/dcforum/user_files/472bfbfd1fb0a5e1.jpg

:D

-- Tim --


How very ODD.
Why would a t-shirt manufacturer
Put the pocket
on the BACK???
:)

[cabinetman]

http://xs221.xs.to/xs221/07446/zzzdogowners.jpg

[TDHofstetter]

HA!

It's gonna' be THAT way, is it? :7

http://www.woodworking.com/dcforum/user_files/472c6ac61b28cbdc.jpg

-- Tim --


How very ODD.
Why would a t-shirt manufacturer
Put the pocket
on the BACK???
:)

[TDHofstetter]

http://www.woodworking.com/dcforum/user_files/472c6bd40c38846f.jpg

-- Tim --


How very ODD.
Why would a t-shirt manufacturer
Put the pocket
on the BACK???
:)

[cabinetman]

http://xs221.xs.to/xs221/07446/attack.jpg

[NathanH]

Proof positive that all things on the internet eventually spiral down to lolcats.