Toolsets for those tiny screws

[Drew Wiley]

Well, frankly I'm sick of good tools. Got enough of my own to last the duration of personal projects, including darkroom and remodeling, and am now trying to transition some of my knowledge to the my younger day job replacements. But they're enthusiastic to keep the tradition going and keep us as the West Coast
epicenter of the good gear, at least as far as residential construction, cabinetmakers, art furniture, and marine use goes. No Trump Towers types - can't trust em
to pay. In other words, we don't even want any big developers shopping here; but it doesn't really matter much, since they don't want good tools either! Need to save their overhead money for bribing building inspectors and zoning officials. I do sell some Starrett here, along with a limited amount of German hand tools, plus all the usual disposable, theftable jobsite junk, but not enough to attract pesky ole woodshop tire-kickers, like I'm starting to resemble! Saving my own money for a Speedmat mat cutter. Those are a lot easier on the ole fingers than my ole linear Logan matcutter.

[Tin Can]

What's sick is how hand tools are worth nearly nothing in resale.

It's why I have all my tools, absolutely no point in selling them.

When I throw out crappy speciality iron, another resident grabs the shit I throw out, and brings it back in the packed workshop. I want the scrap collectors to take it. I put in the alley morning M-F and it's gone in 2 hours. The scrappers are honest workers, self employed and never steal. Sometimes I buy stuff off their trucks!

Power tools and shop tools are different. We once dug out 20 car lifts from a closed dealership, sold 16, kept 4 and installed them in our shop. We only trust lifts we inspect and install. One guy I knew killed his wife, by having her sit under the lift to stay out of the way. He tampered, she died, he was never charged.

[Drew Wiley]

Prior to this gig (which has itself lasted over 40 years), I was selling lots of tools and misc to car dealers and machinists. That whole auto business was rotten to
the core, just like it still is. Out of over fifty local dealerships, there was only one that had an honest service dept. Doubt there is even one now. Yeah, you can get routine warranty service, but that's all those alleged mechanics know how to do, limited specific tasks, and cars still have all kind of engineered flaws in them to keep the service depts fat. We have our cars done by a friend who quit his engineering job at Bayer because he was so frustrated finding a competent honest mechanic himself, so went to the trouble of designing his own diagnostic equipment. Since I sell piles of German power tools, and even German hand tools, I can vouch that they know how to precisely do things. In other words, they can routinely produce auto components designed to fail exactly fifteen miles or fifteen minutes after you warranty expires! And somehow this fellow has gotten those codes for Benz and Beamer, so can preemptively replace those parts at
a fraction of the cost of dealers doing it, as part of routine maintenance. I kept all my own hand tools from that era, along with inheriting quite a few, and these
have come in extremely handy in terms of my personal darkroom inventions over the years.

[Jmarmck]

Put a thick cloth like a towel on your work bench. That way the screws and parts will not bounce around on a hard surface.