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Paint thinner is great for thinning liquid alkyd paint (most times, not always, read the label to be sure), before you apply it. It doesn't do **** for dried alkyd paint, or latex paint, or epoxy paint, or much of anything else... sorry, this hits a nerve. Paint thinner is a mild nonionic...

When I can't or won't open up a ratchet head I soak it in ATF for several days and let it drain for a few more (spin the drive every once in a while)- it helps.

Yep, that. Slotted heads are easiest, just two dragging swipes with the corners of the screwdriver and you're good to go.... but they're worse for every other possible use of a screw (except historical accuracy, I guess... progress comes slowly!).

I'll take American chauvinism and industrial inertia for $400, Alex. It's much better than Phillips for wood screws IMO, as long as nobody's painted over the hardware. For camming out of primitive power drivers on an ancient Ford assembly line, I'm less certain.

I don't think most common solvents will damage existing plating (unlike acids or bases), so yeah, acetone or MEK or xylene for starters. Acetone (in carb cleaner, I think) took aluminum high- temp exhaust paint off a drop tube in a heartbeat when I had a brain fart and sprayed it to clean off...

Uh, holy ****. Canadians love square drive Robertson stuff (it was invented there), and Americans love Phillips stuff (it was invented here). Square drive is more and more common in the US- I've run across 1, 2, 3 square regularly in the last 15 years in all sorts of applications, mostly wood...

Yep. My first ratchet was a Cman triwing (terrible balance, but worked when I needed it, which was rarely). I like using the Wright, Proto (Facom), and Cman RHFT I've since stumbled across, and hope to snag an old Williams and S-K or five eventually.

Looks vaguely familiar, but I can't place it... the handle looks like cast aluminum.

It's almost certainly threaded into the base of the knob itself and looks like a set screw, not an oval headed screw. I have no idea what the diameter or thread count is... any places nearby that sell salvaged building materials? The knobs themselves are valuable if they're in good shape...

Agreed, it's the name of the guy that invented the framing hammer, fer chrissakes. Did Home Depot drop their line of crappy Hart hammers? I haven't looked in ages, and don't see them on the website.

Wow, a red Tootsie roll! Anyone have any guesses on the age of that one?

If you can, and it looks like you mostly can (looks like 4 matched pairs in your pic, which will cover the long leg of the L), I think it would look good. Hopefully someone with more tile installation experience will come along and offer some guidance.

If you can, sure, but it might not be possible. What color grout are you going to use? If it's contrasting (gray instead of white, say, seems to be a lot of that these days) connecting the veins will be much less important because each tile will be "framed" by very visible grout. In your...

I have no idea at all... some kind of mystery woodworking jig would be my guess. :dunno:

No worries, seems like a lot of confusion was going around, glad it helped.

He's clearly asking if anyone has purchased motor oil packaged like box wine (liquid in a thin plastic bag, inside a cardboard box). This type of packaging has been around for years. If you search for a specific and common grade of motor oil at NAPA online, you get result for everything from a...

I'm impressed, that's not been my experience at all. I can't say for certain that the clearcoat scratches on my wife's car are all from the carwashes here, but I've had to pull chunks of microfiber out of the hood and headlight seams more than once, and plastic bristles (? maybe more...

Cool! The round shank versions are everywhere, and seem like they were made everywhere... here's one from the USSR. https://www.ebay.com/itm/NOS-Vintage-Flat-head-Steel-Screwdriver-with-Wooden-Handle-Russian-Soviet-USSR/274422052039?hash=item3fe4d434c7:g:hpkAAOSw0YlfBgH~ I've got a rusty old...

Yeah, I remember regretting not buying one of the Toptul versions back when Denny had them. The Craftsman closeout at HJE is sorta similar, but there's no handle lock, it doesn't pivot as far off axis, and the ratcheting mechanism is a little coarse and sloppy. On the plus side, it's cheap...

Well, to be fair, most hand drivers (including basic screwdrivers) are at their best with smaller screws- it's a wrist- killing pain in the *** to try to pull a 3"+ #10 wood screw out of hardwood with any kind of hand screwdriver. Ratcheting screwdrivers are great for repetetive work, easy...