I had a pretty wild weekend, at least in terms of buying cool junk I didn't really need.
I took the day off on Friday to take care of some personal business but before I left the house I noticed an estate sale listed on CL. The sale was badly advertised and didn't include any pictures however buried in the description was the phrase "tools tools tools". I figured it was a trick to lure people to the sale but before I closed the ad I heard a little voice whisper "Wiillltonnn". I was in.
The house was on the bad side of a depressed little town. I got to the sale just as it opened and expected to see a big crowd of people but there was hardly anybody there. The house was a dump but there were two detached two-car garages on the property. One of the garages was pretty old and had apparently housed a business years ago, it was falling apart but included a bunch of strange alcoves and rooms and every square inch of both buildings was packed with stuff. Good stuff. Apparently the deceased was into tools, camping gear, mountain bikes, and kayaks. It seemed like he had about 5 of everything and most of it was top quality so for his sake I hope it's true that he who dies with the most toys wins.
I chose the old garage first because it looked the most interesting. My instincts were good because as I walked in the door my eyes lit on (cue the spooky music)... a beautiful Wilton Bullet bolted to a bench across the room. I nearly peed myself when I saw the price tag- $50. The rest of the morning is pretty much a blur, the sheer quantity of stuff was amazing but so were the prices. Evidently the guy was a widower, he died unexpectedly, and his kids lived on the other side of the country and told the estate sale company to clear the place out to the walls by 4:00 Saturday. Most of the smaller items weren't priced and more than once I approached an employee to ask for a price on something and they told me "you've already spent a bunch with us today, you can have that for free". I blew all the cash I had with me and didn't have time to go get more so I headed off to take care of business with a sick feeling that I was missing out on a ton of good stuff. But the next day was Saturday and everything was 50% off, and there was just so much stuff that there was bound to be something left.
Like a junkie I was back first thing Saturday morning with my dad for assistance. I didn't get pics of everything I bought but here are some of the highlights:
Acetylene B tank with plumber's torch and about 6 valve wrenches- $10 (bought it because my torch setup needs a new gauge and I lost my valve wrench)
Coleman Dual Fuel Lantern with case, like new- $10
Coleman single-burner white gas stove- $5
Coleman Dual Fuel 414 stove, the tape on the box had never even been cut- $10
Military surplus water can- $1
Porter Cable dual action sander- $5 (in the melee I actually thought this was a 4.5 inch grinder because it looks like one and came in a bucket full of grinding wheels, cutoff discs, and flap wheels)
Skil 77 worm drive saw- $20 (been looking for one of these for a while)
Hitachi 4.5 inch grinder with accessories- $10 (new in box)
And the aforementioned Chicago Wilton 5 inch Vise- $50. This thing is gorgeous, I believe it still wears most of its original paint and it's unscathed with the exception of one saw cut in the pad on the dynamic jaw. I think this damage is recent since the cut is still shiny. If I ever find the knucklehead who messed up my vise i'll
.
I found some other stuff that didn't make my staged pic here, including a bunch of hardware, an electric capstan winch that I think came off a sailboat (what can I say, it was $5), an unopened quart of Rustoleum, some 3/8 chain (can't have too many) and an MSR Sweetwater water filter (the sale staff threw it in for free because they weren't sure what it was). All told I think I spent about $130 but who's counting...
I actually saw that before I bought it but my old Dewalt had just croaked and I needed a grinder to finish up a welding project. It's definitely not a top of the line tool but it's worlds better than the HF I used to have. Looks like you can get the same one from CPO for $39.
