Missing tool...hope I'm not alone!

[Sevenhills1952]

Re: Missing tool...hope I'm not alone![emoji38]

[emoji3]

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[CHRIII]

Re: Missing tool...hope I'm not alone![emoji38]

This spring I replaced a couple of brake lines on my '93 f150 and could not find my 3/8 combo wrench that I was using on the bleeders. Looked all over the driveway and couldn't find them. Ordered a replacement from ebay. The day after the replacement was delivered I was backing out of the drive to leave for work and see something shiny in the gravel in my mirror. I swear I walked past it everyday for about a week. Pretty sure I didn't see it because I was looking for it.

I do the same. I call it "Male Pattern Blindness".

 

[bobcatdan]

It happens to me sometimes. I left auto to go into equipment over 15 years ago. There are speciality auto tools I haven't used in years. The stuff gets moved 3 or 4 time to make room for stuff I use now. Then one day I need my fuel line disconnect kit to change a fuel filter on a car and I'll look for 20 minutes because I can remember every spot it was except where I moved it last.

 

[Downwindtracker 2]

Moving stuff from where it had been for 20 years to a more logical place is not good.

 

[humber2]

After spending too much time locating sought after items I know I'll find them in the last place I look.

 

[laser3kw]

OP - Yes!
hunt high and low, can't find - buy replacement.
now I have 4 caulk guns! All stored on the same shelf where the first one was / is.

 

[joel63]

Curious how often this happens. Either out of the blue or because you need something and you know you had one but can't find it?
Last year I completely organized all my tools, put labels on tool cabinet drawers, everything clean and organized. Anything missing I ordered and replaced. Then I'll think of something I need, I'm 100% sure I had one and it's missing.
Curious how often that happens, you spend hours looking and it drives you crazy! Lots of times it will be something sentimental or odd, something you can't replace.[emoji848]

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Oh, you are not alone!
Missing Klein diagonals, 2 Snap on bit sets, 1 hacksaw.
Still looking.

 

[Downwindtracker 2]

There is the other side of this. On the search, I have come across tools that I bought and forgot I had. It was like Christmas as a kid.

When I retired, I brought home my work tool boxes. I haven't dared to do much reorganizing.

 

[Wrench97]

Oh, you are not alone!
Missing Klein diagonals, 2 Snap on bit sets, 1 hacksaw.
Still looking.

I got the hacksaw do happen to have the end that holds the blade in?
I about 3 of them....................................

 

[2oolhound]

I broke my snappy 3/8 drive 3/4" socket. Since I already have most the tools I'll ever need there is no driver that comes around so I just thought dam, I'll have to keep my eyes open amoungst my local resellers for another. I kept the broken one at the back of the bench where I see it often as a reminder. I knew I could grab my 19mm instead and did so for about 6 months but every time I looked at the broken one at the back of the bench I'd mentally beat myself up for not replacing it yet. Then one day I was sorting out my snappy spares drawer and what do you know, I already had a spare. Sheesh.

 

[PelicanPines]

I broke my snappy 3/8 drive 3/4" socket. Since I already have most the tools I'll ever need there in no driver that comes around so I just though dam, I'll have to keep my eyes open amoungst my local resellers for another. I kept the broken one at the back of the bench where I see it often as a reminder. I knew I could grab my 19mm instead and did so for about 6 months but every time I looked at the broken one at the back of the bench I'd mentally beat myself up for not replacing it yet. Then one day I was sorting out my snappy spares drawer and what do you know, I already had a spare. Sheesh.

so... you warrantied yourself... bet you, just like the drivers will have to eat the return.

 

[Jmellc]

Re: Missing tool...hope I'm not alone![emoji38]

I’m 66, been on the farm all my life. I can think of three tools I’ve lost. A sears hammer I’m sure my son left somewhere on a fence line. A sears pocket knife I know I left on a grain drill over 40 years ago. (I know the spot, I still look when there), a Craftsman 9/16 combo that when into a grain truck, but not before poking a hole in the auger tube and a sweet pair of Klein pliers.

Those pliers were old and I’ve never seen a pair like them, the one handle was bent the other way, made it very comfortable to use but they had to be used that one way.

Still miss those.

The Klein pliers sound like side cutters made for rod busters. They are still made. Check Klein’s website.

 

[Jmellc]

If I had a dollar for every tool I’ve lost, none of my descendants would ever have to work.

I tend to be a little scattered at best, a trait I am fighting hard to overcome. My years in electrical construction, I was always going site to site, working all over a building, etc. Some jobs had more borrowers than owners so my stuff would be all over the building in 10 different hands. I lost tools crawling under houses & in attics. A few things got dropped down walls or down into sump pits. A few more got stolen.

I have been working on cleaning out my 2 sheds. I want to get all my larger wrenches on the wall, easy to spot & return to. My smaller stuff is going to my Ridgid stack boxes.

I now work where tools are provided, 1st time ever. Not much choice in brands, etc but no cost either. I keep up with my tool bag fairly well. Shared tools are a huge challenge. A few of us are trying to reorganize stuff that’s been scattered for a long time. We have reassembled 3 huge socket sets nearly to full status, a few sets of combo wrenches & countless other stuff. Our space is limited & broken up into various areas too. Plus 9 of us covering 3 shifts in a large plant. A huge challenge.

 

[2oolhound]

so... you warrantied yourself... bet you, just like the drivers will have to eat the return.

Yes I had to eat the return but buying used I never pay more than $5 per socket anyway.

 

[Ton ton]

Re: Missing tool...hope I'm not alone![emoji38]

[emoji3]

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Nice t-shirt.

 

[pugsl]

Moving in to me a new house with a shop. Just setting up shop and I know I have that tool but which box??? Thought I had labeled everything but find out missed a lot. Spend more time looking than would going to HF and getting a new one.

 

[driftpin]

Re: Missing tool...hope I'm not alone![emoji38]

Don't feel too bad about that... When we were kids, my Dad couldn't find his binoculars and was asking us kids what we did with them. We had no idea because we didn't take them, but he suspected us anyway. Fast forward nearly a year, one day I notice the binoculars sitting on this big rock that was near one of our outbuildings. This rock was maybe 30' from the driveway, and fully visible from the garage, shop, house, etc. We'd all walked/driven by the binoculars probably hundreds of times - literally hiding in plain sight for nearly a year. When I told Dad where I found them, he then remembered that he was looking at some deer in our grove of trees and must have set them down. I'll give it to the 1970's era Bushnell binocular quality - even after sitting outside for a year, the glass was (still is) crystal clear.

Bushnell/Bausch & Lomb, I toured the factory when I was a schoolkid. The manufacturing of the glass was very-impressive, you could feel the heat of the molten glass as it went-by. Now-owned by VISTA Outdoor.
https://vistaoutdoor.com/brands/

Here is a thread I authored a couple years-ago, if you read the thread, it may give you a clue as-to why the company's products are so-robust. A true story of the power of the USA's proud history of precision industrialization.
https://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=393730&highlight=optics+obituary

 

[Sevenhills1952]

Yesterday was my birthday, Christmas eve.
On a whim I thought I'd check the glove box of one of my old cars, and there was the missing tool! I know it's not worth much, just sentimental and I knew I had one.
Today we took 94yo Mom Christmas dinner, and it the barn workshop I unbolted and brought home the workbench vice.
I can't wait to clean it up and weigh it...I bet it's over well 100#!

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[ovilla]

I’ve ordered the same 3/8 drive 10mm socket THREE times now from
Snap-on. Do you know how expensive this is? All three were lost in my garage.

 

[SuperCat]

I can remember only one tool that I have lost and never found: the infamous 3/8" drive 10mm socket. I bought another and the original still remains lost. It still irritates me to this day.

 

[icthruu74]

Yep, happens to me all the time. Spend hours searching for a tool that I know I have and can’t find. I lost a taping knife a couple years ago. Stupid old $5 tool, but I’d had it for years and knew I’d just used it a couple weeks ago while redoing the bathroom. I searched all over for it and finally decided I must have accidentally thrown it away when I was cleaning up (I’d loaded tools into an old box to carry back to the garage and then threw out all the boxes). Fast forward about 6 months and the wife buys a new mirror for the bathroom. When I pull the old one down, there’s the knife, along with a scraper and utility knife in the old pocket in the wall where an inset medicine cabinet used to be...

But mostly it’s tape measures for me. I must own a hundred of the things, but can never find one when I need it.

 

[metaldad]

i acquired lead ladles years ago.
moved from here, to there, and back again multiple times.
finally had a need for them. been looking unsuccessfully for a year.
and im NOT buying one

 

[ecotec]

i acquired lead ladles years ago.
moved from here, to there, and back again multiple times.
finally had a need for them. been looking unsuccessfully for a year.
and im NOT buying one

You have to...

It is the only way to find the missing ones.

 

[lardy1]

I'mpretty good now if others don't move my things or not put them away. When I was a carpenter it was caulk guns, flat pry bars and utility knives. Years later most of them magically reappeared.

 

[Junkman]

Lost the keys to my tool boxes, and yesterday while looking for something else, found the keys that have been missing for 20+ years. Problem is that some of the locks that they fit have been replace with new locks and keys, and those keys have gone missing. Time to change them all to one key number, or just forget about locking the boxes. After all, I am the only one that uses and looses the tools in the boxes. I need more storage space or to get rid of a lot of the tools. At this point in my life, I really need to start thinking about who deserves to have them next. Oh, the reason that I found the keys, is because I misplaced a 6MM Snap On allen wrench, and I know that I had used it a few days ago, found it and lost it twice.

 

[dffay]

So....I’ll be at an estate sale or flea market and spy something oddball and great shape and quality and buy it.
Get it home to the garage and.....gee, where should it go?
Ahh. In that drawer. Damn. Right next to the one I already had and forgot about.

 

[brianh]

I have always been bad at misplacing tools and just about any item. It gets worse if I have more than one.

 

[Sine Swept]

I think I've been losing tools and pocket knives for 35 years (I'm 41). I now have plenty of tool storage which goes a long way to tool retention. I am to the point where I need to use either a tool cart or at the very least a small bucket to retrieve tools or there will be hell to pay for my mind.

I learned years ago that it is cheaper to buy the tool than it is to obsess about it. I do eventually have some tools boomerang back after I have given up completely. Sometimes though, certain tools are unattainable. If you find rare ones you really like, buy them all!

 

[Rabid Badger]

Most recently I misplaced my Arduino board that I use for prototyping. Turned the house upside-down looking for it before ordering two more so I could have a spare on hand.

The original turned up the day after the new ones arrived.

 

[RWPBR]

If I cant find a tool its usually because my wife moved it.

 

[Zapp Branigan]

When something goes missing out in my shop, I start looking for the thief who stole whatever is was. It's usually some item that cost a dollar, and they walked right past all the expensive stuff in my shop to steal a chip brush or something. I always have the same reaction picturing some burglar in a black mask robbing me, and then I always remember placing it wherever I find it too, followed by feeling stupid thinking someone broke into my shop to steal one small thing, and leaving thousands of dollars worth of tools behind. It's worse at work. Right away I know for sure a co-worker pilfered my tape or something only to find it on my bench twenty minutes of complaining later.

 

[Sevenhills1952]

When something goes missing out in my shop, I start looking for the thief who stole whatever is was. It's usually some item that cost a dollar, and they walked right past all the expensive stuff in my shop to steal a chip brush or something. I always have the same reaction picturing some burglar in a black mask robbing me, and then I always remember placing it wherever I find it too, followed by feeling stupid thinking someone broke into my shop to steal one small thing, and leaving thousands of dollars worth of tools behind. It's worse at work. Right away I know for sure a co-worker pilfered my tape or something only to find it on my bench twenty minutes of complaining later.

That's me too. I always assume someone stole it, which has happened a few times. Sometimes it's just someone borrowed a tool, forgot to return it...not intentionally stealing it.

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[LeonardY]

I spent the day before Christmas looking for some drawer pulls I needed. I went to where I thought I put them. Nope. So I looked elsewhere. I ended up finding my Japanese woodworking planes, four wrenches, two screwdrivers and a missing package of shrink tubing. I also tossed 4 boxes of saved junk that had been sitting for years.
Nope, never found the drawer pulls.

 

[didit]

I am trying to break myself from the habit of keeping needed tools together with an uncompleted, ongoing project. Sometimes, it is months or even years before I get back to it and that's when I find some missing tools. Likewise, there are several pieces of equipment/machinery that I tend to leave tools with that will eventually be needed. This never was a problem in the past but at the same time, I have been trying to cut down on tool duplication in my limited garage space. Simple hand tools, I find I need at least 4 or 5 of everything simply because they are kept conveniently where they will be used...and sometimes forgotten. There is also the "can't see the forest for the trees" thing.

 

[Robinson1]

I'mpretty good now if others don't move my things or not put them away. When I was a carpenter it was caulk guns, flat pry bars and utility knives. Years later most of them magically reappeared.

YES!

At any given time I own somewhere between 0 and 9 flat bars!

 

[steel 35]

My 10mm socket now stays on a 3/8" ratchet, next to the 1/2" on a ratchet next to the 9/16" on ratchet, on my portable home made tool cart. This saves me a lot of frustration from my crippled up hands as well
I will look for days for certain thing's
Last one was my label printer that was and continues to be a night mare, but I found the label maker

 

[PelicanPines]

I am trying to break myself from the habit of keeping needed tools together with an uncompleted, ongoing project. Sometimes, it is months or even years before I get back to it and that's when I find some missing tools. Likewise, there are several pieces of equipment/machinery that I tend to leave tools with that will eventually be needed. This never was a problem in the past but at the same time, I have been trying to cut down on tool duplication in my limited garage space. Simple hand tools, I find I need at least 4 or 5 of everything simply because they are kept conveniently where they will be used...and sometimes forgotten. There is also the "can't see the forest for the trees" thing.

I get more exercise keeping all like tools together... Keeping them with the project till the project is complete (provided it will be completed within 3 days). Any longer and a complete PUT AWAY must occur. Or I will end up with MORE freaking tools I have no room for.

Some slight variances are allowed. I keep a special ceramic utility knife with my water softener to open the salt bags... instead of keeping it in the drawer full of 50 utility knives in my toolbox.

I also have a panel opening screwdriver on a lanyard with my generator... as it's a unique tool for that purpose.

Other than those situations... I have to go for a walk to the wall of drawers and pull out my tool... use it... then put it away and zip up... just like *************...

Decades of doing what you are doing has caused me to own far too many tools. Yes... there is such a thing. Why do I need 8 complete sets of 64ths drill bits... 50 utility knives... over 100 screwdrivers... over 120 pliers... 5 complete sets of the same wrenches... etc.

 

[driftpin]

Re: Missing tool...hope I'm not alone![emoji38]

The easiest, fastest way to find a lost tool is to buy a replacement. That guarantees that the original will immediately materialize at your feet. The most recent incident of this phenomena happened about a week ago. As I was putting away all my tools after completing a repair, one of my C-man combo wrenches was MIA. I looked everywhere for it. Finally gave up. That night, I searched ebay for a replacement and purchased one with Buy It Now. About half an hour after clicking "BUY", I found the original.

No credit for the story until you tell us where it was.

 

[Dutch01]

I never had problem finding tools in my disorganized garage - that is (1) before my mother and her lifelong partner came to stay with me and he decided to reorganize (without consulting me ) and (2) my grand-kids grew older

 

[BFBOB]

Re: Missing tool...hope I'm not alone![emoji38]

I even know where my 10mm socket is

Me too - because Secret Santa gave me four of them this year!!