Tools Made Or Modified For The Job

[Renegade1LI]

How many times do you find yourself needing a custom or modified tool? Most times we get by with what we have, but sometimes you just have to make what you need. We have been doing heating plant replacements for NYC SCA & it requires replacements of all steam traps & valves, hundreds of traps & valves. The biggest issue is opening the existing steam piping, you have to break a fitting, which are cast, but sometimes they're in hard to get to spots & you don't want to break anything not getting replaced. After searching online for a fitting breaker, no luck, a little trial & error I modified a OTC ball joint press to crack the fittings. Used a 1/2" impact extension, cut off the male anvil & replaced the center pin in the otc screw, added a bushing with gr 8 bolt ground a point on the female piece of ext placed over a cast fitting & with a quick shot of a cordless impact the fitting cracked. After about 50 fittings, no issues & it does no collateral damage to the rest of the piping, saves about 10 min per assembly. Hope to see & get some good ideas, I'm sure you guys have made plenty of innovative tools.

 

[NUTTSGT]

1 1/2" crowfoot. We bought new SCBA carbon fiber bottles when the old ones got past service life. To get the old valves out, in and properly torqued, we needed a crowfoot wrench. So I made this along with a bottle clamp. The bottle clamp is gone but I still have the 1/2" drive crowfoot.

 

[Don1357]

Nothing all that innovative here. I have bent plenty of wrenches so they reach somewhere, made them skinnier or narrower for the same purpose, bent or splice or cut pliers to grip something, modified plenty a screwdriver bit for a perfect fit, made scratch owls out of some, center punches it of spare hex bits, so on so forth.

If you are tinkering I think is second nature to pause and think "this would work better if only...".

 

[Fialaja]

Nothing all that innovative here. I have bent plenty of wrenches so they reach somewhere, made them skinnier or narrower for the same purpose, bent or splice or cut pliers to grip something, modified plenty a screwdriver bit for a perfect fit, made scratch owls out of some, center punches it of spare hex bits, so on so forth.

If you are tinkering I think is second nature to pause and think "this would work better if only...".

Same deal. Heated and bent wrenches, turned screwdriver handles into file handles, homemade awls/ punches, homemade adapters and such....

 

[Robinson1]

I once welded a 6 foot piece of rebar to a 1 inch ship auger bit to drill a hole down the wall of a log cabin. I got some looks for that one! It worked!

 

[joshmodelskidoo]

Made stuff from time to time. Most of my snowmobile clutch tools are home made. Made a disc sander and im sure a few othe tools through out the years

 

[Dumber than lumber]

Had a ***** of a time getting thermostat out of water heater. Finally took a piece of unistrut (or Angle iron?) and used the Dremel to cut a slot in the U/S so i could get more leverage. Worked great.
Also, i have used the unistrut plus a pipe wrench and a c-clamp to rig up a high leverage tool.
Similar thing done with old rail from a garage door opener. The rail is actually 3 pieces of t-bar. So i can trap a piece of wood or tool in there or use a c-clamp to secure same. I can do a variety of things with crowbar and or wrenches, etc. to get mechanical advantage.

 

[Fialaja]

My brother in law once drilled a hole in a 4x4 post and stuck a ratchet in it to make a redneck breaker bar...said it worked.

 

[macgee]

I recently acquired this cool little shop made tool from a very nice GJ member. I was trying to figure out what it was until I opened it. It's a pocket folding caliper for inside/outside and a divider. Great idea for quick checks in a machine shop.

Even the personal engraving is cool, bad pic with glare, looks much better in person.

 

[lolaetype]

I needed to replace the stub axles on the E-type, I made this tool out of a short piece of 2" schedule 40 pipe and some heavy washers that I welded to one end. Nasty looking welds but I was in a hurry. It fits over the stub axle and tightening the nut to around 125 ft/lb put enough tension on the axle that a few moderate taps with a 3 lb. sledge hammer on the exposed end on the other side of the stub axle carrier causes it to pop out Beats pulling the stub axle carriers and taking them to the hydraulic press.

 

[islandkent]

Welded two 5/8 sockets together to make a socket to adjust jake brakes on the old Cummins semi engines. Worked great.

 

[Mr.Smoke]

This thread would be a good spot for me to share a little project I did at work last month. It's not so much a "tool" per se, but more of a piece of equipment that I use at work. Will take some pictures tomorrow and post them.

So pretty neat creations in here so far.

 

[lisek248]

1 1/2" crowfoot. We bought new SCBA carbon fiber bottles when the old ones got past service life. To get the old valves out, in and properly torqued, we needed a crowfoot wrench. So I made this along with a bottle clamp. The bottle clamp is gone but I still have the 1/2" drive crowfoot.

good job

 

[tonyciambrone]

Spanner for installing 3" NPT to Raised Flange adapters.

Had no idea how I was going to install them without scratching the **** out of them. Two bolts, a piece of flat bar, and a nut. Ugly as sin but worked out very well with a breaker bar turning it.

 

[darkzero]

I suppose this sorta counts. When I did the timing belt on my truck none of my impacts would budge the crank bolt. Really didn't want to put the truck back together & order the $100 something tool especially since it won't get used much. So I just made my own harmonic balancer holding tool. Good thing I did cause I would've needed the tool to torque the crank bolt to spec anyway.

 

[Dumber than lumber]

Darkzero - kind of pretty compared to some other stuff.
How thick was that barstock?

 

[Blt2Lst]

I just made my own harmonic balancer holding tool.

Made a similar tool to hold the water pump pulley on a dodge dakota 4.7 so you could remove the fan.

 

[darkzero]

Darkzero - kind of pretty compared to some other stuff.
How thick was that barstock?

Thanks. I used 1/4" thick, 1" wide. I used all 3/8" bolts, for the holding pins the unthreaded part of the bolt just happened to fit the pulley holes perfect (Toyota 5vz-fe 3.4L v6) so all I had to do was cut off the bolt heads.

Someone pointed out that because I used a bolt as a pivot that the tool is adjustable & I could use it for other applications. Wasn't exactly my plan to make it for other uses, I just didn't have a welder, but for that reason I've kept it around.

 

[tonyciambrone]

Darkzero - kind of pretty compared to some other stuff.
How thick was that barstock?

Yep this one looks good Piss some paint onto it and sell on Ebay

 

[darkzero]

Yep this one looks good Piss some paint onto it and sell on Ebay

Haha, thanks!

 

[Mr.Smoke]

As I mentioned yesterday I figured I'd share a little project I tackled last month for using at work.

Here is my light & electrical accessory tester.







I work on trailers for class 8 trucks and our shop lacked enough of these testers for every bay. I got sick of always having to wait for an available cart so I built my own. Got a smokin' deal on the brand new BluePoint cart thankfully and paid less than half of retail!! All in all I spent roughly $800 CDN for everything.

 

[Renegade1LI]

Spanner for installing 3" NPT to Raised Flange adapters.

Had no idea how I was going to install them without scratching the **** out of them. Two bolts, a piece of flat bar, and a nut. Ugly as sin but worked out very well with a breaker bar turning it.

I like it always a pia with those.

 

[Renegade1LI]

Haha, thanks!

I bought a similar one when I had a few VW TDIs, looks almost as good, just add some paint plus free!

 

[Renegade1LI]

I needed to replace the stub axles on the E-type, I made this tool out of a short piece of 2" schedule 40 pipe and some heavy washers that I welded to one end. Nasty looking welds but I was in a hurry. It fits over the stub axle and tightening the nut to around 125 ft/lb put enough tension on the axle that a few moderate taps with a 3 lb. sledge hammer on the exposed end on the other side of the stub axle carrier causes it to pop out Beats pulling the stub axle carriers and taking them to the hydraulic press.

Very nice! anything that saves time is awesome.

 

[RandyRanderson]

Made a castle nut wrench from a saw blade. Otherwise, all I've got are bent or thinned wrenches.

 

[larry4406]

As part of my garden tractor repowering project, I had to reinstall the electric PTO clutch and torque the bolt to 55 ft-lbs.

There is a "D-spacer" with flats on it that one is supposed to be able to hold with a wrench while torquing the bolt. Problem is that no wrench (maybe a crows foot?) can be engaged with the flats as the hub of the pulley is raised preventing access. So I made a spanner out of some black pipe and steel plate.

Cut some small ears from steel plate and welded it to the pipe, cut and welded a handle. Handle proved too short and had to insert a piece of pipe in it. Worked great!

 

[Moldyjim]

I recently acquired this cool little shop made tool from a very nice GJ member. I was trying to figure out what it was until I opened it. It's a pocket folding caliper for inside/outside and a divider. Great idea for quick checks in a machine shop.

Even the personal engraving is cool, bad pic with glare, looks much better in person.

That is so cool! I'll have to file that one away for later. I need to make one of those.

 

[Ton ton]

Great thread,OP.

 

[Moldyjim]

Ex tool & diemaker here, I did a lot of "special" tools over the years. Most one shot tools for a specific job, a few were useful more than once.

One you might enjoy is I took a Craftsman 3/8" ratchet and welded the cutoff end of a breaker bar to it.
Ratchet on one end, breaker bar on the other.

With a deep well socket on the bar end at 90 degrees it becomes a speed wrench. With the socket straight it works as an extension for a little more leverage.

Its actually fairly useful. Thought about trying to patent it or at least have some made up for friends, but I never got around to it and I'm too lazy nowadays.

I don't have it at home and won't be in the shop for a couple of days, but I'll post some pictures later.

I probably have others I can dig up too.

 

[Bad Eye Bill]

I don't have a picture but the last tool I made was a carrier bearing adjusting tool for Mopar rear differentials. Simply a long piece of 1" square tubing with the appropriate size nut welded on the business end and a 1" nut on the driving end.

I expect this has been done many times.

 

[Renegade1LI]

I bet we all take for granted how many improvised tools we have made through the years. I'm sure we all have a half dozen modified wrenches, at least.

 

[paulsomlo]

I needed a long philips screwdriver, so I turned down the handle in the lathe:

 

[FMB4]

Was having a heck of time with the ABS wheel senor connectors on a Nissan Titan that I had some yrs ago. These connectors were a real pain due to the 'lock tab' design. Finally made up a simple but very effective lock tab 'release' tool from a 2" or so section of a steal insert from an old windshield wiper blade.

 

[humber2]

Even speciality tools are fair game, look at this one after its visit to the grinder....

 

[Renegade1LI]

I was happy to repurpose a VW timing belt tool to disassemble an arctic cat clutch spider assembly. Felt good to use tools that you no longer have the car for. The best part is the clutch works like it should have.

 

[BlakeTheCarGuy]

I’ve never modified a tool. My OCD would not allow that I’d have to throw it out afterwards as no improper tools can be in my box. LOL. We have one guy at my shop with a modified tool and it’s a bent screwdriver for pulling center caps on wheels. If there is a special tool I’ll buy it or borrow it but I’m not using a perfectly good tool and destroying it. Sorry not my thing. I did make a pick out of a paper clip before I had a pick set I still use that at home sometimes lol.

 

[Slednut]

Many years ago I was working on a bicycle and my adjustable wrench would not open enough to loosen a nut.

I added a grove to the jaw.

 

[bdbecker]

I suppose this sorta counts. When I did the timing belt on my truck none of my impacts would budge the crank bolt. Really didn't want to put the truck back together & order the $100 something tool especially since it won't get used much. So I just made my own harmonic balancer holding tool. Good thing I did cause I would've needed the tool to torque the crank bolt to spec anyway.

Made a similar tool to hold the water pump pulley on a dodge dakota 4.7 so you could remove the fan.

I did something similar when I was rebuilding the t-case on my Jeep. I used a garage door opener arm that had been sitting in the scrap bin for a few years. Ended up being pretty handy that day so it now lives in the 'misc tools' drawer of my toolbox.

Here's one my Dad made many years ago for accessing the nut on the fog lights on a 1992 Nissan Maxima. It also came in handy when I needed to access the top mounting bolt on the t-case. Dumb luck that it was the same size, but this little tool has now gotten me out of a pinch twice.

 

[Renegade1LI]

Kinda modified, i needed a 1/2” x 1 3/4” threaded brass ******, which isn’t made. I cut a 2 1/2” ****** to size and used a bolt extractor lightly pressed into the ****** to hold it for threading, finally got to use my new arbor press! Placed the assembly into the die and turned with adjustable wrench. Surprisingly it came out perfect and now i have a good set up for making ******* size *******.

 

[Renegade1LI]

Ok this is a cheap one but handy and I’m sure a lot of you guys already have one. I already have a dewalt cordless track saw which works great but it’s nice to have a guide for a regular cordless saw. I had to buy a sheet of Masonite and had some left over so I made a few saw guides, one 8’ and two 4’. Real simple ripped the guide on the ts and glued it to the base, than just ripped with saw it works just as good as a track saw, almost. Handy for remodel work and cheap enough to make a few and have them handy.