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tools of the trade

To: morgans@autox.team.net
Subject: tools of the trade
From: "Steve Manwell" <Steve_Manwell@WE-KNOW-ENERGY.XENERGY.COM>
Date: Tue, 14 May 96 12:43:08 EST
     Saw this on a brief visit to the British Cars list ...  So far my 
     Morgan Experience (at least with my own Plus 4) has not involved any 
     driving, but has involved most of the tools in the attached post.
     
     --Steve


______________________________ Forward Header __________________________________
Subject: tools of the trade
Author:  A.Gale@nisms.tei.ericsson.se (Gale Andrew) at INTERNET
Date:    5/14/96 3:20 AM


I got this off the humo(u)r list <HUMOR@UGA.CC.UGA.EDU>, it made me 
smile ...
     
====================================================== 
HAMMER:  Originally employed as a weapon of war, the hammer nowadays is 
used as a kind of divining rod to locate expensive car parts not far 
from the object we are trying to hit.
     
MECHANIC'S KNIFE: Used to open and slice through the contents of 
cardboard cartons delivered to your front door; works particularly well 
on boxes containing convertible tops or tonneau covers.
     
ELECTRIC HAND DRILL: Normally used for spinning steel Pop rivets in 
their holes until you die of old age, but it also works great for 
drilling rollbar mounting holes in the floor of a sports car just above 
the brake line that goes to the rear axle.
     
PLIERS: Used to round off bolt heads.
     
HACKSAW: One of a family of cutting tools built on the Ouija board 
principle.  It transforms human energy into a crooked, unpredictable 
motion, and the more you attempt to influence its course, the more 
dismal your future becomes.
     
VISE-GRIPS: Used to round off bolt heads.  If nothing else is 
available, they can also be used to transfer intense welding heat to 
the palm of your hand.
     
OXYACETELENE TORCH: Used almost entirely for lighting those stale 
garage cigarettes you keep hidden in the back of the Whitworth socket 
drawer (What wife would think to look in _there_?) because you can 
never remember to buy lighter fluid for the Zippo lighter you got from 
the PX at Fort Campbell.
     
ZIPPO LIGHTER: See oxyacetelene torch.
     
WHITWORTH SOCKETS: Once used for working on older British cars and 
motorcycles, they are now used mainly for hiding six-month old Salems 
from the sort of person who would throw them away for no good reason.
     
DRILL PRESS: A tall upright machine useful for suddenly snatching flat 
metal bar stock out of your hands so that it smacks you in the chest 
and flings your beer across the room, splattering it against the 
Rolling Stones poster over the bench grinder.
     
WIRE WHEEL: Cleans rust off old bolts and then throws them somewhere 
under the workbench with the speed of light.  Also removes fingerprint 
whorls and hard-earned guitar callouses in about the time it takes you 
to say, "Django Reinhardt".
     
HYDRAULIC FLOOR JACK: Used for lowering a Mustang to the ground after 
you have installed a set of Ford Motorsports lowered road springs, 
trappng the jack handle firmly under the front air dam.
     
EIGHT-FOOT LONG DOUGLAS FIR 2X4: Used for levering a car upward off a 
hydraulic jack.
     
TWEEZERS: A tool for removing wood splinters.
     
PHONE: Tool for calling your neighbor Chris to see if he has another 
hydraulic floor jack.
     
SNAP-ON GASKET SCRAPER: Theoretically useful as a sandwich tool for 
spreading mayonnaise; used mainly for getting dog-doo off your boot.
     
E-Z OUT BOLT AND STUD EXTRACTOR: A tool that snaps off in bolt holes 
and is ten times harder than any known drill bit.
     
TIMING LIGHT: A stroboscopic instrument for illuminating grease buildup 
on crankshaft pulleys.
     
TWO-TON HYDRAULIC ENGINE HOIST: A handy tool for testing the tensile 
strength of ground straps and hydraulic clutch lines you may have 
forgotten to disconnect.
     
CRAFTSMAN 1/2 x 16-INCH SCREWDRIVER: A large motor mount prying tool 
that inexplicably has an accurately machined screwdriver tip on the end 
without the handle.
     
BATTERY ELECTROLYTE TESTER: A handy tool for transferring sulfuric acid 
from a car battery to the inside of your toolbox after determining that 
your battery is dead as a doornail, just as you thought.
     
AVIATION METAL SNIPS: See hacksaw.
     
TROUBLE LIGHT: The mechanic's own tanning booth.  Sometimes called a 
drop light, it is a good source of vitamin D, "the sunshine vitamin", 
which is not otherwise found under cars at night.  Health benefits 
aside, its main purpose is to consume 40-watt light bulbs at about the 
same rate that 105-mm howitzer shells might be used during, say, the 
first few hours of the Battle of the Bulge.  More often dark than 
light, its name is somewhat misleading.
     
PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER: Normally used to stab the lids of old-style 
paper-and-tin oil cans and splash oil on your shirt; can also be used, 
as the name implies, to round off Phillips screw heads.
     
AIR COMPRESSOR: A machine that takes energy produced in a coal-burning 
power plant 200 miles away and transforms it into compressed air that 
travels by hose to a Chicago Pneumatic impact wrench that grips rusty 
suspension bolts last tightened 40 years ago by someone in Abingdon, 
Oxfordshire, and rounds them off.
     
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- 
-=} Randall {=-   Rude, crude, and politically incorrect ... but Happy!

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From: A.Gale@nisms.tei.ericsson.se (Gale Andrew)
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 09:14:17 +0200
Message-Id: <199605140714.JAA05160@crow.tei.ericsson.se>
To: british-cars@autox.team.net
Subject: tools of the trade
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