Special Tools -v- Resourcefulness

[Jod Clark]

Having just re-valved an Ecotec head using plumbing tools I was just wondering if any of you good folk on here have stories to tell about how you got a job done without the right tools...?

[Nick C]

Are we counting general tool misuse (e.g. using breaker bars & spanners as hammers/pry bars, using screwdrivers as chisels, etc) and get-you-home bodges (once fixed a carb with gaffer tape, always a temporary bodge as the glue is soluble in petrol...)?

I've seen a lot of the latter in rallying circles, including several examples of people fixing bent suspension with the aid of rope/chain, a 4x4 and a large, solid object...

I've made special tools before too, particularly the 'strip of metal with holes in certain places to hold things together' type

[DavePoth]

Are we counting general tool misuse (e.g. using breaker bars & spanners as hammers/pry bars, using screwdrivers as chisels, etc)

I thought that was what they were for?

[straylight]

tech screws can be used to seal holes in blown welsh plugs

well, they can on clapped out subarus at least.

stu

[ddu]

In my youth, I didn't have a vast array of general hand tools, let alone jacks/axle stands etc,
Spent many an evening with my Mini, one side parked on a length of 2x2, half on half off the kerb
Not clever I know, but it gave me access underneath
and it was a quiet street

[Spunkymonkey]

Rebuilt a BMW cam using hardfacing arc rods and reprofiled it using a cardboard template and angle grinder back in my yoof. Lasted at least till I scrapped the car for rot (about a year later) - could well have ended up in someone elses from the yard

[george]

repaired a broken tooth on a diff (rover) ground it refitted it to the box and p/ex'd the car the following week ......somebody ended up with it no doubt ,not quite the thing to do but needs must

you really don't know what your buying second hand do you

[triple tango]

I feel another thread coming on........viewtopic.php?f=5&t=10743

[2F45T4U]

I've got a butter knife in my tool box in work for VW timing belt tensioners

[xvivalve]

I have a G clamp that used to hold an angle poise lamp onto my drawing board at work when I lived in Surrey; borrowed it one evening to pull my brake pistons back into the calipers. Took it back the following day to find the maintenance man had replaced the whole lamp, so in my tool box it stayed!

[DoloWIGHTY]

When I first got my Dolomite I found I couldn't shift the sump plug as it had been totally rounded off. As you know it's one of those square ended jobbies. No spanners, could touch it, it was too far in to get mole grips on.

I found the drive end of a plug spanner fitted perfect, so I hammered it on, put a spark plug in the end (half sticking out), another spark plug socket of the protruding hexagon bit f the spark plug and then the ratchet drive over that, turned and out came the sump plug!!

[RON13R]

I carefully used a crow bar and a big washer to remove my waterpump

[MarkVeryard]

An XR3i totalled my Talbot Horizon years ago by crashing into the back of it. I pulled the back into shape by attaching the car to a big oak tree with a metal chain - and then driving off sharply!

(then cut a replacement panel off a car in a scrap yard, welded it on, and sprayed with some spare paint - total cost of repair £10 - not bad considering that the insurance gave me £500 and let me keep the car - nice )

[MalcGE]

Before I had a suitable valve spring compressor for the sprint, used a std one with a special adaptor on the end - piece of copper plumbing pipe with a section cut out of it and IIRC about 4 x 2 p pieces held together with masking tape.

Crank fornt pulley bolt, and old box spanner cut down with a bar form a lawnmower welded on to it, made by a friend of my fathers, he just muttered something about needed a tool to turn the engine and came back 10 mins later with said item

Waterpump puller, slide hammer adaptor, LH threaded bolt welded 'head to head' with a std bolt that connects to a cheap slide hammer with a nut. then a bolt through a piece of steel to do the cage if that stays behind.

Pushbike days, top of a shreader valve 'araladited' to the are end of a connector from a std bike pump, kept taped up under bike seat meant you could top up with a garage air line - and air was free in those days

Rover 200/ 400 rear bush tool, old bush case welded to a exhaust clamp ring to make a 'bush whacker' about to be given modifield status will a extra bit of sheet steel and a ling iron chisel to be able to 'do on car'

Sprocket alignment tool for my lads kart, piece of hacksaw blade 'just the right length' handed to me by a time served karter - most important tool in the box he said........

And a really special tool use with bottle jacks for compressing the machpearson stru on an X-Type jag in situ when replacing a broken coil spring, you'll need a piccy of this one, tis awesome

[Spunkymonkey]

Morrisons in Holyhead has a temporary wall across part of their carpark that has its batons at exactly the centre distance of Sheila's headlights. Just been down to check alignment before her MOT on Tuesday.

Then had n/s/f indicator and both front sidelights stop working on the way home. Bugger