I think you can tell quite a bit about someone from their tools and how they keep them. I tend to be a kinda messy guy. I let things go and then have to do even more work to maintain my machines – except for my tools. It must be because I know that I will never accomplish much on working on my cars without my tools. I was lucky when I first started doing mechanical repairs on cars at a gas station in Boone, Iowa. My boss had a fairly decent tool selection so when I needed to pull the trans in my big-bock Chevelle, the hoist and the tools were there. I could work on my car anytime a hoist was empty as long as I wasn’t on the clock.

The big lesson on trying to accomplish a task without the right tools was a night when we had to change the rear end housing in my buddy Jerry’s ’67 Chevelle. We were 16 years old and working on his car in the garage at his parents’ house. This was in the wintertime and we had some hand tools but no floor jack. We wrestled the old one out but then had no way to jack the new housing up into place. We resorted to blocks of wood and a long pry bar. It took hours. The real hassle was lining up the upper control arms – ugh. Decades later, while working in my own shop, I swapped a rearend in my ’65 Chevelle laying on my back with the right tools in less than 45 minutes. Having all the right tools made the job relatively easy.

When I was 15 years old I told my mom I wanted a clicker torque wrench for Christmas.  I even gave her the part number. I still have that Craftsman torque wrench to this day. It’s in the drawer with about five other torque wrenches that I’ve accumulated over the years. The only reason I don’t still use that original Craftsman is the teeth in the ratchet assembly have failed and they can’t rebuild the head. I’m half tempted to find someone who could recreate the ratchet parts. It would cool to have my old torque wrench back working again. It’s like an old friend.

Speaking of torque wrenches, I did a test a long time ago with a friend I met at a local shop that does calibration work for precision tools for aviation mechanics. Keith Chauvie at Cornerstone Metrology in Van Nuys, California did the testing. He suggested we take a torque wrench and preset it at 70 ft-lbs and leave it at that setting and see if the accuracy of the wrench would decline. The reason for this test is that Keith says that his experience has shown that mechanics often leave their clicker torque wrenches at a setting they use most often. The problem is that over time this reduces the tool’s accuracy.

So Keith did the test and saw that after three months the torque setting that averaged reasonably close to 70 ft-lbs when new was closer to 65 ft-lbs after sitting in the tool box for only 90 days at that preset value. Now the other side of this is that if you were to preset the wrench and then have it subsequently calibrated after three or four months, it’s possible that the wrench would stabilize – perhaps we should do that test and see what happens. That might be worth looking into since the spring inside the tool might just normalize at that setting. Instead, I just always return the torque wrench to a minimum setting like 20 ft-lbs. This maintains its accuracy.

About 15 years ago I realized I had finally outgrown my small upright tool box and needed a larger one. I bought a big, twin-row Craftsman box that now probably weighs over 1,000 pounds full of tools. I can remember when I bought my first big tool set when I attended vocational auto mechanics classes in Ankeny, Iowa. That was a big day. I later worked with a mechanic at dealership in my hometown. His name was Paul Pimm and I he had the biggest tool collection I’d ever seen. He had two, 6-foot tall upright Snap-On tool boxes stuffed with tools and in comparison I had this dinky little four-drawer box. I wondered if I would ever get to his level.

Now, some 40 years later the big, twin-row box is getting crowded and I’m starting to reorganize so I can stuff in my tools. There’s a whole drawer of pop-rivet tools and rivets that will have to find a new home because I need that drawer for more specialty engine-building tools. I have a whole cabinet on the wall for tapered ring compressors and yet it seems that every time I start to build an engine, about half the time I don’t have the right bore size ring compressor. And now I’m discovering that that taper angle on my compressors doesn’t work very well with the new line of ultra-thin rings. Ugh…

So just this week I was looking at my tool box and re-evaluating ways to organize it better and I realized I’d finally achieved a collection of tools that is probably pretty close to what Paul Pimm had. Plus, I realized too that I’m about the age he was when I came on board that dealership for a short time. Whenever I would get stuck, I knew I could ask him what to do. He always had time for me, even when I think I was probably annoying. He told me once that when he retired, he was going to drive out into the country somewhere and dig a big hole and bury those tools. I told him that I’d dig the hole for him and he laughed. I wonder what happened to all those tools.

It’s always seemed to be a little sad when I see a big tool collection up for sale. There was a time when I was going through my divorce that it looked like I was going to lose almost everything I had worked so hard to gain. Luckily, it never got this bad, but I was prepared to start over as long as I could come out of it with my ’66 Chevelle, my stereo, some clothes, and most importantly my tools. It never got close to that bad so I guess I’ve been blessed.

I’m not sure I’m going to bury this giant box in a big hole in the back yard though. It might take a back hoe just to dig the hole. I’m sure there are friends who will give them a good home. If I’m lucky, I won’t have to worry about that for a couple more decades.