Stupid Tool Tricks | SouthernPaddler.com

Stupid Tool Tricks

gbinga

Well-Known Member
Nov 7, 2008
736
2
Hoschton, GA
OK - here is mine. Share yours if you dare.

This is a few years ago. I'd been living in the Midwest for a while and just got transferred back to Georgia. Moved into an apartment for the short run so as to take a look around and see where I wanted to buy. It was a ground floor apartment, with a patio and storage closet facing the parking lot. Had all my tools in the storage closet.

Needed to solder something - - I can't remember what the heck it was; something to do with my boat. It wasn't electrical, it was some sort of boat part I was trying to repair. So I got out the propane torch - the kind you solder pipe with - and screwed it on to the propane can and lit it.

All of the sudden I had fire in places where I didn't want it. Long story made short, I didn't have the torch screwed on to the can tight enough, and propane was spewing out from around the neck of the can and making my hand really warm. Kinda past warm, actually. I found this not only startling, but unpleasant. The smell of hair burning affects me that way, particularly when it is hair that is attached to me. So I toss the torch over the deck railing... right into the shrubbery bed between the patio and the sidewalk.

So now I'm standing on my patio, going into cardiac arrest, looking at this lit propane torch laying in the shrubbery bed getting ready to set the whole damn complex on fire. I can see the news reports in my head. Ignorant hillbilly sets apartment complex on fire. Film at eleven. This ain't gonna do. No way, no how.

While I was vaulting the railing and grabbing for the torch (which was still happily burning just about all over itself), I'm wondering if the thing is going to explode, or what? And just how bad is it going to burn me when I pick it up?

Picked up the torch, spun around in a circle or two, trying to pick a good direction (a tough call when you are standing in the parking lot of the apartments where you live, getting ready to hurl a flaming can of propane), and threw that sucker just about as hard as I could toward a grassy area at the end of the street. Made a pretty good toss, too. Got it all the way past the pavement so it landed in dirt and grass instead of on asphalt. I didn't know what the #$%^ was about to happen, but I figured it was better for it to happen fifty feet away than right there in front of my patio.

The god who looks after damn fools was watching over me that night, in that 1-it was a ground floor apartment, 2-when I threw the torch, the wind snuffed the flame out, 3-apparently nobody saw any of this happen.

I haven't used that torch since. As a matter of fact, I believe I threw it away. It obviously had a curse on it.

OK. That's my confession of the dumbest thing I ever did with a tool. Share yours if you have one that is good for a laugh.

George
 

Kayak Jack

Well-Known Member
Aug 26, 2003
13,976
171
86
Okemos / East Lansing Michigan
Not counting jack knife blades closing on my fingers, I can't top that one.

My cordless saw has a wooden handle and a double edged blade - Japanese handsaw. My cordless drill has a crank handle on the side. I'm more of a mechanic than a wood butcher.
 

john the pom

Well-Known Member
Jul 30, 2007
345
1
Queensland
Ya know them big industrial drills that you have a big handle on the side. Its big 'cos this powerful a drill is gonna provoke a lot of torque, and really in order to control it you shoulda put a two foot length of pipe to extend that handle. Well it was one of them drills. I was fifteen so knew bugger all about such stuff. The boss said to drill a 2 1/2" hole with a holesaw in a sheet of copper, the bit was blunt so of course after a while my hand went numb and I pressed in the triggerhold button.
Now those of us that are left handed soon learn that those triggerhold buttons get squashed into your hand by the spinning drill when the drill grabs whatever you're drilling... This is when I learned about it.
It was a bitch of a cold workshop that day. I wore a sloppy old sweater over my overalls...
Well when it grabbed hold my arms got all twisted up, my hand completely covered the triggerhold button I thought it was about to rip my arms off.
LUCKILY :( It tipped forwards and away from me...the top that is. The other end, the one with the spinning holesaw was now at about navel height and naturally grabbed hold of my sweater... I honestly thought I was gonna die as this thing crawled up the front of my sweater. I was able to eventually able to release the triggerhold button with the holesaw about an inch from my throat. This was a true near death experience. I unplugged it and walked to the boss' office with this thing still tangled up close to my throat... To his credit the boss was concerned. He almost ran to make sure I hadn't scratched the copper sheet.
I changed jobs pretty soon after that and survived.
Regards John.
 

gbinga

Well-Known Member
Nov 7, 2008
736
2
Hoschton, GA
Good one!

We had one of those in a shop where I worked. An old Rockwell about the size of a starter moter off a truck. Ran 500 RPM, so the torque was probably enough to turn you inside out. Switch wore out, so someone patched in a toggle switch.

Fella was drilling overhead, standing on a ladder. The bit jammed, needless to say he came off the ladder, and the drill spun until it had reeled up the entire drop cord and yanked the plug out of the wall.

Absolutely amazing that nobody got hurt.

GBinGA
 

seedtick

Well-Known Member
Jul 22, 2006
1,161
7
Denham Springs, LA
it's de ja vu all over again

had one of those big drills, drilling a hole in a utility pole to mount a 12' gate

pa-in-law standing next to me sez hold on, sometimes it gets in a bind

i made one flip - fortunately the law of gravity kept me on the ground while the drill wrapped up the cord until it came unplugged
 

john the pom

Well-Known Member
Jul 30, 2007
345
1
Queensland
Probly should have added to the above post that I always make sure I can unplug from the socket or extension lead with my foot ie make a loop for one foot and have the other foot standing on it. LEFT HANDERS BEWARE!
 

gbinga

Well-Known Member
Nov 7, 2008
736
2
Hoschton, GA
Can't think of another really FUNNY story to tell on myself... Done all kinds of stupid things with tools, just not all that funny.

I did work with two different guys who hit themselves in the mouth with the aft end of a straight claw hammer while driving a nail. Installing prehung doors, driving 16 penny casing nails through the jambs, you end up with your back against one jamb while you are nailing the other. If you do a bunch of 3'0 doors, and then switch to a 2'8, and you lose your concentration... bang, bang, bang, SPLAT!

The one guy, Coggins, just got a fat lip. The other guy, Boudreaux (no, I ain't kidding, and he was indeed from Louisiana) ended up with a bridge.

GBinGA