If you’re looking to decorate the garage or man cave and have some old car parts lying around, here’s some inspiration… Reclaimed Car Seat Chair This drool-worthy reclaimed Jaguar XJ40 Sport seat in Doe skin with solid black walnut poles was created by Dave Clark Designs. Called the Morsetto, this chair sells for around $600, but can … Read more
When I was 17, my pride-n-joy was a ’72 Olds. My dad bought it for me as a project car—and man, was it a mess. I worked on that thing day and night. When it came time to laying down paint, however, I just didn’t trust myself. Today, I’m a bit more confident, but still haven’t properly … Read more
We all have our favorite tools, but us old guys sometimes have a hard time reading their labels. You can buy etched sockets and other tools already, but that’s expensive. And permanent markers or stickers just won’t last. One of our favorite YouTubers, Chris Fix, shows us how to etch and personalize our tools DiY … Read more
Garage geeks love their Shop-Vacs (we’ll call them wet/dry vacs, since Shop-Vac is a specific brand), but boy are they noisy! Depending on many variables—room dynamics, how close you are to the unit, etc.—the typical decibel reading for a running wet/dry vacuum is anywhere between 85-95db. That’s pretty loud. For comparison, the average conversation is around 60-65db. There are … Read more
As a teenie-bopper back in 1987, I bought a brand-spankin’ new red GMC S-15 pickup truck. It was the first vehicle I bought with my own money, so I was super-proud. I didn’t get a bed liner because I didn’t want to cover the painted truck bed. Lo and behold, two weeks later a buddy of … Read more
Ever been assembling a project and really, really wished you had an extra pair of hands? Most of us improvise using whatever clamps, vices or props we have laying around to hold everything in place. I once drilled through a piece of wood right into the plastic housing of a portable radio I was using … Read more
Pallets have a long history of helping man to move stuff from ship to shore and warehouse to door. Pallets go back as far as the ancient Egyptian times to the more common World War II wooden pallets we know today, which are still lifted via forklifts and similar machines. Pallets are a critical cog in … Read more
SketchUp is a 3-D modeling software application from Trimble, which acquired the software from Google in 2012. Used by many in the engineering, construction and product design industries, to name a few, SketchUp is free for non-commercial use (a pro version is available for about $500). And as Popular Woodworking Magazine puts it: The original developers … Read more
If you’ve ever read my bio on these posts (down below), you know that I’ve got a lot of interests. And while I never considered clock making all that interesting—only because I never put much thought into the subject—an Aussie named Chris has completely transformed me. Chris, who says he’s an amateur clockmaker and machinist, proves to be anything … Read more