In the spirit of the Christmas season I thought I would do a post showing some of my favorite "go to" tools. While all of these are useful in the model railroad hobby, most are also very useful for woodworking or general home handyman work.
If you see one or two that you like the look of, put them on your Christmas list or buy yourself a gift - you deserve it, I am sure!
This is a paint brush cleaner (Micro-Mark). It has a reservoir of clean water in an upside-down refillable bottle on top, a well where the clean water for cleaning brushes is contained and a tank in the base to hold the dirty water. When cleaning a hobby brush, the dirty water is drained into the base by pressing the blue button in the foreground - this drops the drain plug slightly so the dirty water can drain out. Very handy.
You can never have enough clamps. The top two need no explanation. The pliers on the right are not common as the jaws are smooth and keep perfectly parallel to one another when they close. I don't use these a lot but they sure come in handy when I need them (Micro-Mark).
The red clamps are made by Bachmann (Kalmbach publications on-line store; I have seen in some hobby shops). Each clamp consists of a top and a bottom piece which attract to each other with strong magnets. The angle can be adjusted to fit the shape of the item you want to hold (such as the roof of a model building which needs to be precisely positioned while the adhesive sets).
The small metal clamp at the bottom, middle is from a dollar store. It is very strong yet light and the jaws have a nice protective rubber coating.
The four clamps at the bottom-right are all versions of good old clothes pegs. The blue one to the right is a modern plastic take-off on the design of traditional wooden clothes pegs (the regular wooden one and the two miniature ones were all purchased at a dollar store).
These are some of my favorite measuring and marking devices. The two stainless steel rulers on the left are very useful because the edge remains very straight and the markings are clear (from a dollar store). The third ruler from the left shows various measurements in various model railroad scales, such as HO, N and O (Model Train Stuff; Micro-Mark).
The set square is small and accurate (Micro-Mark).
The tape measure device has a mechanical pencil on the smaller end. The larger end houses the metal tape measure, beneath which there a sharp metal point. This is very useful for drawing accurate arcs of up to several feet (Micro-Mark).
The angular stainless steel device on the right is for precisely drawing a line across the diameter of a round object, such as a wooden dowel. By making two such lines perpendicular to each other you can quickly find the precise centre of the object -- very handy if you want to drill a hole in the centre (Micro-Mark).
Another thing you can't have enough of is files. The file on the left is a rasp and is strictly for use with wood. It is course and is excellent for smoothing away jagged edges following a rough sawing job or simply to remove lots of wood.
The next four smaller files are all
include a flat file, a round file, a triangular file and a flexible flat file. These files are from various sources.
The pointy things in the yellow case are reamers. These are very hand for slightly enlarging a hole that you have drilled when the hole is not quite big enough for your needs but using a larger-diameter drill bit would make the hole too big (Micro-Mark).
The yellow-handled device at the top-right is a Stanley Surform file (hardware store). This is great for getting rid of imperfections in cork model railroad track bed or for filing extruded foam.
The small tray at the top left contains a very strong magnet underneath the metal tray. I have several of these in different sizes. This is great for holding small screws or other small ferrous metal objects because it reduces the chance of losing small parts. These can be purchased at many automotive supply stores.
The package at the top right contains micro brushes. Available from most hobby shops as well as on-line, these are great for very tiny painting jobs or applying lubricant or soldering flux in situations where precision is important.
The device at the left is a nibbler (Micro-Mark). Once a hole has been cut in sheet material large enough to accommodate the head of this device, it is used to "nibble" away at the material, bit by bit - it cuts the material out in little squares, making it easy to make square corners.
The red-handled device is an awl (many hardware stores). This sharp object is good for many things including rounding off small holes, making small holes or making pilot holes in wood prior to drilling to prevent the drill bit from wandering.
The wooden box at the right is a set of various X-acto knives (Micro-Mark, hobby shops and many other vendors).
Another tool you can't have enough of: tweezers. The five tools starting from the left are tweezers of various sizes and shapes. The second and fifth from the left are clamping tweezers which are closed all the time and only open when squeezed - great for holding things when, for example, soldering.
The two tools on the right are Kelly Clamps - medical devices, a non-medical version of which can be obtained from many auto supply, hardware and other retailers. The two tools at the top are dental tools, a non-dental version of which can be obtained from the same sources. These dental tools are great for marking, shaping, etc. of softer material as well as for retrieving things from small spaces.
A good selection of weights and other devices to hold things in place is very useful. I'll start with only item in the above picture which is not technically a weight, the wallpaper roller at the top right. This relies on the weight applied by you to the work being done. I find this roller indispensable when gluing cork roadbed to the sub-roadbed of a model railroad. By running the roller up and down on the top of the cork, the adhesive under the cork is spread and the final result is much more even than if it had not been rolled.
All other items in the picture are weights. To the left of the roller is BB shot, available from a hunting supply store as well as at many others, such as Walmart. This particular brand has the beads coated in copper. The plastic container itself is very heavy when full of BB shot and makes a good weight on its own. However, by loading some of the BB shot into a plastic or cloth bag this makes for an excellent weight if you want to hold down something that is uneven or even on an angle. For example, if you are gluing a completed peaked roof of a building to the building itself, placing the weighted bag over the peak of the roof to weigh it down.
The two small square rods to the left of the bag of BB shot are scraps from when I replaced the banisters of the main staircase in our previous house. They are made of heavy steel square tubing, painted with a baked powder-coated paint making the finish very durable and non-marking.
The weight with holes further to the left is a Micro-Mark product sold as a very precisely machined block for truing items that need to be exactly perpendicular to each other. The holes are all threaded so one block could be attached to another such block. These also make excellent weights.
The brass cube on the very left is a solid brass paperweight.
The miniature anvil (Micro-Mark) is a great anvil but it also serves as an excellent weight.
The cross section of rail is an actual slice of rail from Canadian Pacific - I wonder if CP has discovered the gap yet?!!!
Finally the tall cylinder with the loop at the top is from a 200-year old grandfather clock which I inherited from my late father who purchased it at an estate sale in the UK. The bell in this clock is more appropriate to the musty halls of the old English stately home than in a typical Canadian home - it is very loud so we don't use it. This weight is the one would power the bell mechanism. This clock weight is easily the heaviest thing I own, by volume.
This wonderful device is from Lee Valley tools. By simply decanting your favorite adhesive into this device (I use it for yellow wood glue but white glue could be used also). Adhesive is dispensed by removing the red silicon cap to which glue does not stick, and squeezing gently. The spout produces a flat stream of glue, the thickness of which depends on where you trim the spout when it is first used. You can always see how much is left in the container and you never have to turn the container upside down for the glue to come out when it is getting low. I have one of these in my workshop and one in my train room. Lee Valley sells these in two sizes.
Links to several of the vendors I have mentioned can be found on the "Links I like" tab at the top of my blog page.
I hope this has been helpful. Perhaps some of these tools will someday find a home in your tool collection.
