Having trouble holding tiny little screws in place way the hell down in the dash of your car? TM reader Keith has the answer: a five-pronged pick-up tool.
“I bought one on a whim a while back because I often do electronics repair work and thought it might prove useful for that. This past weekend my son and I were working on the speedometer of his car and found this tool to be just the ticket for putting Phillips dash screws back in when they’re too deep to reach with one’s hand. It worked better than the screw starter I have that’s intended only for slotted screws as this tool could grab slotted, small hex head, Torx, and other screws, too. Saved us a lot of frustration by avoiding trying to keep screws on the end of a magnetized screwdriver without losing them in the dash.”
Damn straight. I have a bigger version of this, and I’ve used it to pull all sorts of crazy tricks. I can’t believe it didn’t occur to me to pick up a smaller one for this purpose. Though now it occurs to me that I might be able to use the bigger one to assist in positioning a replacement speedo cable in my Miata.
Kudos on the find, and kudos for linking us a version for under $5 on Amazon. If you’re not an Amazon buyer, I’m sure you can find one elsewhere, too.
Via Amazon [What’s This?]
Elsewhere [What’s This?] [Google Products]
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9 Responses to A Third Hand… With Lots Of Fingers
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I have a plastic one of these with only 3 fingers, but it is dang handy. It came in a little kit of computer tools. I might buy this one though because the plastic is starting to crack.
Nice find, thanks!
I use one to grab pickles out of the jar. Never thought of putting it in my tool box
I can usually only find long ones at hardware stores, but see these small ones all the time by the bucketful as olive and pickle grabbers at gourmet and specialty food shops.
That looks like the perfect tool to remove my alien mind control chip.
I can shove that up my nose, grab the chip, and finally pull the thing out of my brain.
I have used a long, Craftsman 4 finger grabber for many years, although not for starting screws.
It can snatch a ball of lint stuck a foot or more down inside the dryer’s lint trap. I’ve used it to retrieve items dropped behind heavy furniture and to clean out the leaves clogging rain gutter downspouts.
You covered pick-up tools 3 years ago.
Here is an alternative for starting tiny screws – the “jaws” are a bit stiffer:
https://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/949-519
And here is a different approach:
http://www.westernoptical.com/products/Dispensing_Hand_Tools/Deluxe_Drivers/universal-screw-and-nut-grabber.html
A most interesting pickup tool – and a solid addition to any tool box! Seems like we never have enough hands or fingers when we need them. Definitely worth a try.