“This’ll be a quick and easy post,” I thought. There I was out in the garage, preparing to cut a piece of angle iron. I put the metal-cutting blade in my reciprocating saw, clamped the angle iron in my trusty Workmate (the Deluxe Dual Height version, no less), grabbed my beat-up old tube of Johnson’s #140 Stik-Wax to lube the blade, and zipped right through. Then I paused and thought “I should write a post on #140 Stik-Wax.” Ah, how naive…

After more than a few minutes of web browsing, I discovered that SC Johnson sold their industrial division to British Petroleum’s Castrol division many years ago. Castrol is apparently packaging the same product in a similar, although different-colored, tube as shown above. If you can find a place to sell you a single tube rather than a whole case of 24, it’ll cost around $18.

While looking for #140 Stik-Wax information, I came across a few references to AnchorLube G-771, and people praising it for metalworking.

As a metalworking hack who does this kind of stuff infrequently, I think #140 Stik-Wax — or its equivalent — does a good job. For all you real metalworkers out there, what’s the insider’s solution to proper lubrication when amateurs are cutting, tapping, sawing, or drilling metal?

Castrol Stick Wax [National Supply]
Castrol Stick Wax [Anchor Chemical]

3-In-One oil is no longer the only product bearing the distinctive red, white, and black logo that has graced oil cans for decades. Now the No-Rust Shield joins it on the shelves of the local home center. The No Rust Shield, surprisingly enough, is aimed at doing just that — stopping rust from forming on your tools.

The rust shield works by releasing “metal-seeking Vapor Phase Corrosion Inhibitors” (VpCI) that make their way around any enclosed area up to 2 cubic feet and prevent the moisture in the area from turning your tools into that fabulous shade of orange we all try so hard to avoid — for up to 90 days.

(more…)

After a bit of a hiatus we resumed our search for a transmission for our shop truck project. We learned several things in the process, not the least of which is this: transmissions can be expensive.

Thankfully our luck held and we managed to find one in the local area that would suit our purposes — but not without first looking damn near everywhere for one that fit both our budget and level of desired risk.

The simple fact of the matter is buying a new tranny would cost about as much as the entire build put together, so we decided to look for the used/rebuilt solutions. These, however, come with the knowledge that you could be right back in this position sooner rather than later. We broke it down into several categories.

(more…)

Legacy Manufacturing, not to be confused with Legacy Woodworking, claims their MEGABOOST grease gun is the most powerful pistol-style grease gun out there.  If you set the gun for boost, it’s able to deliver 10,000 PSI — or, if you set if for volume, it’ll pump out more grease per stroke than other similar grease guns.

(more…)

Dirt and metal particles on your bike’s chain can accelerate chain and sprocket wear and cause shifting or other performance problems.  Park Tool sells its Cyclone chain scrubber to keep your bike’s chain clean and operating at peak performance.

(more…)

The first thing you do when greasing a fitting is wipe all the crud off it so you don’t pump it into the fitting — so how much time and mess could you save if the fitting was already clean?  These grease fitting covers from Caplugs fit securely over grease fittings to keep them clean and dry.

(more…)

Most Toolmongers probably just grab any oil that’s close at hand while drilling into metal, but if I actually bought cutting oil, I have to admit that I’d probably buy Bad Dog Drool cutting lubricant — not because I’m sold on how well it works, but because I couldn’t resist the awesome name.  Just imagine the look on your buddy’s face when you ask him to fetch some Bad Dog Drool.

Use Bad Dog Drool to keep cutters cool and minimize wear when boring through metal.  This “thick and juicy” cutting lubricant — Bad Dog Tools likens it to St. Bernard drool — stays in place even on inclined surfaces.

On their website, an 8oz bottle of Bad Dog Drool will run you about $10 plus $5 shipping.

Bad Dog Drool [Bad Dog Tools]

You just want to mix a pint of gas in a 40:1 mixture with two-cycle oil, because you don’t want to have a gallon or two of mixed gas left over at the end of the season.  Do you want to crunch the numbers in your head or find a calculator?  No.  Instead use the MixMizer’s ratio scale to take the guesswork and/or calculation out of mixing gas.

Hopkin’s MixMizer is a plastic syringe-like tool that only weighs 15.8 ounces.  It comes with a plastic extension tube to reach the bottom of the can to get those last few drops of oil.

You can purchase the MixMizer for something like $6 to $7.

MixMizer [Hopkins]
Street Pricing [Google]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]

If you store your metal tools in a high-humidity environment, you’re asking for rust.  Unlike older solutions such as an outer layer of wax, oil, or WD-40, Boshield T-9 Rust and Corrosion Protection actually penetrates into metals and provides them with a protective coating.

(more…)

Bic Warehouse is selling this pistol-grip pump oiler with a flexible spout for $6.65.  This type of tool does most of the oiling jobs in our shop, be it light oil for the lathe spindle or way oil for the machine ways.  I’m not sure what brand these are — all the ones we use are old ones found at garage sales!

Pistol-Grip Pump Oiler [Bic Warehouse]
Street Pricing [Google]

Industrial Boys is selling a 16oz. bottle of Tapmatic’s Natural Cutting and Tapping Fluid for $10.86.  Lately we’ve switched to this fluid for most of our tapping jobs.  It smells odd, but it definitely reduces the amount of tapping force required, compared to other cutting oils we’ve tried.

16oz. Tapmatic Natural Cutting And Tapping Fluid [Industrial Boys]
Street Pricing [Google Products]

You pop your grease gun onto the zerk fitting and try to pump, but instead of moving the pump handle your arm just stops. You’ve got yourself a clogged fitting or joint. Replacing the fitting and trying again is easy enough, but what if the joint still doesn’t take any grease? Instead of replacing it or taking it apart give the Grease Joint Rejuvenator a try.

(more…)

Greasing the front end of your vehicle can be so frustrating sometimes, you just want to give up and bring it to your mechanic.  Automakers obviously weren’t thinking about serviceability when they designed some of these vehicles.  Thexton feels your pain, so they designed the Lube Tube to help you reach those impossible-to-reach fittings.

(more…)

With lawn and garden season fast approaching, it’s time to fire up the garden polluters, and by that I mean the tools powered by two-stroke engines. Luckily, Green Earth Technology has developed its new line of Green Oil, a “Green alternative” to your regular motor oil. Green Earth Technology makes their G-Oils from American-grown base oil that’s “enhanced with the power of nanotechnology and dehydrogenation”.

G-Oil contains bio-additives such as amino acids, plant and vegetable extracts, non-ionic surfactants, and plant-based fatty acids in a base of colloidal micelles. It all adds up to produce a range of oils that’ll work in anything from your lawn mower to your heavy-duty turbocharged and super-charged diesel.

(more…)

Raise your hand if you actually re-pack your trailer’s wheel bearings once a year as recommended. Yeah, repacking bearings by hand can be a greasy mess — who really wants to put globs of grease in their hands, except my three-year-old?  Do yourself a favor and pick up a bearing packer like this one from Lisle for $8. A bearing packer evenly injects new grease into the bearing, which forces out the old grease and flushes out any other contaminants.

(more…)

Ridout Plastics makes their Slick Strips out of an ultra-high molecular weight plastic film, with a low coefficient of friction. In English, that means it makes surfaces slide past each other easier. It’s also tough — its abrasion resistance surpasses Teflon, but you can cut it to length easily.  Even with an adhesive backing, the strips measure only 1/32″ thick.

(more…)

You want to protect the things you love — your family, your pets, your tools – but with all the folk remedies swirling around the mythosphere, who’s to know what works best? For cleaning and lubricating metal tools like saw blades and router bits, folks over at the Ridgid forum have discussed using Simple Green All-Purpose cleaner (an alkaline water-based cleaner with a 9.4 pH), carnauba wax (mainly acidic, found in cosmetics and Altoids), oven cleaner (a soap-forming caustic base), apple cider vinegar (which, according to enthusiasts, helps remove “body sludge toxins”), washing soda (a potent base with a pH of 11), and even coffee (acidic with a pH around 5, unless you’re French).

Then there’s Empire’s Complete Tool Saver System. It includes a surface cleaner/degreaser, a water-based pitch resin remover, and three types of lubricants: one for router bits that reduces heat and friction, one for moving parts, and one for saw blades. This collection is supposed to replace and best all the folk remedies, for about twenty bucks.

So what do you prefer: a pre-packed kit like the one pictured above, or home chemistry experiments? Let us know in comments.

Manufacturer’s Website
Via Amazon [What’s This?] [What's This?]