We’ve been talking about the difference we’ve seen in the truck market this year. Even down where we live in the land of big trucks, it’s starting to change. I was walking into one of the local big boxes today and saw three lawn care guys jump out of this truck, pictured above. It got me to thinking about those same three guys a few years ago and what they might have driven then.

It could be a total fluke, of course, but these gents didn’t look like they really cared about style or image. They just had the vehicle that got them where they needed to go with room to carry potted plants and all manner of equipment in the back. A few years ago it would have been a Ford F-250 but now I’m starting to see more and more crews opt for a ride like this.

It looks like the truck market may already be moving to encompass a more broad definition of the term “work truck” than the big three are willing to admit yet. I’d like to think that trucks aren’t dead and the revival of the truck in this country might be as simple as consumers selecting a rig that gets better mileage but trades some of the size they didn’t need for practicality, be it import-built or not.
 
Of course something like this won’t work for everyone, but it is interesting. Small, more practical rides like this are popping up all over town and I can’t help but wonder how it’s going to play out. What do you think? Let us know in comments.

At the Milwaukee product event last week, a passionate man named Michael Callanan — he’s Executive Director of the National Joint Apprenticeship and Training Committee (NJATC), and he works with both the National Electrical Contractors Association (NECA) and International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) — spoke to us about a problem with the next generation of skilled workers:  there aren’t enough of them.  Looking ahead, the NJATC has created a program to fully prepare and train electrical apprentices and journeymen, which makes the hip-deep wading through acronyms more than worthwhile.

Michael said the “hands-on” crafts suffer from a bad image nowadays, and the differences in the way things are done now vs. thirty years ago will hurt all of us in the long run — for instance, most parents or counselors today will tell young people that they’re throwing their life away if they don’t go to college.  We’re not saying college isn’t a great place or that it can’t help a young person along their way, but it’s not the only option.

This line of thought got me thinking about how we’re going to train the next generation of workers. Colleges certainly can’t do it, and as the current batch ages and retires, where is the qualified group behind them going to come from?  How will we train them, and what will they have to know ten or twenty years from now?

It’s a large topic that makes my brain hurt, but I think Michael’s impassioned plea to wake up and smell the industry turnover might be a timely call that we need to start listening to now, instead of when it becomes a more serious issue. How do we get the net-savvy, info-hungry kids of today to become interested in being the skilled and qualified electricians and such of tomorrow?

Sure, organizations like the NJATC can help, but as Mr. Callanan said in his presentation, 80,000 people applied and the program could only take 12,000, and the demand drastically outstrips this amount.  We’re in an employment slump right now, but the problem isn’t going to go away — houses and buildings will still need fixing and building in fifteen or twenty years.

It’s an interesting issue, and I don’t think many people want to think about it right now. There’s no glamor or sky-high salaries attached, just a good honest living that provides a much-needed service. My question is, when did that fall out of fashion?

National Joint Apprenticeship and Training Committee [Website]

Certain things become parts of our everyday lives; GM was one of those things.  Sure, they made some crappy vehicles — ok, they made a lot of crappy vehicles.  But I completely feel for the folks who’ve already lost their jobs, and for those who know their days are numbered.  I’ve been on the downside of that scenario, and honestly there’s absolutely nothing good about it.  My question is, what did GM think was going to happen?

They were, after all, still a business.  They made cars and trucks — that’s all they did.  If no one can afford or wants to buy the things you make, and you don’t change what you’re doing, then sooner or later you’re going to have a problem.

I know, I know, it’s oversimplifying the issue, and folks much more qualified and smarter than I am are trying to figure this whole mess out as we speak.  But let me ask you this:  If you wanted to go to Congress and ask for a bailout to save your company and the thousands of jobs attached to it, as the first order of business wouldn’t you come up with a badass plan that you thought would work, before you asked for the cash?

Scale that back to a small business, and go ask for heaps of cash to bail yourself out of a problem that you got yourself into by not staying on top of your business, and the first question anyone on the other end of that question will have for you is, “What’s the plan for turning it around?”  GM didn’t even have that prepared.  Even if it was a craptastic idea, they should’ve had something in the chamber to fire back.

As I said, I feel a great pang of sympathy for the folks out there doing their jobs and trying to make ends meet, because we are them.  That could be any one of us, and anyone who doesn’t think so doesn’t understand the situation.  I don’t think it’s cool that GM is going to get to roll out of this by laying off thousands and hosing over debt-holders and stockholders — and I don’t think the emerging Chevy products are still going to be held near and dear to people’s hearts here in the States.

A good finish is as important to a furniture project as its construction. You’d be surprised how much trouble that statement has gotten me into over the last few years, but it happens to be true.  The first reaction I get to it is, “Not every project needs a finish,” and that’s also absolutely true — however, that particular statement is often the battle cry of the lazy.

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To follow up on the aforementioned sad state of affairs:  I have the home shop up and running again.  It’s not perfect yet and there’s still a ways to go, but I did manage to make room for two big pieces of gear — Chuck’s big Delta planer and my father’s ShopSmith have both come to live with me.

It’s a super-sweet turn of events, but I quickly found out I know precisely zip about setting up the eight tools the ShopSmith’s got going for it — so I’ve been poring over manuals to learn how to calibrate this hunk of wood-mangling hotness.  Also, I need to drop a 240 plug in the shop for the planer.

Speaking of the planer, here’s a handy tip for you folks setting up your own home shop:  Suggesting to your other half that you’ll just run an extension into the laundry room and unplug the dryer when you need it — not a good plan.  Who knew?

Talk about Doh!  I look back fondly on December of ’08.  I look back on it fondly because it was the last time my shop was functional. It’s my own fault. Seriously, take a look at this picture and tell me this is the shop of someone on the ball. This, quite frankly, is what happens when you become the dumping ground for other people’s crap or projects — the junk seems to swell beyond capacity and beyond any semblance of control. That program ended two days ago.

I snapped this picture about an hour into working the mess down, and I posted it on the blog to serve as a warning to others.  Especially if you have a shop at work and the home shop is not your primary, beware! Don’t end up like me, two weeks behind any project you’d like to start, simply for the fact that you can’t get to your tools.

I’ve already begun several projects, like a new miter bench and a few homemade wood racks, as well as a bit of store-bought storage for some of the new gear I’ve managed to steal from my old man. I’ve also started the crap-removal process which has already filled two trash cans.  It’s shameful, I know, but over the next few days I’m getting the home shop down to fighting weight if it kills me –- or anyone else in the way for that matter.

We’re sure that most folks to the north never give it a second thought till later on in the year, but down here in Texas, March means the blast furnace we call Summer is looming ahead.  In my case that meant I needed to get the AC fixed at the ole homestead. The Freon leaked out last year due to a faulty coil, and I’ve been without since September.

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The hardware store in the town where I grew up had been around over 100 years, until recently. Driving around back home a while ago I noted it’s now a nick-nack shop. Like so many other little hardware stores it folded due to lack of support. It’s a bit sad that a hardware store that was around when a hitching post was considered parking could simply disappear one day — but when I got to thinking about it, that’s not really what happened.

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I have a tremendous amount of respect for the woodcrafting capabilities of the Amish. I’m sure most of them could run circles around many of us with hand tools, and the level of their craftsmanship is highly regarded in many circles. My question is what on earth made them think the Heat Surge was a good project to get involved with?

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As you can see from this mangled piece of trim, I recently had a router mishap. Thankfully I wasn’t injured — the only casualty was the oak trim — but it was exciting for a few minutes there, and the incident brought to mind a few things I thought I’d share.

When I was ‘round about fourteen, our assistant shop teacher –- a very grizzly, annoyed sort of man –- brought us all around the nearest shop station, told us to pay attention, and gave us the most effective demonstration ever.

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People will try to tell you you can’t do a certain project, or you need tons of cash on hand to tackle minor projects — it’s one of my biggest beefs.  Perhaps they mean well, but the problem is that folks less pigheaded than the average Toolmonger might actually listen and not attempt small household repairs.  The simple fact:  You can do a lot of projects yourself, without thirty years experience or thousands of dollars to throw at ‘em.

This picture by ghb624 sums up the attitude I’m talking about:  Just get it done.  That’s often all it takes.  In this case, ghb had a leak in his roof, but instead of whining and crying about what to do or wondering how much it would cost, he got up on the roof and fixed it.

You’ll notice there’s no fanfare, no spectators in the photo with him — that’s how DIY is.  Some call it thankless work;  we call it getting it done.  And once you’ve got a few tools and a few projects under your belt, you may find that fixing a sink or replacing a toilet isn’t as scary as it used to be.

Whether you’re a rank amateur or seasoned veteran, try and tackle that window that won’t shut, or install the new garage door opener yourself.  Though you’ll want to leave some projects to the pros — AC unit repair, for instance — you can pull off most of ‘em without the hired guns.

The sad fact of the matter is there’s a reason stores chain up the valuables and make tool corrals to keep the high-end gear in the store.  It’s because a few morons kill it for the rest of us.  Just the other day I was checking out the Bosch lineup at one of the local big-boxes and was quite pleased to see the drills and gear displayed where I could pick them up and play with them — no tethers or anything.  A day later I was there again, and two of the batteries were missing.  Two days after that, all four were gone and only the tools remained.

I asked about the disappearance and was informed that folks had walked off with them — they were surprised any of the batteries made it past the first day.  I know it should be expected that valuable, easily-palmed gear will disappear, but it’s still sad that it’s universally true.

It’s like kindergarten all over again.  We can’t be trusted with the really cool toys because some idiot, who eats paste and didn’t learn to respect other people’s stuff, screws the rest of us.  I realize I’m taking a bit of license here, but it’s better than taking display-model batteries.

Brightly colored Christmas trees are already up in the big boxes and local shops this year, displayed in rows, their breathtaking light displays winking back at you from across the store.  It’s enough to give you holiday buying fever –- as it was intended to.  Just keep your head, and remember you don’t need to spend yet.

If you’re in need of some new holiday swag and there’s any way you can limp through this year and wait until December 26th, do it.  The same 7-1/2’ tree with the $150 price tag will go for about $20 after Xmas. In fact, everything else’ll be slashed, too.  Don’t fall for the glitz and glitter — $50 after the season will get you an entire attic full of light-up crap.

The art of organizing a workshop can make a big difference in how you work. Here at the Toolmonger shop we engage in constant discussion about the right tool for the job, which tool is a good tool — and then we generally grab the tool closest to hand, unless it’s really the wrong tool for the job. It’s a really interesting phenomenon.

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I had a plastic welding kit when I was a kid — one very much like the one (pictured above) that I ran across on Gizmodo last week. It’s a pretty simply toy: a motor in the “welder” spins plastic “welding rods.” The friction between the soft plastic “rod” and other plastic items creates enough heat to melt the rod, which then hardens and attaches things together.

(I know, since it’s almost always the rod that melts instead of the items kids are hooking together, this is technically brazing. But try writing kid-friendly packaging with “brazing” on it.)

As the Giz points out, this kind of toy is probably a lawsuit waiting to happen — you know, when little Bobby gets a small welt from spinning the rod on his finger, or when Timmy brazes his toy cell phone to the front of daddy’s new $5,000 plasma HDTV. Such is our litigious society.

So instead of learning from the welt, Bobby grows up in blissful ignorance, eventually picking up a Harbor Freight MIG unit after a long night of American Chopper reruns, and proceeds to flash and burn the crap out of himself and every metal item he owns. (Timmy, well, grows up to be a well-adjusted kid spared the merciless ass-beating he’d have endured after jacking up the TV.)

My point is simple: it’s easy to hurt yourself with tools — especially as a child. But that doesn’t mean we should shield children from every possible injury, robbing them of valuable — and often inexpensive — life experience. Toys like this plastic welder give kids a chance to use a real tool and learn how fun it can be to take charge of one’s environment instead of just accepting things the way they are. As most Toolmongers know, with a few tools, a lot of sweat and spare time, and enough desire, one can have most anything.

Anyway, if you want to buck the trend and give your kids an early start, you can have your own Discovery Power Welder for about $30 via the link below. And do us (and yourself) a favor: follow up that tool gift with the gift of knowledge and experience, lest you find (as Gizmodo suggests) “all your credit cards fused into one lump, never to be used again.”

Working Plastic-Welder Toy For Kids [Gizmodo]
Discovery Power Welder [Discovery Store]

Standby power is getting more press lately, and a few companies out there want to sell you something to save you money — strange, they want you to give your money to them instead.

BUT! Fellow Toolmongers! Today for you we have something fan-tastic, practically for free, something that you can use, something that if you had to pay for it you would give real money for it!

Nah, really I just want to point out that putting your electronics on switches, and turning them off, is the easiest solution. But these resources may help you if you’re really into convenience, or measuring your specific situation.

As usual, Wikipedia provides some interesting information, including the fact that the government got on the bandwagon in 2001. You know it’s bad if the government is ahead of you in saving money! At least they’ve compiled lists of low-standby-power appliances, in case you want to take it into consideration when you go shopping.

Surge Protector With Remote [Belkin]
Standby Power [Wikipedia]
Appliance Database [LBL.gov]
Standby Power [Energy Star]

Last week’s post about my ordeal with customer service, just to order a drive belt for my sander, turned out to be a hot button — and here’s a follow-up to it. I’ve installed the new drive belt, and the sander is ready to go again.

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