Tools that changed your life

[smj]

Originally Posted by Fidsplice

Artery forceps. (Haemostats). Great for picking things up from tight spots (think dropped nut etc), holding wire when soldering, grabbing mousing line, pulling out fish bones, tiny lock pliers for tiny nuts, oh - and if you happen to sever an artery they are very useful. Except by now they are filthy.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemostat

Roach clips? 🤣🤣🤣

[Fidsplice]

That too! Great for grabbing spiders, bugs, roaches. Wash well after bugs. They stink. (Protective mechanism). And certainly a tool that changed the bug’s life!

[TPG]

Forecepts, different styles and sizes.

[SailingBulls]

A towel is just about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can carry. Partly because it has great practical value. More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value.

A sonic screwdriver. Loads of useful things that it can be used for. Like many other things, the ocean is a bit wibbly wobbly, so don't forget the sonic screwdriver!

[SuW]

Originally Posted by SailingBulls

A towel is just about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can carry. Partly because it has great practical value. More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value.
A sonic screwdriver. Loads of useful things that it can be used for. Like many other things, the ocean is a bit wibbly wobbly, so don't forget the sonic screwdriver!

Mostly harmless.

[flightlead404]

Originally Posted by skipperpete

This tool has saved me from endless cuts and clothing tears from razor sharp ziptie cutoffs ….and also for anyone who works where I installed cable ties in the last 20years.

I just avoid (and hate with a passion) tie wraps and use waxed lacing cord. Much better in the end once you learn how to use it.

[hd002e]

Originally Posted by flightlead404

I just avoid (and hate with a passion) tie wraps and use waxed lacing cord. Much better in the end once you learn how to use it.

And how do you use it?

My favorite tool is locking pliers: a must have for a singlehander.

[CaptainRivet]

Originally Posted by hd002e

And how do you use it?

My favorite tool is locking pliers: a must have for a singlehander.

Waxed lacing cord:
you simply lash it and knot it with several 2 round and half hitches knot.
I use lacing cord on all external on the boat due to its more UV stable then zip ties, internally i prefer zip ties.
I also used waxed lasing cord from Liros instead of the pins on the turnbuckles of my standing rigging.
Also have very thin 1.5mm and 2.5mm dynema cord for lashing to connect two points which needs flexibility. Eg lashed around 30 times the chain hook with the 2.5mm dynema to the bridle as it is 18mm rope and the chain hook takes max 14mm. Works better then a spliced eye with a timble and a shackle as there is no chaffe as the lasshing is so tight to the 18mm rope that its not sliding a mm but its still 10cm of flexible lasshed rope bundle that can move with. Also stainless and saltwater is not a good combo, dynema doesn’t care.

Dozen of soft shackles of different sizes, where chaffe could occure just slide over a piece of hose with the appropriate internal diameter till the knot.
I replaced nearly all SS shackles with them.

An IR temp gun, USB Flir thermal camera for the cellphone and 3 USB cable cams with different length 5 and 10m semiflexible. They are worth their weight in gold for finding issues and root courses of problems and with the cams you reach all hidden places of the boat.
The 10m cable cam swmiflexible i also use to route cables, again the thin 1.5mm dynema rope knoted to the cable cam and with sight you get it through difficult spots or eg turns much better. The dynema line when pulled through with the cam i lash then to the cable and pull cable with it through the conduits and hidden spots. Works often better then the cable puller. I fill up my cruising kitty by heling other boaters with installing lithium batteries, so i pull a lot of cables.
One cam is for all dirt stuff like toilets pipes, raw water, tanks....and 1 for dry spot and 1 backup.

[Tin Tin]

I always wondered about these, but I lashed out and paid the bucks for a Jabsco oil draining pump and flat tank container. As we have 4 engines to service, 3 diesels and an outboard - I love this thing, no mess too as waste oil very easy to handle. Have used it on my car too.

[Kettlewell]

I don't know what to call it, but I made my own fishing wire out of the inner part of an old steering cable. This is a very stiff stainless springy wire that I bend a small eye in one end of. Comfortably coiled it is a foot or more in diameter, but uncoiled mine is around 8-feet long. It has been invaluable for fishing wires and lines and sometimes hoses through various passages on my boat. Small enough to poke through small holes and spaces for many feet yet flexible enough to slide around corners. For example, I installed a new depth transducer forward of my keel and I had to run the transducer cable aft through many bilge compartments and bulkheads back to where I could run it up to the cockpit where the depthsounder display lives.

[JPA Cate]

Tool that changed my life was a 1/2" drive breaker bar (not a pry bar or crowbar). Not being a big strong person, the extra leverage was a godsend for me. It made changing tires easy, so easy I used to stop and help women who didn't know how, to change their tires. They get to learn a skill, and I got to help myself and others. ....Mind you, this was over 40 yrs. ago.

On the boat, I also really like the headlamps, too. Still, I often just grab a torch/flashlight for easy to find stuff in dark places.



Ann

[Don C L]

A phone that can tell me where I am within 16 feet, how fast I am going over the ground, what direction I am going (true or magnetic!) and make a movie of it too. And it can answer just about any question I ask it.

[Bruce K]

A large hammer. The most useful tool when electronics give trouble; All I have to say is "where's that hammer" and the piece of electronic equipment miraculously starts to work.

[HankOnthewater]

Can we please stop posting new ideas? My shopping list is getting now quite large

[SuW]

Originally Posted by JPA Cate

Tool that changed my life was a 1/2" drive breaker bar (not a pry bar or crowbar). Not being a big strong person, the extra leverage was a godsend for me. It made changing tires easy, so easy I used to stop and help women who didn't know how, to change their tires. They get to learn a skill, and I got to help myself and others. ....Mind you, this was over 40 yrs. ago.
On the boat, I also really like the headlamps, too. Still, I often just grab a torch/flashlight for easy to find stuff in dark places.
Ann

On the subject of amplifying one's strength, I previously found it impossible to close the last 1-2 cm (half inch) of a pair of ratcheting electrical crimps by hand - on the largest crimp. Now I slip a couple of pieces of aluminum tube over the handles of the crimper and that makes it possible. These tubes are 30 cm (1 foot) long and 2cm (1 inch) in diameter.

We've also used pieces of such aluminum tube to extend the handle of our teensy outboard - to make steering the dinghy less of a strain. It's a 2.5hp Nissan.