After getting back into wrenching after several years, I've realized there's laws here that Murphy would be afraid to find:

1. No matter how many wrenches or sockets you carry with you under the truck -- it's always the other one in your toolbox.

2. No matter how big a box of nuts and bolts you have, you won't have the one you need.

3. If there are six open parts stores and 1 closed one -- guess which one has the part you need?

4. Your socket is always going to be one extension to few away from the nut.

5. If you buy a brand new set of Craftsman 6 point sockets from 3/8" to 1", the first nut you work on will be 5/16".

6. The only thing worse than a jack that won't go up high enough is one that doesn't go down low enough.

7. If you grab your metric wrenches, the nut will be standard, if you grab your standard wrenches, the nut will be metric. If you grab both, the nut will rusted tight and rounded off.

8. If you have but one drain in the floor of your garage way back in the corner, no matter where you drop that last nut, it will find it.

9. No matter how long the extension cord or garden hose you buy, it's always a foot too short.

10. If you have 6 nuts to loosen, the hardest one to reach will be the tightest.

sigh......

 

I just came back in from a full afternoon in the garage, logged on, and just now read this post. And I also just now completed the list above.
Except the hose that was one foot too short was an air hose.

Engine swap time!

 

1 more, The bolt, nut, part you drop while working on your truck will always roll to the middle of it.

 

One more....
Every time you drop a nut or bolt, you won't find it for 3 months, rule #2 applies, and you can't find a replacement.

 

If you have a drain pan full of any type of fluid under your truck, that is where nuts, bolts, and particulary electrical parts will fall.

 

Yet another:

The safe place you use to place the fitting bolts for temporarily removed equipment will be the first thing your wife moves in the garage.


When your wife does this, she will forget that she has, and argue with you.

The voice of experience....... I have looked everywhere. I cannot find them.


Theo

 

This can be added to the list of rules, not quite rules, but they ALL apply!

Tools & Their Intended Usage

HAMMER: Originally employed as a weapon of war, the hammer nowadays is
used as a kind of divining rod to locate expensive parts not far from
the object we are trying to hit.

MECHANIC’S KNIFE: Used to open and slice through the contents of
cardboard cartons delivered to your front door; works particularly well
on boxes containing seats and driver's uniforms.

ELECTRIC HAND DRILL: Normally used for spinning steel pop rivets in
their holes until you die of old age, but it also works great for
drilling mounting holes in fenders just above the brake line that goes
to the rear wheel.

PLIERS: Used to round off bolt heads.

HACKSAW: One of a family of cutting tools built on the Ouija board
principle. It transforms human energy into a crooked, unpredictable
motion, and the more you attempt to influence its course, the more
dismal your future becomes.

VISE-GRIPS: Used to round off bolt heads. If nothing else is available,
they can also be used to transfer intense welding heat to the palm of
your hand.

OXY-ACETYLENE TORCH: Used almost entirely for lighting various flammable
objects in your garage on fire. Also handy for igniting the grease
inside a brake drum you’re trying to get the bearing race out of.

WHITWORTH SOCKETS: Once used for working on older British cars and
motorcycles, they are now used mainly for impersonating that 9/16 or 1/2
socket you’ve been searching for the last 15 minutes.

WIRE WHEEL: Cleans rust off old bolts and then throws them somewhere
under the workbench with the speed of light. Also removes fingerprint
whorls and hard-earned guitar calluses in about the time it takes you to
say, “Ouc....”

HYDRAULIC FLOOR JACK: Used for lowering a race car to the ground after
you have installed your new front disk brake setup, trapping the jack
handle firmly under the front fender.

EIGHT-FOOT LONG DOUGLAS FIR 2X4: Used for levering a race car upward
off a hydraulic jack.

TWEEZERS: A tool for removing wood splinters.

PHONE: Tool for calling your neighbor to see if he has another hydraulic
floor jack.

SNAP-ON GASKET SCRAPER: Commonly useful as a sandwich tool for spreading
mayonnaise; used mainly for getting dog-doo off your boot.

E-Z OUT BOLT AND STUD EXTRACTOR: A tool that snaps off in bolt holes and
is ten times harder than any known drill bit.

TIMING LIGHT: A stroboscopic instrument for illuminating grease buildup.

TWO-TON HYDRAULIC ENGINE HOIST: A handy tool for testing the tensile
strength of ground straps and brake lines you may have forgotten to
disconnect.

CRAFTSMAN 1/2 x 16-INCH SCREWDRIVER: A large motor mount prying tool that
inexplicably has an accurately machined screwdriver tip on the end
without the handle.

BATTERY ELECTROLYTE TESTER: A handy tool for transferring sulfuric acid
from a car battery to the inside of your toolbox after determining that
your battery is dead as a doornail, just as you thought.

AVIATION METAL SNIPS: See hacksaw.

TROUBLE LIGHT: The mechanic’s own tanning booth. Sometimes called a
drop light, it is a good source of vitamin D, “the sunshine vitamin,”
which is not otherwise found under race cars at night. Health
benefits aside, its main purpose is to consume 40-watt light bulbs at
about the same rate that 105-mm howitzer shells might be used during,
say, the first few hours of the Battle of the Bulge. More often dark
than light, its name is somewhat misleading. However, always trouble.

PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER: Normally used to stab the lids of old-style
paper-and-tin oil cans and splash oil on your shirt; can also be used,
as the name implies, to round off Phillips screw heads.

AIR compressor: A machine that takes energy produced in a coal-burning
power plant 200 miles away and transforms it into compressed air that
travels by hose to a Chicago Pneumatic impact wrench that grips rusty
bolts last tightened 60 years ago by someone in Detroit, and rounds
them off.

PRY BAR: A tool used to crumple the metal surrounding that clip or
bracket you needed to remove in order to replace a 50 cent part.

HOSE CUTTER: A tool used to cut hoses ½ inch too short.

SPANNER WRENCH: a bedeviling wrench that causes you to improvise with a
pair of Craftsman needle-nose (see NEEDLE NOSE PLIERS) freeing you up to
waste several hours attempting to get the Spanner nut off but breaking
the needle-nose and causing you to drive 3 times to 3 different Sears
stores to replace them. You forget to buy a Spanner Wrench while you’re
there each time.

SNAP RING PLIERS: see SPANNER WRENCH. Causes all above the same
effects with the addition of finally getting the ring off, but at 450
mph straight into left eye.

NEEDLE NOSE PLIERS: see SPANNER WRENCH and SNAP RING PLIERS. Useful for
breaking while attempting to remove spanner nuts and snap rings