Essential tools and information for the complete "Plywood-Pirate"
by ....Pirate & author,.....'Yerron Yerrone',
using basic skills, ... known in the trade as "the frivolous activities of polished idleness".
Pirate. Firstly let me define the meaning of a pirate. [for those who aren't quite sure what a pirate does].......
He [and quite often, she], is mainly a sea-robber, but can be a publisher who infringes copyright, or an illegal radio-broadcaster, or a producer of illicit artistic work, or, even a receiver of questionable goods. Well boys & girls & fellow pirates, that's it, everyone I know is a pirate. The only difference is, plywood pirates are good pirates, because we only build and enjoy boats.
Now to the tool section ..... [courtesy MITRE 11 ]
DRILL PRESS: A tall
upright machine useful for suddenly snatching flat material
out of your hands so that it smacks you in the chest and flings your beer across
the room, splattering it against that freshly varnished,
plywood part you were just
drying.
MODIFIED BIKE TUBES: believe it or not,
make 'good' clamps, when you can't find your good-clamps.
BELT SANDER: Used for
making neat, good-looking rectangular gouges in
plywood surfaces.
PAD SANDER: Used for blending the edges of the
rectangular gouges, [created by the belt sander].
RANDOM ORBITAL SANDER: Used for removing the marks [left
by the pad-sander, of course] which can be found
on any surface perpendicular to the original gouge. May also
be used to make decorative
semicircular gouges in finished ply-wood
surfaces.
DETAIL SANDER: Used to make decorative triangular
gouges, to take your attention away from the circular gouges.
BISCUIT JOINER: Tool used to misalign wood in a very consistent manner which can
then be sanded heavily, to reduce the finished strength of the original
piece of wood.
CHISEL: Multi-use tool in skilled-hands,
good for making deep cuts to those skilled-hands,
and when dropped, can also be used to test your reflexes.
CORDLESS DRILL & POWER SCREWDRIVER: Used for rounding-out
Phillips-head screws, especially at
high speeds.
ROUTER: Used to darken wood by friction and create
blue smoke. For this latter purpose, it replaces the
incense used by primitive boatbuilding cultures who
wished to influence the wood-working cult.
When used with a ROUTER TABLE this tool can be used to make varying profiles
using a single bit and a single depth setting.
TAPE MEASURE: This device is used to measure length, but not height,
[width is ok sometimes]. It should be immediately
dropped in to liquid-epoxy-resin,
several times, so that,
it will then stick to every other tool in the
workshop.
NAIL PUNCH: Used to make small, round depressions around the head of a finish
nail. Principally used for decoration.
CLAMPS: These come in three sizes: too small,
too heavy and too far away.
[see phone]
WIRE WHEEL: Cleans paint off bolts and then throws them somewhere under the
workbench with the speed of light. Also removes fingerprints
and hard-earned calluses in about the time it takes you to say,...
"B#%*#$%"
ELECTRIC HAND DRILL: Normally used for spinning pop rivets in their holes until
you die of old age; and with the proper accessories,
can destroy perfectly good
ply-wood.
PLIERS: Used to create skin-piercing copper-wire-twists, which, stitch,
ply-bits, together.
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 off-course you go.
JAPANESE SAW: cuts on the pull-stroke, but only
if you are pulling, [similar to Hacksaw, ....but in
reverse].
VICE-GRIPS: Used to round off bolt heads. When welding,
can also be used to transfer intense heat to the palm
of your hand.
OXY-ACETYLENE TORCH: Used almost entirely for
setting alight various flammable objects in your shed.
Also handy for igniting all your boating chemicals and wood shavings.
WHITWORTH SOCKETS: Once used for working on older boats. They
are now used mainly for impersonating that 15 mm or 12mm
socket you've been searching for the last 15 minutes.
HYDRAULIC FLOOR JACK: Used for lowering heavy boats to
the ground after you have installed your new furniture,
trapping the jack handle firmly under the keel.
8-Ft Long 4 x 2
timber : Used for
levering heavy boats off the
hydraulic jack handle. Watch out for splinters.
TWEEZERS: For removing the splinters,
from the 4 x 2, [and ply-wood]
PHONE: Tool for calling your neighbours to see if they have another hydraulic floor
jack.
PHONE (alt.): Tool for calling all your mates to see
if they have any of your missing CLAMPS .
TABLE SAW: Used to make wood slightly narrower than necessary.
MITRE SAW: Used to make wood slightly shorter than necessary.
THICKNESS PLANER: Used to make wood slightly thinner than necessary.
JOINTER: Used to make the too thin, too short, too narrow wood perfectly
straight. Very useful for making two sides of a board perfectly straight,
but, not
parallel.
SCRAPER: Theoretically useful for spreading
epoxy-resin; [mainly
used for getting dog-shit
off your boots].
E-Z OUT BOLT AND STUD EXTRACTOR: A tool ten times harder than any known drill
bit, that snaps off in bolt holes that
you couldn't use anyway.
TWO-TON BOAT HOIST: A
very useful tool for testing the tensile
strength on everything you forgot to disconnect.
CRAFTSMAN 1/2 x 16-INCH SCREWDRIVER: A large pry bar that inexplicably has an
accurately machined screwdriver tip on the end, opposite the handle. Can
be very dangerous in experienced hands.
MARINE METAL SNIPS: Not in our
pirates-tool-kit. See Japanese saw and
hacksaw.
TROUBLE LIGHT: The home boat-builder'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 boats
at night. Health benefits aside, it's 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. [see
dark-suckers]
PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER: Normally used to stab the lids of old paint-tins
and glue containers and splash contents
on your best shirt; but can also be
used, as the name implies, to strip out Phillips screw-heads.
Best when the handle is struck end-on, with the hammer. [see hammer].
AIR COMPRESSOR: A machine that takes energy produced in a coal-burning power
plant 500 kms away and transforms it into compressed air that travels by hose to
a Chinese Pneumatic impact wrench that grips rusty bolts which were
last over-tightened, years
ago by someone in Japan or China, and then,
neatly rounds off their heads. Mostly hisses like an
old Tomcat, late at night.
PRY BAR: A tool used to crumple anything surrounding
that clip or bracket you needed to remove in order to replace a 20¢
part.
HAMMER: Originally employed as a weapon of war, the hammer nowadays is used as a
kind of divining rod to locate the most expensive parts not far from the object
we are trying to hit.
HAMMER (alt.): The tool of natural-choice,
for making medium sized circular depressions in all, finished
wooden surfaces.
UTILITY KNIFE: Used to open and slice through the contents of cardboard cartons
delivered to your front door; works particularly well on contents such as seats,
vinyl records, liquids in plastic bottles, collectors
magazines, envelopes containing tax-refund cheques,
and hard-to-get, rubber or plastic parts.
UTILITY KNIFE (alt.): Used to slice through the fingers. For purposes of
sanitation, the blades are easily replaceable.
DAMMIT TOOL: Any handy tool that you grab and throw across the garage while
yelling "DAMMIT" at the top of your lungs. It is also the very
next tool that you will need to use.
...oooOOOooo...
Newsflash The following items are waiting approval from our tools conference [see conference].
GPS RECEIVER; A recently invented tool, so that you really know, exactly where you are, when you are lost.
E_MAIL; A useless tool to get all pirates together on Wednesdays & Saturdays, for a paddle,
ITOLDYASO: Usually applied verbally in hindsight, which somehow eases the pain and suffering
following our very efficient foresight.
KAYAKING; A great family sport, except for the women and kids. [canoeing, is a bit different]
RUDDER; Used by some 'beginner-pirates' who can't yet, paddle in a straight line.
SAILS; A wind-fed, upright 'bed-sheet' for those who build a kayak/canoe for paddling exercise.
ELECTRIC OUTBOARD MOTOR; A 'mechanical-aid' for those who, will not, sail or paddle.
BATTERY; An exercise weight, especially getting it, to & from the car, to the boat.
CONFERENCE. A meeting of those amongst us, who, individually can do nothing, get together and collectively
agree, that nothing can be done.
...oooOOOooo...
Go astern... [or 'back', if you don't know what 'astern' means]
The tune is "Leaving Liverpool". .... [press refresh to hear it again]
20.2.2008. freddo.