The Apprentice's Toolbox

My twin grandsons are to young to build anything yet but I'm going to
save the info on this project for when they get to be about 12 years old
so we can do this together.

Tony

wrote:
On Apr 13, 9:08 pm, "dublin_o" wrote:
I am going to gather up the tools and the list and show my grandson how to
build the box, my grandfather did this for me and I still have the box, but
now it has misc parts in it for my router.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Good for you!

As a project, it's pretty easy. The secret is that you only have to
lay-out three rows of holes. Once drilled, the three parts are then
used as drill-guides for all of the other holes except for the
handles, hinges & fittings. Once the builder understands the
principle, the work goes very quickly.

The foundation for the tray may be self-bent using a table edge,
clamps and a rubber mallet but the tray is usually used as a means of
introducing the student to the brake. If you use T-zero stock the
partitions you can fudge the bends a bit, eliminating the need for
high precision.

On Mon, 14 Apr 2008 00:08:53 -0400, "dublin_o"
wrote:

I am going to gather up the tools and the list and show my grandson how to
build the box, my grandfather did this for me and I still have the box, but
now it has misc parts in it for my router.

When my grandson comes for a visit you could not keep him out of the shop.
Maybe because I have not video games. LMAO
I even has a hand saw that belonged to my greatgand father and I am over the
hill, retired and drawing social security. But I still fly ever chance I
get.


Sir you have a life time of experience, you are now a gentleman of
leisure and the country is repaying you a modest stipend in
recognition of all your years of service to it.
the fact that you fly every chance that you get means 2 further
things.
1. that you are engaged in a complex mentally stimulating activity.
2. that mental stimulation and passion means that you will never
become old before your time.

you sell yourself short.


I'm not a pervert or anything but I enjoy the company of women, so I
find it easy to talk to them.
At one of our flyins a group of visitors wives was complaining about
their hubbies passionate interest in aviation.
I pointed out in turn a number of the guys on our airfield. How old do
you think he is I asked?
as we went to each guy they gave the numbers I expected.
45, 50, 50, 55 and so on.
ok Tom isnt 55 he's 78, Ralph isnt 40 he's 68, Roger isnt 50 he's 65.

wouldnt you girls like your guys to look like that when they were that
old?

....instant conversion to aviation. the guys stopped being hassled to
leave, they had lunch made. amazing. ...its true.

your interest in aviation will keep you young.
the american chap who renewed his grade 1 instrument rating at age 99
is a role model we can all try to emulate.
so dublin_o you think you've had it? .....bull****!!!!

Stealth Pilot

On Sun, 13 Apr 2008 23:32:51 -0700 (PDT), "
wrote:

On Apr 13, 9:08 pm, "dublin_o" wrote:
I am going to gather up the tools and the list and show my grandson how to
build the box, my grandfather did this for me and I still have the box, but
now it has misc parts in it for my router.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Good for you!

As a project, it's pretty easy. The secret is that you only have to
lay-out three rows of holes. Once drilled, the three parts are then
used as drill-guides for all of the other holes except for the
handles, hinges & fittings.

Once the builder understands the principle, the work goes very
quickly.

veedubber that is the key part.
the kids these days dont seem to have been taught the way we were.
we got taught the core principles and how they were applied.

the kids now seem to be taught an endless passage of superficial
details with little structure and none of the core issues explained.

when we were kids the old man built a duck boat with us. it is a free
plan somewhere on a web site these days. it is a slab sided ply thing
that looks 1950's but is actually a magic little boat to use. it is a
really good design. I conjured up a single seat 80% size version of it
out of one sheet of plywood, calculated the bouyancy as workable, and
built it. the kids saw it almost complete and the nipper (about to
become an airforce pilot) admitted that he had no idea how you would
go about designing the little boat.

the thing that you do masterfully veedubber is write in a manner that
is entertaining and interesting. you need to keep doing this.

what the rest of us need to do is enthrall the kids with what we do,
get them involved hands on, gradually reveal to them how things work
and how people go about designing them. above all we need to instill
in the kids that everything complex is made up of little individual
components that are build one after the other and then assembled into
the more complex thing.

we old farts who understand these things have an important legacy to
pass on to the kids. we have to do this because they arent going to
get the skills any other way.

Stealth Pilot

(for the life of me I couldnt remember the boat's name. google is my
saviour! the design is called Pintail and is available free from
http://www.svensons.com/boat/?p=RowBoats/Pintail
for anyone wanting to build woodworking skills with a view to aircraft
building it would be a good safe start. It's where I started.)

warning: this is a long post and has little to do with airplanes

I lost my Dad on March 20, 2006, rather suddenly after a long illness.
He had worked as an A & P for Petroleum Helicopters for 35 years, most
of them bending wrenches. And of course that meant that if it had an
engine and 4 wheels, we were under it or up to our armpits in it at
least once a month. I can't even count the number of times he was
waiting for me at the bus stop with his usual "Good, ur home... I need
ur help" which I cursed repeatedly since I hadn't even made it to the
door of the house before being pressed into service as a lamp post.
"Shine ur light down in here... and quit wiggling dammit." My Old Man
was something of an S.O.B. It always amazed me how he kept his job,
considering the things that came out of his mouth when we worked on
cars. And it seemed that the older I got, the worse things got between
us. I was never really sure why. But I went off to college and got my
B.A. etc. Big deal to my Old Man.

But then I started to make things. First a small wooden boat about the
size of a kayak... in the living room of my apartment. And then flying
machines cobbled together from bamboo and "viz-queen" and duct tape.
And then they started to fly. My Old Man showed a little interest. And
two years later, I tore apart an overworked minivan and replaced a
rear main oil seal... on a front-wheel-drive. We'd done that one once
before, when I was 14, but that was on a RWD car. The Old Man was
almost impressed. Then I started building the Wright machine. I had
planned to unveil it to my folks in Kitty Hawk and fly it. But that
dream was bigger than I was, and we never made it there. Two months
after that failure, the Old Man, who had had diabetes for years and
still smoked a pack a day was forced onto dyalisis every other day. I
knew what that meant, even then.

But a few weeks after that, I got a call from the folks at the CAF
about thier Houston show. Houston was only about 4 hours from my
folks' house so I asked for comp-passes for them. Pop made it in for
the Saturday show. We spent about 2 hours inspecting the flying
machine and discussing the various parts and systems. I could see that
the kidney failure was really taking a toll on him, but he stayed
through the entire show. In the middle of the afternoon, a man stopped
by and asked if Pop had built the glider. Pop looked up and said
"no... my son built it." The man said, "Wow, its really nice" and Pop
said, "yea, it really is." And to me, that one moment made all the
difference.

A few days after Pop passed, we got the coriner's report. The results
set me back. The official cause of death was listed as accute
congestive heart failure, as a result of kidney failure, as a result
of diabetes, as a result of agent orange poisioning. Pop had be
drafted in 1967. He went to Vietnam, served in the 2nd Bat., 94th
Artillery at Camp JJ Carroll, came home, and said almost nothing about
it. Except once or twice that he'd shelled Khe Sanh or Hue or Cong
Thien. He had worked steadily as an A & P for 35 years without saying
much about it.

After Pop passed, I learned why he didn't talk about the war, and how
he'd kept his job. Pop was at Camp Carroll during the worst of the Tet
offensive, and his battle record read like a list of newspaper
headlines. Pop was also one of the most respected (maybe not well-
liked, but respected) mechanics in his company, as I learned from
stories told about him. And when we burried him, I sent him off the
way he had lived: with a pack of smokes, my Zippo, and his 9/16" box-
end wrench, without saying much about it. I kept his other tools...
and his toolboxes, for myself. Like he wanted it. And now, two years
later, what I have left are a few memories, a halfa' life's worth of
skills and experience, and that toolbox.

Scott David Frey
"some people call me Harry"
Wright Brothers Enterprises

I have been reading great stories from y'all about how your Fathers or
Grand-dads were good mechs and passed it on to you, willingly or
not...and now rather later, you have the skills and appreciation.

Here is the rest of the story. Or at least another side of it.

My Dad was not too close to us kids nor us to him, only long after he
died and I was (am) his age when I was a boy do I now understand
better. He was not much at all of a handyman though had a few simple
tools.

Somehow I always liked airplanes and started with the plastic models
(Revell, Monogram) eventually moving on to first u-control gas
models, then R/C. This was the late '60s to early '70s so the gadgets
were not cheap like now. My brother and I did this entirely on our
own, Dad being even less in the picture. I learned a very modest
amount of craft techniques from this.

Around age 12 or 13 I saw plans in Pop Mechanics for a
land sail-cruiser, sort of like a go-cart but powered with a sail.
This caught my fancy--anything involving the air did--and I determined
to build it. But I had no skill or knowledge, hardly any tools except
what was in the household cardboard box--hammer, screwdriver, etc.
Nevertheless off I went. Purchased the materials at the local
hardware store and began to stumble through it. Absolutely ignorant
about fittings, consulted with the hardware store guys, but finally at
some point could go no further. Left it half-built. Don't know why
that sticks with me still today.

Took metal and wood shop in high school and learned something: with
some instruction, and taking time, I could make something with
quality. Might be slow about it but the result would not embarrass
me.

Continued building the R/C models, got my PP-ASEL at age 20 and
finally bought my own plane at age 46--an Aircoupe. And got the bug
for something faster so last December sent the money in for an RV-9A
Quick Build. Have a few more skills than from 40 years ago. But
still remember that if I take my time and ask for advice it will be a
good ending.

Don't know how all that fits into an Apprentice Toolbox. Too bad for
kids growing up in the suburbs today. Gotta be driven everywhere,
can't be allowed to think for themselves. Too many damn
temptations. WTH.
--
Monarchy degenerates into tyranny, aristocracy into oligarchy, and
democracy into savage violence and chaos.
~ Polybius

On Mon, 14 Apr 2008 19:39:48 -0700, Bob Fry
wrote:


Don't know how all that fits into an Apprentice Toolbox. Too bad for
kids growing up in the suburbs today. Gotta be driven everywhere,
can't be allowed to think for themselves. Too many damn
temptations. WTH.

nobody is born with these skills.
some are taught as part of life's experiences. some have the harder
yards of teaching themselves.

I can still remember the old man ****ing himself laughing at something
I was finding difficult to saw. I had the blade in the hacksaw
backwards ...accidently. other than that he was ok.

most of my skills I've learnt by teaching myself. actually bill hannan
used to put an old estonian proverb in his peanuts books.' the work
will teach you how to do it'. it does, helped by the rubbish bin of
quality assurance.

I always feel sorry for the 'gee you're lucky' brigade that have never
dared to fail and thus have never tried.

guys we're doing ok.

Stealth Pilot