Magnetic Benchtop Tool Holder made from a Speaker

I saw a novel use of a speaker magnet to make a benchtop tool holder and decided to give it a try.

I had some 1/4 threaded rod lying around along with a doughnut speaker magnet, a stripped down speaker housing, nuts and a few fender washers. After looking it over I decided I needed a couple of 5/16x1 1/4 fender washers to finish the project.

I cut about nine or ten inches of threaded rod, then used washers and nuts to clamp the base to the threaded rod followed by the magnet.

The magnet is strong enough to hold a 6 inch crescent wrench, a Phillips screwdriver and a box cutter knife. I haven't weight tested it, but the idea is to have a magnet that is strong enough to hold a typical small tool without being so strong that I have to hold the stand to extract a tool from it. Of course a good trick to minimize a tip-over is to pull the tool down from the magnet before pulling it away.

I find this more of a conversation piece than something I would really use, but this could change over time so I'll let it occupy space on the bench for now. I suppose the thirty five cents it cost me to make something from raw materials makes it worth the effort.

Cardboard Bins Made from Scratch

I needed some bins, and in poking around the web I saw some cardboard ones in a picture. This got me to thinking that the bins would be a good solution for my needs.

I proceeded to investigate the cost and the prices were outside of my budget, plus I had to buy a hundred of them to boot.

This kinda chapped my butt. Chapped Butt Stick is something in short supply around my garage so I set out to sooth the source of irritation.

I sat down and began noodling what I needed to do to make my own. I quickly discovered that it isn't hard to design a cardboard bin, cut the template, and make my own from scrap cardboard.

 It's a bit tough to see, but I drew out the tabs and lines for the folds, plus drew the notches I needed to tuck the flaps into. The key in the design is to account for the thickness of the cardboard when working on fold lines. Once I had the hang of it the design went pretty quickly.

 I then cut and folded together my prototype. I learned that it is important to hammer the fold lines to get straight folds exactly where I wanted them. I used a straightedge and mallet to do this.

 Fits in the drawer exactly the way I wanted it.

 So I made five more of them for that drawer. I discovered that there will occasionally be some cutting and trimming to make them fit if an exact fit is required. A decent pair of scissors did the tweaking nicely.

And here's the completed template waiting for me to make more of that design when I need it. I put the dimensions and uses on the template to make it easier to identify should I ever end up with a collection of them.

It took an hour or so to design the first template, then another hour or so to make a second from the template, test and tweak it. After that, cutting and folding one takes about 5-10 minutes depending on the sharpness of your box cutter and your skill. What I do is simply cut the desired bin directly from the template instead of drawing the lines and using a straightedge to make cuts. I did this by placing my railroad rail/anvil on the template to hold it down as I made cuts. It's much quicker and I had no problems with cutting into the template as I made cuts.

Along the way I noticed that Elmer's Glue would work great if extra strength were needed to keep the bin from coming apart.  Just apply a daub where the tabs fold together and it should make the bin as permanent as any cardboard box can be.

Ahh, another victory over the garage improvement budget!  Total Cost: $0.00

Door Stop Hanger

I spotted a decent  trick to manage door stops at Frets.com and decided to adapt it for my own garage.

His version tethers the door stop to a screw in the garage door making it easy to pick up without bending over.

I didn't need this feature so I simply put a loop of 550 cord through the end of the door stop.  Then I can hang it from the door knob of the door. This way it's easy to find and right where I need it.

It may not be as handy as the tethered method, but I'm just not quite that lazy to not want to bend over to pick up a block of wood. If I change my mind I can always add a bit of string and do it his way.

Benchtop Ruler from a Broken Tape Measure

I've had an old tape measure go out on me and it turned out to be a broken spring. I tossed it into a repurposing bin and thought about what I could do with it for a few days.

Then I hit on a nifty solution. I'll attach it to my project work table.

 Here's the tape attached to the back of my project work table.

And here's a close up of how it's attached. I cut off some brads and nailed right through the metal tape every six inches or so. I like the look and it's a complete no brainer to get the length of something by just pushing it against the tape.

This method can be used on any equipment where quick measuring is important while fiddling with the tape is a pain in the butt. Smaller width tapes are more useful in situations where the tape must lie flat against a surface though so don't just throw out that broken tape measure!