Toolboxes
Find more home improvement articles - click here
Toolboxes are a personal thing, and what finds
its way into yours is likely to be reflected in
the type of DIY you like. This guide is primarily
aimed at DIY beginners, perhaps people who have
just taken possession of their first property,
or who have decided to add another string to their
bow. This is aimed at a relatively low budget,
so most of the fancy tools like routers and jigsaws.
Your toolbox will grow with your DIY, and will
include some special tools which have not been
mentioned below. Bear in mind that this guide
is meant to be light-hearted in places.
First things first
For virtually every job you will want to mark
the work out, and ensure that it is straight,
plumb and square. So:
Pencil; an ordinary HB pencil is just right for
the job. If you break the point, you can sharpen
it with a razor knife. You might prefer a carpenters'
pencil, which is rectangular in section, and so
is the lead. This means you can use it for thick
and thin lines. With the lead trimmed to two points,
you can do parallel lines, or follow a wall contour.
If all else fails, in conjunction with a piece
of paper, or even an offcut, it doubles as a primitive
calculating device. A piece of chalk may also
come in handy.
Tape measure; I suggest at least 3 metres, 5 if
you can afford it. Second in usefulness only to
the pencil. When you go off to buy materials for
a project, you will need to know how much to buy.
When you buy it, snap off the belt clip. Only
poseurs wear tape measures on their belts. You
can also check large items and rooms for square
ness (what?) by checking that the diagonals are
equal.
Square; A combination square, has a spirit
level built in. It can be used to mark right angles,
45 degrees, as a depth gauge, and as a ruler.
Plumb line; You can improvise with (e.g.)
a nut and a piece of string, but if you buy one
of the self-chalking ones, you will be glad when
it comes to wallpapering and tiling. They can
also be used for marking straight lines on floors
and ceilings.
Spirit level; In a pinch, you can use a
torpedo level, or the level on your square. Ideally
a 1 metre level is very useful, but quite often
you cannot use one in a confined space, so you
still really need the torpedo type as well.
Safety
The most important consideration in DIY.
Eye protection; a pair of goggles is a good idea
if you are using striking or power tools (anything
which throws up dust or particles).
Gloves; gardening gloves will protect you against
splinters and raw edges of metal. It is a good
idea to have a current tetanus immunisation. This
is available on the National Health, and indeed
if you go to hospital with any sort of cut, the
injection will be given to you as a matter of
routine.
Ear defenders; if you are going to use a Kango
hammer, or tackle a lot of hammer drilling or
a lot of heavy hammering.
Steel toed boots; a good idea if you are going
to be handling (e.g.) paving slabs.
Dust mask; good for nuisance dust, (brick, cement)
but for asbestos it is probably better to find
a professional contractor to do the job. Some
councils do free asbestos removal.
Boiler suit; if you do not have tatty workclothes
one of these is a good investment. There are plastic
semi-disposable ones available from the usual
DIY outlets, or you could get one from an army
surplus shop.
Hat; useful if you are doing overhead work, or
something really dusty. In any case after DIY,
you will probably want a good bath or shower.
Odds & Ends
These are handy on occasion.
Torch; doesn't
need to be a particularly expensive one, but if
the lights go out, or you are trying to see what
is going on in a confined space, it will be invaluable.
If you are feeling rich, a Cyalume lightstick
is an alternative.
Cricket (disposable) lighter; always handy,
especially in conjunction with the next item.
Candle; besides providing light in emergency,
it can be used to lubricate woodscrews and drawer
runners. Also good on wood saws if the cut starts
to bind. Rub the candle onto the sides of the
blade.
WD 40; all sorts of uses, including stopping
your tools going rusty.
Insulating tape; again all sorts of uses,
limited only by your imagination.
Cable ties; another DIY panacea. When pulled
tight with pliers they come close to the holding
power of Jubilee clips. You may find these discarded
in all sorts of places. If you get the blade of
a razor knife under the pawl of the ratchet end,
you can back them off and reuse them.
Extension lead; again, a very useful bit
of kit. If you are working up a ladder, you may
want to fix the end of it to the ladder at a suitable
height, using either the tape or the cable ties,
so that the end of the extension lead does not
keep bashing you in the shins, and the power tool
is easier (and safer) to use. If you intend to
use power tools externally an RCD protector is
a good idea. At the slightest sign of any risk
to the user of the power tool, these interrupt
the electrical supply to the tool.
Picture hooks; sooner or later, you will
want to hang something decorative on the wall.
PVA wood glue; for making sure that the
flatpack furniture you put together stays that
way. All sorts of other uses, of course. Best
used in conjunction with the next two items.
Nails; a bag of assorted nails and pins
can be useful, particularly to hold a workpiece
together while the wood glue sets.
Dowels; short lengths of (usually ) beechwood,
the best ones are grooved, as this allows the
glue to form a really good bond. The best way
to buy your first dowels is as a kit with the
drill and markers. You set the depth collar to
just more than half the length of the dowels,
(or as needed) drill holes in one of the pieces
to join, put the markers in the holes, offer up
the pieces in exactly the position you want and
knock them together firmly. The markers will have
left indentations in the other piece of wood,
which you drill into to match up. put glue in
both sets of holes, drive dowels into one side
and assemble. If it is not going to show, you
can simply drill one deep hole, an dowel the assembled
joint from outside. If you are trying to screw
into the endgrain of a softwood, you can install
a dowel at right angles to the screw in the end
of the appropriate piece of wood.
The Next Step
This is a list of basic tools which allow you
to do simple DIY tasks like assembling flat-pack
furniture, changing fuses and fixing leaky taps.
Razor knife; also called a Stanley knife
in a generic way. Plasplugs do a quite reasonable
disposable one with snap-off blades. When it wears
out or if you lose it, a replacement is not expensive.
Useful for trimming, cutting and much more. Do
not apply too much force with one of these knives
as if it slips you could cut yourself very badly.
For cutting rubber, use dilute fairy liquid as
a lubricant to make the job easy.
Spatula; for scraping off old decor, and
applying filler, among other things.
Pliers; Engineers' pliers. Grip, twist
and cut, but beware if the pliers' grip fails
suddenly, you can nip yourself very painfully.
Screwdrivers; One medium pozidriv, one
medium slot type, and an engineers screwdriver
are the bare minimum. larger posidriv and slot
types are useful, or you may wish to get one of
those drivers with the 6mm hexagonal bits stored
on the handle. An engineers screwdriver has an
8" blade, and a narrow tip. It is excellent
for work on electrical jobs. You may wish to get
one with an insulated shaft, but if you are that
cack-handed, perhaps you ought to stay away from
the electrics. The very cheapest screwdrivers
are made of inferior steel and will not give good
service. You may want to buy a power driver, but
if you do a big job, it may go flat before you
finish. You may also want a mains testing screwdriver,
but check that it does light up when on a live
wire. Otherwise you may think that a circuit which
is live is safe to work on, with potentially lethal
results.
Hammer; avoid the cheapest, as the head
may splinter. A claw hammer is probably the best
for general DIY.
Adjustable spanner; the purists will insist
that only the right spanner should be used on
any nut, but for general DIY, the main tasks for
these will be plumbing tasks, notably changing
tap washers. For this sort of task, bearing in
mind how rarely it gets done, an adjustable will
be adequate. Ideally you would want a 6"
and a 12" adjustable to cover the domestic
plumbing. If you intend to do car maintenance,
then yes, buy a full set of spanners.
Wood saw; probably the best bet is to buy
the cheap hardpoint type, and be prepared to ditch
it when it goes blunt. My local ironminger charges
more than the price of one of these cheapos to
resharpen a saw.
Hacksaw; one of the "junior"
size will probably cope with most of the jobs
you will be tackling.
File; a flat medium-cut file will be useful
for (particularly) cleaning up the edges of the
metal you have cut with the hacksaw. Don't forget
to do both edges as the jagged finish a hacksaw
leaves behind can cause a nasty laceration.
Surform; a useful all-purpose wood tool.
The blades wear out rapidly, so when the tool
starts feeling like hard work, it is time for
a new blade.
Chisel; a wood chisel is likely to be bought
for a specific project, so initially at least,
you could leave this out.
Pump pliers; Enourmous pliers, which again
will probably be bought for a specific job. Alternatively
a pair of stillsons for heavy work.
Shave hook; specially for stripping paint
from complex mouldings. Beware, however that if
they are left lying around, they almost always
have a point facing upwards waiting to ambush
the unwary.
Putting it onto the wall
One of the first DIY tasks is fixing something
to the wall. One of the best ways of achieving
this is to use rawlplugs, as it is more economical
to buy in bulk :
Rawlplugs; No. 8 size, if these are genuine Rawlplug
articles they are colour-coded red. They come
in a "block" of 100.
Supascrews; recognised by the following details;
The heads are usually Posidriv.
They do not taper.
The thread runs all the way to the head.
There are actually two threads, running parallel.
Buy a box of these No.8, 1 1/2" long. The
boxes are usually rather flimsy, so find an old
tupperware container to keep them in.
A hammer drill; the subject of another FAQ I have
written.
Drill bit; a masonry drill bit with a tungsten
carbide bit. These do wear out, so when your progress
into the walls slows down, it is time to get a
new one. It is possible to resharpen them.
Masonry nails; an alternative to rawlplugs,
but they appear to be falling out of favour these
days.
Power tools
Heat gun; a much safer alternative to the blowtorch,
this softens gloss paint so that it can be scraped
off prior to redecoration. can also be used for
lighting barbecues, and in a pinch, for soldering
pipes.
Steamer; for stripping wallpaper. Not everything
the television adverts would have you believe.
Better to pierce the wallpaper with a rowel, paint
it with dilute wallpaper paste, and keep damping
it down for a couple of hours, when it will come
off easily. Plasplugs make a scraper which looks
not unlike a jackplane.
Hoover; if you have just acquired a place,
and will be doing some serious DIY, the dust will
be bad for your normal domestic vacuum cleaner.
Sacrifice your old one, (and buy a shiny new one)
or buy one from a second hand shop. If you are
feeling rich, buy a shop vac with water capability.
You'll wonder how you coped without one before.
Jigsaw; nice, but probably not for the
beginner.
Router; if you really like working with
wood, and pride forbids you buying flatpacks.
Angle grinder; a very capable, but potentially
very dangerous tool. Make sure you use the right
sort of disc. Stone for stone, metal for metal.
The large 9" size have a quite intimidating
torque-kick when they start up, but as long as
you are careful, they are superb. ALWAYS wear
eye protection when you use one. In the first
instance, hire one. The 4.5" size are increasingly
affordable.
John Schmitt john49@mdx.ac.uk
|
