Triumphrat

Kframe

Reading about Sweat's "custom" milkcrate for sitting on while working on the bike got me thinking.
What tools OR common household items have you modified to help you work on your bike easier/smarter?

I've heard of people heating up box end wrenches and bending them so they can fit in a tight area (like a crow's foot), but it's even more interesting hearing about regular old stuff being turned into a job-saving tool.

First thing that I can think of that I've made is a filter wrench out of an old belt, a couple screws, and a piece of 1x2.
Not pretty, but it did the job.
What have you done?
-Kris

geolpilot

Cut off a 24 mm box wrench so it will fit in travel tool kit.

Kframe

Ooo, just had to share another one.
I'm a nurse, and have a few old and/or cheap stethoscopes laying around.
So, I pulled the diaphragm assembly off of one and stuffed a short piece of 1/4" steel rod in the end of the tubing.
Works like a charm when trying to isolate weird noises in an engine.

Sure a lot cheaper than those fancy automotive stethoscopes.
The cheapest medical one can be found for about $5.
(But for $5 you can't hear lung sounds worth ****, that's why I have a Littman MC III now.)
-K

OKcarburetor

I used a bicycle cable housing ferrule and shaped into a homemade D tool.

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"I never vote for anyone. I always vote against."
W.C. Fields

modre

here's a lift I made for $100...one of the handiest things I've ever made...has been in daily use since the welds cooled for motorcycles, tractors, fabrication/welding jacket/coffee parking table. Lifts to 33", drops to about 11". I've had 1000 lbs. on it.



bring the work to eye level and sit takes 80% of the "chore" out of tinkering.

CAPTDON

Spent m-16 cart for D-tool.

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CAPT D

Geoff

Heres one that sometimes works on those brake system nightmares, where nothing seems to work. This works best if you know its going to be a nightmare ahead of time, and do it this way on a dry system.
Buy an old school oiler, a small oil pump with a small reservoir for the oil, clean it real good and fill it with brake fluid. Use a small hose from the nozzle of the oiler to the caliper bleeder and fill the system slowly from the bottom. Keep an eye on the brake system reservoir and stop when the bottom is completely covered, then fill to proper level. Sometimes, I give the system one or 2 pumps to bleed in the conventional matter, just in case, but it rarely if ever needs it
G

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I never wanted to lead, and I never wanted to follow.
I just wanted to ride

Baltobonneville

Medical irrigation syringe and plastic tubing to withdraw fluids such as fork oil and over-filled motor oil.

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Marty
2005 Bonneville Blue 790cc, AI removed, Staintunes, Unifilter, no snorkel, 120/40/Thrux needle/1 shim/3 turns, fly screen, tacho, D9 gauge panel, center stand, Ikon 7610s, Hagon fork springs, gaiters, Pirelli Sport Demons, 3 seats.

Bryan

I've made too many tool's in my time that I can count. However I remember my friends brakes went out up in the Santa Cruz Mountains on Alpine road one time. His brakes faded and at the last second before a long down hill he slammed it into park with a nice grinding of the parking pall. Had we gone any further I think it would have been certain death to us both [or badly injured].

We ended up changing all his brakes {hmmm, what are those doing in the back of the car}. The only tools we had were a very small screwdriver, a 9/16's"wrench, a rock and some logs that were on the side of the cliff we were on. We rolled the car forward onto a log placed under the axle's and stopped the car when the tire's came off the ground. We used more logs to stop the car by chalking the wheels.

Funny what you can come up with in an emergency. I remember the bolts we had to remove were 1/2" so we used the screwdriver as a shim to make the larger wrench fit. We needed that arrangement in order to get the back hubs off the axel's. Then we used the edge of the wrench and a rock to get the axle nut's off the front hub's. Anyone who's used a cold chisel to remove a nut knows what we did.

Looks like the only tool's we made were the log's for a jack and the rock for a hammer but we made it all work to get us down that hill.

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If at first you don't succeed destroy all evidence that you tried.

VR6

I took a used Sawz-All blade, ground the teeth off so it would fit up inside the idle mixture screw hole and then ground it thinner to fit the screws themselves. No taper but straight shoulders to keep from buggering the screws up. The opposite end has the hole for attaching the Sawz-All which I use to run an allen wrench through for leverage. It fits nicely in a wallet.

VR6