San Angelo Bar

They Won't Sell You a Beer at This San Angelo Bar!

Although their name sounds more like somewhere you might catch a Los Lonely Boys¹ gig of a Saturday Night, San Angelo bars are pretty much as far from beer halls as you can imagine. Sometimes called a "rock bar" (also a venue where you might see Los Lonely Boys play, I guess), a San Angelo bar is essentially a seventeen-pound steel pencil. You can't buy a drink at one and you most likely won't hear any music, but when it comes to prying out a rock or busting through a hard streak when you're digging a post hole, you sure can't beat one.

Post holes are exactly why I have one - digging new holes and busting the cement out of old ones. I’m talking situations like a recent fence repair, courtesy of a 60-mph wind and a string of rotten, 20-year-old posts…. not to mention 95-degree heat.

Mine is the classic San Angelo bar design manufactured by Ludell Tool. A drop-forged steel bar with a one-inch hexagonal cross-section, it's seventy inches long and came painted with dark green enamel (newer bars are black). One end is pointed, as if the bar had been plugged into a super-sized (and super-tough) pencil sharpener. The opposite end is flattened into a dull chisel point 2½" wide. All told, it weighs seventeen pounds. Because it’s long and solid, a San Angelo bar is perfect for prying loose a heavy rock you encounter when digging. The pointy end can pierce dense, hard layers of soil, which is especially useful for digging post holes. Seventeen pounds of hardened steel launched two or three feet onto that point does a fine job on tough soil layers: a former neighbor once punched through what he thought was rock with his rock bar only to realize he'd poked a hole in the top of his septic tank!

Your Legs and Back Will Say "Thanks!" for Some Anti-Fatigue Mats

The older you get, the more obvious it becomes that no other floor is quite so unforgiving as a bare concrete slab. Even cheap vinyl tile has a little give. Unfortunately, most workshops are found in basements or garages, with floors of - you guessed it - bare concrete. If you find yourself standing for hours on end on hard flooring at work or in your hobby space, then your back, knees and hips will probably start aching about the time you hit your mid-fifties. You owe it to your skeleton to find some sort of cushioning to put underfoot.

If your joints and back are achy after a day in your workshop, an anti-fatigue mat may be just what the doctor (or chiropractor) ordered. You can create shop-built wooden platforms for stations like your drill press or band saw or buy commercial versions. A key advantage of the commercial mats is that many have beveled edges to reduce tripping hazards and to make it easier to roll equipment across them. On the other hand, they are sometimes fairly expensive.

Equipment Essentals for Field Geology

Many geologists chose the field because they enjoy being outdoors in quiet places (like the roadcut along I-70 west of Denver?), but day after day - or week after week - spent climbing limestone cliffs and bushwhacking through forests means that your favorite geologist is going to need some gear. That's beyond the essential tools of the trade, but I'll get there, too.

What to Wear: Let's Start at the Ground

Field geologists don't spend their days sitting around: they spend most days on their feet, often nowhere near a trail. Solid hiking boots are an absolute essential: sneakers just won't cut it. Choose boots that go over the ankle for the extra support and have tough, deep-lug soles for the added traction. This is one item to splurge on if possible, because your hiking boots will be a long-term commitment and they absolutely must be comfortable.

Universal Forest 3 Step Stair Stringer

You Don't Botch Your Notches with Pre-Cut Stair Stringers

The 1895 farm house we owned in Illinois had porches galore: most houses don't have that many doors, let alone exterior doors. More than a century of benign (and occasionally malignant) neglect took its toll on those porches, though, just in time for yours truly to be called on to repair them. The porch we used most - the one at the kitchen door - was in such bad condition it looked like a lawsuit in waiting, so our second year in the house I tackled it head-on. It wasn't the toughest project of the summer, but it also wasn't the easiest. The ledger by which the porch attached to the house remained sound, but that was it. Everything else was toast: frame, deck, railings and stairs. And when I peeled off the old stair treads, I found those gorgeous old cedar stringers were in no condition to be re-used. Oh, dear...

CRL Red Devil Window Zipper

Take This, Window-Painting Idiots!

Repeat after me, everyone "There is a special spot in Hell for anyone who paints a windows shut." I’m specifically envisioning the people who used to own my house burning... Oh, sure, I know it’s almost impossible to paint a window, either the inside or the outside, without painting it shut. In other words, that special place in Hell should be reserved for whoever paints a window and then doesn’t bother to unseal it (including my previous owners, of course).

If you've ever lived in an older house or apartment and learned you couldn’t open windows that had been sealed with a layer or six of old paint, don't be concerned because there’s an easy solution: the CRL (Red Devil) Window Zipper. Usually you’re reduced to tapping the all-purpose putty knife into the space surrounding the frame, but the Window Zipper is specially designed for this job and this job alone.

Craftsman Air Tool Oiler 16309

Oil Air Tools the Smart, and a Little Lazy Way

The owner's manual of every air tool includes instructions on lubrication; usually something like

"place a few drops of oil into the air inlet every day" for most tools (paint sprayers excluded); maybe one or two drops if it's a grinder. So you're sure to get the point, most manufacturers include a two-ounce bottle of oil along with their nail guns, air hammers, and orbital sanders. For continuous-use tools, though, like grinders and sanders, manufacturers recommend that using in-line oilers. The moisture in compressed air has a tendency to rust the bearings and vanes of these tools, making them prone to problems, even with in-line filters.

That's why every time I hook up an air tool to my compressor - especially here on the humid Gulf Coast - there's a Craftsman 16309 Air Tool Oiler in the line; even if it's a nailer instead of a grinder.

Basin Wrenches

Before You Change that Next Faucet, Pick up a Basin Wrench

Unless you've done something more than the simplest of plumbing jobs, you probably still grumble about how much a plumber's time is worth, at least according to their bills. If, however, your "vast" experience goes beyond installing a new valve or flapper in your toilet tank or replacing a leaky faucet washer, you may know better. Once you get beyond the jobs you can complete standing up, you start to appreciate the skill of trained plumbers; perhaps even more so a trained plumber's collection of tools.