History Ever come across a tool that you lost...

I once lost a set of pliers under the hood of a car and found them again about 8 months later when it came back for service.

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I'll play , couldn't find my crowbar for the life of me , my friends Saturn trans goes bad , time to junk the car..asks me to assist him clean out the car..I find it , the crowbar buried under a ton of crap in the trunk and he says..hey that's my crowbar.....yeah right....it had a Yellow stripe my brother painted on it....nice fellow , however I won't lend him anymore tools.....

 

I was in U-pullit and left a 1oo piece screw driver bit case. Was reading a thread on the HAMB about a guys trip to the junkyard. I see an old Dodge truck in the pic`s. I mentioned I took the registration and door tag and outside door handles. He said he found a set of bits in the snow. I thought that`s where I left them. I see him occasionally at shows, he says he needs to return them to me. I tell him there`s no need, Kind of got rusty sittin in the snow. My replacement set is much better.

 

I go to Ez-pull & save junkyard every spring and fall the day before Carlisle.
I got home from Carlisle and was missing a little 10 mm combination wrench. I searched the tool boxes and could not find it. Six months later I bought a replacement at the next Carlisle. Another six months later I was going to my car at Ez-pull and looked down and found my original wrench lying in the dirt of the parking lot. It still had the little orange price sticker from the vendor I had bought it from several years before! Now I have two 10 mm wrenches to choose from when I work on my OT car.

 

When I was in kindergarden my Dad bought me a 1/4 " snap-on combination wrench, I cherished that wrench and would show it to my buddies, well of course I managed to lose it and he got me another one, after I lost the second one that was the last. I still lose tools at a regular rate, like others have said I would need a large tool box to store all the tools I've lost since that first 1/4 " wrench in 1963!

 

Years ago, a customer drove in the yard, laughing at me because I'd left a pair of vice grips holding a mudflap in place that I'd installed. When I bent down to retrieve the visegrips, the was another pair of visegrips clamped to the E brake cable. I asked him if he'd had his brakes worked on lately and he said Bill had worked on them. I removed that pair too and told him to give those back to Bill next time he sees him. We all do it.

 

I've lent a few things out ,because I'm a nice guy so we will start with my brand new eng hoist my buddy needed it bad so being nice sure take Cate of it but I need it back in a few days to yank a motor. Well 2 month s pass nothing ,then two more I finally said screw it I need my crap drove down to his place 2 hours south. There's a eng hoist sitting in his front yard rusted to hell ,so I'm thinking dang why not just fix this instead of borrow mine . Well he comes out,said man I was just getting ready to use it so me being a nice guy I said ok let's pull the motor then I'll take my lift home ,I told him I had a fly I would give home for his lift ,he says I don't have a cherry picker ,I said who's is that one there .... Yours ! Haven't talked to him since .
So the next one is my snap on scope ,the little camera with the cord you can see inside engs,trans ,rears this was the expensive one $450 .Anyways my best friend said can I borrow this I need to see if I got a hole in a piston ,sure go for it I knew he was good for it if he broke it. Well I forgot all about it because I got in a bad car accident and he had it for 3 years I finally got my tools back from my work and was fuming thinking someone stole it finely one day me and him were hanging around his garage and I see the manual for the scope I said you bastard you have my scope ,he said man that was yours I couldn't remember where I got it from so I was happy I was getting it back ,so he finely says hate to tell you this but I didn't need it anymore so I sold it . So long story short I made off with his brand new angle grinder after he went in because he said he couldn't pay me back . No tools leave my garage anymore without a deposit if someone needs something I make them leave me a gun as collateral so if they keep my tool I keep there gun . I get my stuff. Back all the time now .

Ok last one I borrowed my father in-laws easy out/reverse drill bit set . I broke most every drill bit (long story was a horrible day let's just say someone was already in there and broke off something very hard in the stud I was drilling out) anyways I pack his tools up and set them "somewhere safe " I'm sure you guys have done this before well they were so safe I couldn't find them when I went to bring them back to him . So he buys a new set and sends me the bill of course. Well 5 months later I'm out in my shed taking inventory of the car that's in there and there's the stupid easy out set sitting on the car . So I put them in my pocket and head in stuck them in the garage ,went in to get my keys to trade his set for the new set I bought (it's only fair right) well went back out and couldn't remember where I set them down ,after 3 hours I found them sitting on my welder (both the same color red) but I got them back to there owner only 5 months and a few hours later . I hate forgetting stuff

 

Most of the tools that I "lost" in fact actually went through an "involuntary ownership change".

 

I think all the lost 1/2-9/16 wrenches and sockets are in a giant room somewhere staring at all the unmated socks and right handed gloves.

 

Yup, I have more than one tool I've lost then discover them and wonder where and why I bought it!
Is this a hoarding issue?
Do we need to see someone about it?
Are there meds we can take to prevent it?

 

2935 - there's no cure, only the HAMB for support. Do you really want a cure?

 

I loaned a friend my angle grinder, forgot about it, moved out of the area. 15 years later on a visit, I saw my angle grinder. I said "Hey, that's my angle grinder." His reply: "Well, you said I could use it until I was done with it. I'm still not done with it." I took it.
As far as accountability goes for those of you that loan tools out. Try this. Now that we all have cell phones with cameras on them, just take a picture of the borrower holding the tool. You now have a permanent record and he knows that you do.

 

No, No, and No..I bought a good pair of snap ring pliers to use on trans bearing retaining snap rings back in early 70's...I know where I used them last, in the middle of the cellar on the floor taking a trans apart in early 80's..When I went to put the trans together about a week later they were gone; I thought I left them there on the floor with the trans parts I wasn't going to re use..Gone for good I guess as I moved out of that house in late 80's and cleaned the cellar to bare bones and they still didn't show up..I was only about 33 years old at the time, losing stuff still happens, shows up eventually in the yard or wrong place in the tool box or under something else on the bench..

 

Ok.....no cure!

 

Cleaning my desk today and found lots of things tools, letters, a tool post design that I for some reason.

So I started a garage box along with a papers to be sorted box.

 

When I was a kid on the farm my Dad would come out of the barn all mad, yelling at us because one of his wrenches (or something) was missing off the peg above the workbench and of course it was us "damn kids" that wound never put them back after borrowing them. So we go look for the tool, first place we'd look it where ever Dad was working last and 9 time out of 10 there the tool would be! Take it back and he would just grunt something and go back to work. Years later I was in the barn, noticed he had painted all his tools a bright orange. I asked him what that was about, he said it was so he could see them when they were "lost" Guess after we were gone he had no one else to blame and had to admit it was his own bad habits!
Every once in a while I'll grab a tool out of my box and it will have remnants of orange paint on it, a tool I got when we closed out Dad's estate. Make me think of him, been 10 years and I still miss him.

 

Speaking of "kids losing things" back on the farm....
When I got to the age where I was physically able, one of my assigned tasks was to grind a jag of ear-corn for the milk cows every (damn) Saturday...rain, snow, didn't matter.
SOP for hooking up implements, etc was to leave the hitch pin with said implement; in this case, the hammer-mill.
My Dad, brother, and I followed this unspoken rule so that we'd always have a pin for hookup.
Looked all over for that pin and couldn't find it. Went to the shop and got a heavy bolt for a substitute.
Put that in, got the PTO shaft of the hammer-mill hooked up. Walked around to the side of the tractor and pushed the foot clutch down with my arm to engage the PTO. SLOWLY let the clutch out and pulled the throttle down to full open.
Within seconds that mislaid pin made its presence known. "Someone" had laid on the in-feed apron and it went right into the maw of that hammer-mill.
Most gawd-awful noises emitted from that machine until I could get around to disengaging the PTO.
I was anticipating a royal a$$ chewing when I had to confront Dad about it.

He never said a word. That afternoon he went to "the city" and got new hammers. Not cheap.
We changed out the broken hammers with not much of anything being said.
It didn't dawn on me 'till later, that he was the one that left the dang pin in the trough.

 

I bought a small pair of channel lock type pliers back in 1966. I lost them sometime in the 80's. Years later,I was at my uncles house doing something in his garage with him and there they were! Apparently I left them there when we had installed his garage door. Anyway, they seemed to disappear again until my brother and I were cleaning up the tool box in my truck. Believe it or not, I have had these pliers for 50 years!!!!

 

Years ago when I lived in Wisconsin I lost a favorite box end wrench.....moved to North Carolina for one year, then to Kankakee Ill....after I was in Kankakee for about three years, I was messing around on the front end of my truck, found it laying under in front of the radiator support on the sheet metal.. All those miles and it just laid there waiting to laugh at me...

 

I have a small black board in my shop. When a friend borrows a tool the tool and his name is put on the black board for everyone to see along with the date. It is removed when tool is returned.
This seems to work great as when the friend comes to my shop he sees his name on tool he has and it reminds him he needs to bring the dam thing back.

 

-I loaned a tool to my next door neighbor, emphasizing it was a loan and that I wanted it back. He was in a jam and the subtext of our conversation was he would get his own (better) tool SOON and return mine... pronto... as the tool would be exposed to the elements for sometime. 9 months later, I still didn't have mine back. I asked him if he ever got his own and he told me..

'yep, right away.'
'What happened to the one I loaned you to get you out of your jam'?
'Ohhh, I was done with it, so I gave it to my brother (who lives 30 miles away)'
'I loaned that to you, I wanted it back. I remember telling you that'
'Ohhh, OK, let me get ahold of my brother'.

That was two-three years ago. My neighbor has 3x the tools I do, but didn't have this one at the time. Neither do I, now... yet I see his replacement almost anytime I want to from my kitchen window. I don't have the nads to just take his. Enough bad blood has formed from his son & friends coming into my yard and doing damage. Love thy neighbor... yahhh right.

Thanks for letting me vent.