Tools you Treasure

...I still have the very first micrometer I bought when I was an apprentice Fitter / Turner back in '64; iirc it cost me about a weeks wages...£3 10s 6d ( £3-52p ) paid for on 'tick' on a weekly basis, 1s ( 5p ) a week,...

FWIW... at todays prices it would be...



​... Dual scale irrelevant in todays digital age what with digi mic's & callipers but it brings back memories.

George.

During World War 2 my father was an RAF electrician, and he was seconded to the Americans to fit British radios to the B17 bombers. For this purpose they gave him the B17 toolkit, and they refused to take it back when the task was finished - so he brought it home. I still have some of it, mainly ring spanners and a couple of screwdrivers, but my favourite item was a hand drill with a gearbox, on one setting of which the chuck always turned clockwise no matter in which direction the hand wheel was turned. This was very handy for drilling holes in awkward corners. Alas, it wore out some time in the 1990s, after serving my dad, then me, for around 50 years. This was a favourite tool, and I wish I could get another one.

My first micrometer cost me 2/6 Half a Crown in 1962, it's a DCMT, as avertised in ME in the 1940/50s. Made in England, and made cheap, no ratchet, moderately accurate, a bit better than calipers and a steel rule.

Ian S C