I dropped it

Well at last I realised how to stop me bridgeport quill from tightening when drilling and making things stiff and loosing sensitivity. The spring clip which used to be used got in the way n I had a brainwave. Fit a spring washer! Remove lock and find it’s a pair of shaped collets. Oh a very light spring will do the job between the collets.

find long soft spring. Stand in front of machine and cut flat end off and chop a short length. Put it in position.. it works. Brilliant

where’s the spring? Must be on the floor, I’m sure I saw it fall. Grrr not again....

out comes the torch from me pocket where it lives to direct the spring hunt

on me knees yet again. ( perhaps the third time today) hunting fir the spring to put away.
new brainwave. And the request. I need a Heath Robinson type of inventor to design and patent a raising floor I press a button, or wind a crank to raise the floor up to waist level so that I can pick up the frequently dropped item without having to get on me hand and knees with all the problems of getting up again.

any offers?

ps I didn’t find the spring

found an hour later sat in my overall pocket where it was caught by the gremlins.

My Vet Collge had a large animal operating suite with a very large padded table where sections could be removed to allow operator closer access and the whole thing could also be tilted either way to near verticle. A thing of beauty but even a poor man's version would be pricey to create.

I do have a simpler answer for you, though. A simple tripod walker surrounding your body (one leg each side and a stabiliser to the rear) with a waist strap to hold you into a hooped rod that gimbles on each lateral. Whenever you drop something then simply pull a locking pin and go inverted

pgk

Zane,

My late Great Uncle was a watch repairer and I still have his old bench somewhere down in my cellar. It has a small strip of wood around the edges forming a wall to stop items being fed to the gremlins. Essential as he was disabled and probably impossible for him to scrabble around on the floor. Never met him personally as he snuffed it the year I was born, over 70 years ago! Also get/make a magnetic pickup or a 3 prong claw on springs device, probably Proops flog that sort of thing and it will grab all non magnetic items. Bigger/heavier items could be dealt with by a common litter picker/helping hand. I have in the past just used a thin section 2ft steel bar with a magnet stuck by it's own power to the bottom or business end. BTW, I also have an extending tube device with a mirror on the end, complete with led light. Have used all these devices in anger over the years, with emphasis on anger and frustration! And much bad language. Hope above suggestions prove helpful.

John

I have a big magnet on a telescopic rod which I wave about at the drop zone and this has saved me quite a few times

Don't drop anything aluminium and you'll be fine

I need a Heath Robinson type of inventor to design and patent a raising floor I press a button, or wind a crank to raise the floor up to waist level

First of all you need a floor that tilts - so that anything that has been dropped will roll to the lower corner.🙂

I always think the issue is that dropped items always drop and then move to a different unexpected location. Now if we could persuade them to move to where we are looking we could find them easily.

My suggestion is to mount your floor above an array of subwoofers. The subwoofers will induce large vibrations in the floor and cause the dropped items to jiggle. By controlling the amplitude and phase of the vibrations across the floor it would be possible to cause the items to migrate to where you wish to look.

Some background reading on how it works https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Chladni

I used to find that trouser turnups were very useful for catching dropped items. I no longer have turnups on my trousers so I recently put down some cheap laminate flooring in my workshop. It's much easier to keep clean but things dropped on it tend to bounce and skitter. The solution has turned out to be surprisingly simple - when I drop something I make a mental note of where it fell and look somewhere else.

If it's something heavy or with sharp corners it's easier to see where it fell - I just look for the scar in the flooring.

George B.

One of these and/or these.

Essential for any shop.