Time for a little tool gloat, since I never get any ;(
A long time ago somebody said that the best deals on machining stuff is at the estate sale of a retired machinist. It's no good when they're around-- they remember exactly how much they paid for everything, but once they're gone, the relatives often have no idea what's what and just want it out.
Austin is not a machining mecca; tools are rare here, even beaters, but today I ran across that sale.
They said the guy was a master machinist for IBM. He must have had a dozen vernier height gauges, micrometers galore, depth gauges, DTIs, DIs, end mills, reamers, taps, dies, gear cutters, v-blocks, 123 blocks, sine plates, magnetic vises, magnetic v-blocks, magnetic sine plates, two really nice Gerstner chests, etc, etc. All top quality stuff-- mostly B&S and Starrett. Unfortunately about 80% of it was metric, and while I like metric, I don't work in it much. The estate sale company had a guy that sort of knew what a few things were worth, but the rest... no idea. They took numbers to get in. I got #17 and still came away with a Hardinge dividing head ("what's that?"), thread mic, a couple B&S DTI's (one metric 0 to 0.2mm. Each division is 2um), angle blocks & plates, a sine plate, 4" DI and a raft of clamps, drills, end mills and other bits and pieces.
Tomorrow is half-off day. Unfortunately I won't be there to see what's left
Anybody near Austin that sees this today, drop me a line.
A long time ago somebody said that the best deals on machining stuff is at the estate sale of a retired machinist. It's no good when they're around-- they remember exactly how much they paid for everything, but once they're gone, the relatives often have no idea what's what and just want it out.
Austin is not a machining mecca; tools are rare here, even beaters, but today I ran across that sale.
They said the guy was a master machinist for IBM. He must have had a dozen vernier height gauges, micrometers galore, depth gauges, DTIs, DIs, end mills, reamers, taps, dies, gear cutters, v-blocks, 123 blocks, sine plates, magnetic vises, magnetic v-blocks, magnetic sine plates, two really nice Gerstner chests, etc, etc. All top quality stuff-- mostly B&S and Starrett. Unfortunately about 80% of it was metric, and while I like metric, I don't work in it much. The estate sale company had a guy that sort of knew what a few things were worth, but the rest... no idea. They took numbers to get in. I got #17 and still came away with a Hardinge dividing head ("what's that?"), thread mic, a couple B&S DTI's (one metric 0 to 0.2mm. Each division is 2um), angle blocks & plates, a sine plate, 4" DI and a raft of clamps, drills, end mills and other bits and pieces.
Tomorrow is half-off day. Unfortunately I won't be there to see what's left
Anybody near Austin that sees this today, drop me a line.
