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I got a phenomenal response to my request for input on this newsletter. Thanks to all who messaged me. Turns out, an overwhelming number of you like the newsletter the way it is and simply offered encouragement. I also got several excellent suggestions for new features which I’ll be rolling out in the coming weeks. Keep those cards and letters coming!
How to Restore Yellowed Clear Plastic
In this quick Tested video, Adam Savage sets out to restore the lid of a gorgeous vintage Nagra IV-S audio recorder he recently acquired. The machine is in surprisingly good condition, but the clear plastic cover was scratched and badly yellowed. Doing research, he found many recommendations for using 12% hydrogen peroxide. He tried it with partial success. He discovered that finishing it up with plastic polishing compound returned it to something close it is original glory.
Making a Cheap, Simple Air Cleaner for a Small Shop
In this I Build It video, John shows how he made a simple and inexpensive air cleaner for his small woodshop. The air cleaner was made from little more than a small fan, a piece of duct piping, some scrap ply, and a several shop vac air filters. I love the way it can be expanded (with additional filters) via a threaded rod that holds the filters in place.
IKEA Wrenches on Your Pegboard
I just discovered a use for all of those hex wrenches that come with IKEA and other flat-pack furniture. They make perfect pegboard pegs!
Oil Can!
The tin man in dire need of maintenance.
The other day, while oiling a squeaky hinge with some lithium grease, I flashed on my granddad. A consummate tinkerer and inventor, Gramps was obsessed with maintenance. He frequently had his spring-bottom oiler in hand, blue shop rag tangling from his back pocket, going around the house, the yard, his backyard workshop, the car, lovingly maintaining the machinery of his life. I decided in that moment to try and be better at doing the same. Moments later, on Twitter, I saw this Kurt Vonnegut quote: “Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance.” Exactly. OIL CAN!
Maker Slang
Slang, jargon, and technical terms for the realms of making things.
Crown pulley – A pulley designwhere the center has a larger diameter than the outer edges, thus a “crown.” Perhaps counter-intuitively, the belt on the pulley will always seek the area of highest tension, returning it to the crown. Via Maker Update.
Promptcrafting – In AI art, it’s all about the quality of the prompts you craft. The better your invocation, the better the magic that gets returned.
Rewilding your attention – Writer Clive Thompson has been promoting the creative benefits of exposing yourself to the novel, the offbeat, the serendipitous. Look beyond what the online algorithms feed you – rewild your attention!
Shop Talk
As stated in the intro, I received many fabulous emails from you, dear readers. Here is one from Paul Cryan. Look for some tips from Paul in a coming issue!
“Thanks for doing all you do. Your tip books [Ed: Vol 1, Vol 2.] are great and I’m really enjoying the newsletter. I bought and devoured both of your books, in Kindle and PDF formats. I refer to them often and having the search function (via either the Kindle app or iBooks, respectively) is really handy. Every few days, I find myself looking at objects in new ways and going back to your references. This past Friday, I didn’t have a clamp within getting-up-from-my-chair distance at my office desk, so I ended up using a pair of pliers and a rubber band to hold together a plastic part I was gluing. Thanks for putting that seed in my head.
“The only problem I have with the weekly newsletter is that it gives me way too many things to think about and try per unit of time!
“With your tips books, I’ve got months to read through them and try things out. This week, I experimented with the lanolin mineral oil mixture to rustproof tools out of your latest tips book and it seems to hold much more promise than Johnson’s Paste Wax for keeping my old restored Shopsmiths looking and working great. I still need to test whether the stickiness can be buffed sufficiently off the power-tool surfaces to avoid particles grabbing, but so far so good. And who doesn’t like that faint smell of ungulates on their metal? 😉
“With the newsletter, I’m interested in just about everything you cover, which leads me to a weekly frenzy of investigation and implementation. Within the past month I’ve upgraded our broken sink strainers to the OXO type (love them), picked up a Williams ratcheting screwdriver (my new favorite ‘good enough’ tool), and bought Fat Boy pencils and FastCap markers that have me wondering how I didn’t know about these things before. And now I’m browsing saw blades!”
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I use Wise.com on a weekly basis for international business transactions with low fees, as do most of the people I know running online businesses. So there was a burst of excitement this week when they announced that their multi-currency debit card would be available to US account holders again after cutting us off years ago. Turns out the terms are terrible though, like a 2% fee every trip to the ATM or 2% plus $1.50 if you withdraw 3+ times in one month. Here’s my full take on it: The New Wise Debit Card is a Dud.
Who Drinks the Most Beer?
The Visual Capitalist site always has some fun charts and infographics packed with information. One of the latest is a rundown of beer consumption per capita around the world. If this were a World Cup of Beer, the Europeans would dominate. The Czechs drink almost 50% more than the silver medalist Austria and the next 10 contenders beyond that are all European. Panama is a surprise after that, drinking 81 liters per adult per year, barely edging out Bulgaria and Mexico. Gabon and South Africa rate higher than any Asian nation, with Cambodia being tops on that continent. Australia (#24) and the UK (#25) must be tipping fewer pints these days and craft beer heaven USA is in the passing lane: #27 with 61 liters per year.
Four Destinations to Avoid
When Tony Wheeler gives his opinion on something travel-related, people listen. As the founder of Lonely Planet, the guy who wrote their first guidebooks, he’s earned plenty of respect. In an article titled, “I’m Not Going There Anymore,” he runs down four destinations he won’t return to in their current state. Two of them I’ve never visited and probably won’t: Russia and Saudi Arabia. One I haven’t returned to since the ‘90s because I know it would make me cry: Bali. The last one I have no choice on because I’ve got friends and family there—the USA—but I can’t argue with anyone who has sworn it off for the next few years.
Travel Abroad, Work From Your Home Network
None of us has tried this, but Mark F. of sister newsletter Recomendo sent me this intriguing service for remote corporate workers who want to make it look like they’re still at the home office in Austin, not logging in from Auckland while traveling. Called KeepYourHomeIP.com, this service lets you “work remotely and still appear to be working from home, ensuring that your Internet access is secure and private. This means that your traffic cannot be identified as originating from a VPN service…” At less than $500 for the business option and no subscription fees, it seems like a great solution.
A weekly newsletter with four quick bites, edited by Tim Leffel, author of A Better Life for Half the Price and The World’s Cheapest Destinations. See past editions here, where your like-minded friends can subscribe and join you.
The tin man in dire need of maintenance.
