Where is it written that you have to put your classic vehicle away just because the leaves have fallen and there’s snow in the forecast? Bucking the trend of garage-bound classics is a new wave of vintage vehicles that offer year-round enjoyment. Whether it’s conquering rugged terrains or cruising through […]
We live by a certain saying around Eastwood and that is “You can Never Have Too Many Tools”. It’s true, we’re always looking for new tools to make a job and our lives easier. We’ve done a pretty good job over the years of putting together an impressive catalog of unique tools that will make your friends jealous. I decided to go through our long list of tools and give you my top 10 must-have tools that you need in your garage or your tool box.
A retro looking dash for a 60’s Chevy truck will cost you about $400+, that’s a lot to spend on just the dash. Depending on your gauge layout there is another affordable option that will not only retain a classic original look, it will also allow the use of modern gauges. In this article I’ll show you how to retrofit modern gauges into an original cluster by only making a few minor modifications to the factory hardware.
An air compressors is a tool, specifically it is a tool to run other tools, unless you just need a volume of air compressed for a SCUBA tank or to inflate a tire. What sort and how big of a compressor you need is going to depend a lot on what sort of tools you need to run with it. A body shop running DA sanders and a paint booth all day long needs a much more robust compressor than an engine shop running impact guns and occasionally a media blast booth.
A plasma cutter is a life saver for irregular shapes or thicker metal. Sure they are much more expensive than mechanical cutting tools, but for really complicated shapes and cut-outs nothing is faster and easier than a plasma cutter.
The rusty trailing arms on my 1963 C-20 were about as bad as they come, so much so I could reach my hand through some of the rust holes. About a year ago I stenciled out 3/16″ plate and welded them on both sides of the arms in order to regain structural rigidity so I could drive it safely. As you’ll see in later pictures I have yet to weld in one of the plates but it is already cut and will be welded in soon.
Plasma cutters cut so easily they seem like magic; even their name sound like something from a science fiction story. But they are real, and in the past 15 years the prices have come down to the point that nearly every shop has one, from the hard working professionals to […]
Just like paint, you can create custom powder coating finishes by adding metal flakes directly into the powder . Unlike paint powders will not accept pearl additives because pearls cannot withstand the high temperatures that powder requires to cure. With that said, creating custom powders is a game of trial […]
One of the defining elements of TIG welding is the Tungsten. In fact that is what the first letter in TIG stands for: Tungsten Inert Gas. TIG uses an inert gas to shield the weld (typically Argon), a filler rod of a metal that matches what you are welding, and an electrode made of Tungsten that focuses and directs the arc. All TIG electrodes are more than 95% Tungsten, which is a rare metal used because it is hard and has one of the highest melting points of any metal. There are at least 5 distinct types of “Tungstens”, as most people call them, typically color coated based on how much of what other elements have been added.
