Archive for the 'Irwin' Category
Tuesday, September 1st, 2009
Irwin has been busy doing what Irwin does best: making products under their ever-growing umbrella makes sense. In this case we’re talking about the Irwin Performance Threading System. In a nutshell, their new system takes a few evolutionary steps in an attempt to make our tapping projects easier.
First, Irwin sings the praises of their new self-aligning taps that feature new starter threads to get the tap aligned properly before getting cranked up. Simply place the tap in the hole and it aligns itself correctly every time. The new taps also feature a chip-breaking technology (or CBT) that helps smooth the thread-making process a little more than their older bits.
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Posted in Irwin, Metalworking | 7 Comments »
Monday, April 20th, 2009
The old saying goes, “You can’t have too many clamps,” and it’s largely true. Even folks who do have too many say they need more. Why? Take a look at this pic from reader Jmillerid and see for yourself.
There are somewhere in the neighborhood of twenty clamps on this garage carriage door that’s being constructed, and at the moment of this shot he’s only got one side of it clamped down. The simple fact of it is that no matter what you’re thinking of doing, if clamping is involved in the process you’re often going to need more clamps than you think.
Stock up early and often. Also we salute Jmillerid for his excellent clamp selection — those little Irwin triggers are a shop favorite for us as well.
Toolmonger Photo Pool [Flickr]
Street Pricing [Google]
Quick-Grip Trigger Clamps [Irwin]
Posted in Flickr Pool, Irwin, Woodworking | 2 Comments »
Monday, December 15th, 2008
Scoff if you like, but these little blue clamps deserve to be here. We don’t often think about these 6” Irwin Quick-Grip trigger clamps until one of ‘em is broken. The truth is, we appreciate their inexpensive nature in a very unique way -– we use the living tar out of ‘em. We’ve tapped these things to squeeze together anything we could get their jaws around, and we never, not once, felt bad about it.
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Posted in Hand Tools, Irwin, TM's Favs '08, Woodworking | 8 Comments »
Tuesday, December 9th, 2008
Though a good bow saw comes in handy around the yard and camp, you don’t always want to carry around a full-size version. Irwin makes this little 12″ bow saw that looks like it’d be easy to pack and still useful around camp. And it also accepts standard hacksaw blades — that’s one useful tool.
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Posted in Amazon, Irwin, Saws | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, November 25th, 2008
Irwin is upgrading their XP Quick-Grip line that we first covered in 2006. Now they describe the clamps as one-handed bar clamps. The clamps feature the same Power Locks to hold pressure longer and an I-beam bar to resist twisting and bowing, but Irwin increased the rated clamping pressure to 600 pounds and added double-locking swivel jaws with removable face pads.
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Posted in Irwin, Shop Tools | 4 Comments »
Thursday, October 16th, 2008
A single-size tool beats an adjustable tool hands-down most of the time — but that doesn’t mean there’s no place for the adjustable tool. For instance, if you owned this $30 adjustable bit from Irwin, you could save yourself some money by just buying the sizes you need and using this one for those rare times you need another odd size.
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Posted in Amazon, Drills/Bits, Irwin | 6 Comments »
Monday, October 13th, 2008
Rockler must be clearing their stock of Quick-Grip clamps to make room for the new generation. You can get a 12″ Quick-Grip clamp or a pair of 6″ Quick-Grip clamps for $10.
The sale goes through October 18, 2008, or as long as Rockler’s supplies last. Their online outlet will definitely honor the deal, but we’re not sure if the sale is happening at the brick-and-mortar stores.
6″ Quick-Grip Two-Pack [Rockler]
12″ Quick-Grip [Rockler]
6″ Street Pricing [Google Products]
12″ Street Pricing [Google Products]
Posted in Dealmonger, Irwin, Rockler | 2 Comments »
Monday, October 6th, 2008
It’s always sad to see a tool die in the line of duty. Until this week, I owned eight of these 6″ mini-clamps from Irwin. It seems that a 3-foot drop with a 2×4 in its jaw was a bit too much for one of these little blue clamps to handle; it snapped like a twig and sent the smaller jaw skittering across the shop floor when it hit. So now I’m down to seven — depressing.
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Posted in Camping, Irwin | 15 Comments »
Wednesday, October 1st, 2008
Though there’s no information on Irwin’s website yet, Rockler has started advertising Irwin’s new SL300 Quick-Grip clamps. The new swiveling-jaw design gives you an improved grip on surfaces that aren’t parallel and compensates for the flexing of the clamp itself.
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Posted in Hand Tools, Irwin, Rockler | 2 Comments »
Wednesday, August 13th, 2008
You need to bore a bunch of holes through some timbers, but your drill just isn’t up to the task. If you have your impact driver handy you can do the job with one of Irwin’s impact-wrench utility-pole auger bits.
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Posted in Drills/Bits, Irwin | 3 Comments »
Wednesday, July 16th, 2008
If you own a good screw-extraction kit you may have encountered left-handed bits. Left-handed bits rotate counterclockwise — the opposite direction of normal drill bits — so you drill in reverse instead of forward. Using a left-handed bit to drill out a broken screw prevents the screw from tightening further and may even extract the shank in the process.
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Posted in Amazon, Drills/Bits, Irwin | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, May 13th, 2008
Sometimes a pencil isn’t the marking tool of choice — when you need long-lasting, weatherproof markings on wood, concrete, ceramics, metal, or just about any other surface, grab yourself a lumber crayon. These crayons also mark oily, slick, and wet surfaces.
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Posted in Amazon, Irwin, Marking | 5 Comments »
Friday, May 9th, 2008
Irwin’s 25′ Strait-Line tape measure features a pencil-less, quick-marking tip. Simply measure out your distance, press the bottom of the tape against your material, and mark your line. I wouldn’t recommend using this for precision work, but for rough marks I’d use it all day long.
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Posted in Accessories, Irwin, Measuring | 9 Comments »
Monday, April 14th, 2008
Whether you need to secure a load, fasten a tarp, or just wrap stuff together, chances are you’ll be needing some tie-downs. If you’re like me, you already own a bunch of these things in all different lengths — and they’re probably all stuck together in one giant, tangled knot. The Versa-Link adjustable tie-down helps out with tie-down clutter, by eliminating the need for multiple lengths.
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Posted in Irwin | No Comments »
Tuesday, April 1st, 2008
If you ever picked up one of those 100-piece-or-more security bit sets, you’ve probably run across this bit pattern and wondered, What type of screw does this fit? Browsing the Irwin site, I found the answer: Torq-Set — also know as Tee+Cross and offset cruciform. Apparently our friends in the aviation business see these all the time.
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Posted in Drills/Bits, Irwin | 16 Comments »
Thursday, February 14th, 2008
Working on a project, whether at home or work, you reach for the stuff that works. When we first picked up the Irwin Groove Lock adjustable pliers, we were less than stunned, but they were a decent quality tool for the price so we threw them in the tool cart. Over time, we found we’d choose these over almost any other adjustable pliers out there.
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Posted in Hand Tools, Irwin, TM's Favs '07 | 12 Comments »
Thursday, February 7th, 2008
Irwin recently released what they call “the first circular saw blade specifically designed to cut through vinyl siding.” As part of their Marathon line, it sports 120 symmetric, 60-degree teeth that Irwin claims eliminate chipping and cracking on both push and pull cuts.
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Posted in Accessories, Irwin, Saws | 8 Comments »
