The Toolbox

[kruser79]

I thought I'd start a thread with tools as the subject.

With Mike's ordeal with the M48, it got me thinking about what tools I'd want to have on hand if I were building a toolbox for repair of my own MV.
Now let me think over some stuff and I'll start tossing tools into the box!

[kruser79]

Start with a good comprehensive accumulation of socket sets. These should include the following handles:
Ratchet (of course)
Breaker Bar (a lot of MV's have very corroded fasteners, you don't want to strip the teeth inside your ratchet breaking loose frozen bolts)
Speeder Bar (face it, sometimes a little speed is nice)

The sockets should range from at least 1/4", all the way up to 1 and 1/4". Not all of your sets need to be so widespread (can you imagine trying to find a 1/4" socket in a 3/4" drive?). But you should have the three major sizes of drive, 1/4", 3/8", and 1/2" drives. And you can have the set overlap in the middle, but the smallest and the largest sizes will be covered by the smallest and the largest sets.
For those of us that have aspirations of defending our homes from behind hardened steel with large caliber guns, working on track vehicles is going to require the same tools to start with. But you're going to need to add another set to your box. This one is BIGGER. 3/4" socket sets are part of the assigned tool sets for every maintenance shop, and also on the Recovery Vehicles (Wheeled vehicle wreckers, M578, M88, and now on the new FRS). When you talk about bolts that are 1 and 1/2" and torqued to 350 lbs./ft., you just ain't gonna break that loose with a 1/2" drive set, no matter HOW many cheater pipes you put on it!
Lemme think some more, and I'm sure we'll get this box well stocked.
Go ahead! Start adding.......

[kruser79]

Impact wrenches are something that I've always loved using. They were always part of the Common #1 tool set in the Motor Pool, but rarely used. Either your shop wasn't equipped with a compressor, or the Motor Sgt wasn't good pals with the Supply Sgt (hence, no adaptors for hooking into the shops airlines).

3/8 Air ratchet, 3/8 air impact wrench
1/2 impact wrench

Now the big stuff on tracked vehicles? The M88 is equipped with a 3/4 hydraulic impact wrench. This thing will twist the head right off of a 1 1/2 inch bolt. Since hydraulics really aren't practical for the average shop, go for large capacity pneumatics...

3/4 impact wrench or,
1-inch impact wrench

More to come in reference to pneumatics......

[kruser79]

Whether you have a track or a truck, you're going to need big air tools somewhere down the line. Army mechanics are used to doing everything by hand. Not by choice mind you, but the simple need is to be able to do things in the field without the help of air compressors or generators. So having a shop with working air, and properly setup air tools is like Christmas for a mechanic.

But let's be real. You probably won't have the benefit of a platoon of mechanics when it comes time to change sprockets or final drives. Are you froggy enough to break loose rusted-in bolts that were torqued down to 650 lbs/ft? Or what about the U-bolts holding that front axle on your deuce or 5-ton?

Since the difference between a good compressor, and a really good compressor isn't what you'd think, it's a good place to buy the best you can afford. Someday, somewhere down the line, you're going to be able to afford that sweet 1-inch drive impact wrench. It'd be a shame to get it, only to realize that the bargain compressor you bought last year, won't spin it, but only has the cajones to cough and wheeze through that wrench's muffler.

A hand grinder is invaluable if you want your vehicle to remain realistic looking. Most vehicles in use are well over twenty years old. By the time you get your mitts on it, it has at least doubled that. A good crew will prep their vehicle for paint every other year or so (since us mechs schedule painting, we sometimes get it done a little more often, lol). Back in the days before CARC paint, we used to paint our vehicles ourselves. You think the paint shop removed any of that paint before they laid another coat on your baby while it was on active duty? Heck no! They greased up the windows and lights, and squirted away! And I can tell you about my second M88. I was the senior occupant (that only meant that I was in a unit that required an NCO on every vehicle, and mine didn't want to stand in the hatch, so I did the TC duties while he rested his butt on our pogey-bait bags, napping from destination to destination), and my driver and I figured we'd grind down the 1/4 to 1/2 inch of accumulated paint before we dressed her up in some new camo. We hadn't even gotten a quarter of the way through when we realized that this was going to be a job indeed! Once it sank in just what we were up against, we got mad. We attacked the paint, using up over thirty grinding wheels, and priming her flanks to keep the rust off until we could paint. Once the job was done, we were proud as peacocks. She looked new, not just repainted, new! (Well, except for some grind marks we hadn't smoothed out.)
But watch out if you're grinding Chemical Agent Resistant Coating (CARC) (most vehicles painted after the late 80's have CARC paint), it's a carcinogen, and has a number of restrictions on it. Applying with a spray gun requires a face mask with special filter, the dust generated by grinding requires you to wear a dust filter. The only way we were allowed to paint without protection was with a brush, and even then only in quantities of a quart or less.

How the heck did I go from air compressors to paint? I suppose I could explain it away somehow.....but nahhhh.

More to come......