Tools you wish you'd bought sooner...

[EggsBenedict]

S6PNJ said:

RacingPete said:

S6PNJ said:

My father (now retired) used to have a precision engineering business, so I had access to a couple of old lathes and a CNC mill amongst other tools. I do have a 'hobby' lathe (Emco Unimat 3) but it's far too small to do anything decent on it, so I've been hankering after one of these - https://www.warco.co.uk/metal-lathes/302920-wm-240... but need to clear some space to be able to put it in my garage.

Interesting - that one does look good, but I think slightly bigger than I was imagining as think I want something probably half that size to fit on a worktop in the garage along with pillar drill, vice, sander etc... so is there something between a hobby lathe and this

Just found this - https://www.zoro.co.uk/shop/power-tools/lathes/min... Someone is selling one on Facebook Marketplace in Gloucester - £425 Might give you something else to search for?
Or an Axminster Model Engineer Series C2-300 Mini Lathe?

Not sure what you're looking for, but you might find it here: https://www.homeandworkshop.co.uk/

I bought a Colchester Student lathe from them. It's older than me! I love it!

[EggsBenedict]

AJLintern said:

andyxxx said:

Piersman2 said:

andyxxx said:

And the best tool I have purchased in the last five years (again, mentioned earlier) are these portable work benches.
https://www.screwfix.com/p/bora-speedhorse-saw-hor...

Errr... I've had a pair of these for years... £24 , and I don't need to two lengths of 4x2 either.

https://www.screwfix.com/p/sawhorse-10-2cm-2-pack/...

People that want a quality, quick, easy, stable, portable bench.

I got a pair of these a few years ago from Axminster: https://www.axminstertools.com/axminster-trade-saw...
They've been serving as a rather expensive table ever since! I should really just knock up some rough timber legs and release them for other duties...

Got both types - the metal ones are super sturdy (e.g. I piled up a load of plasterboard on mine as I hate cutting plasterboard on the floor), and they have some neat features, but they're heavy compared to the placky ones which you can whip out in a moment to do a quick job. Horses for courses, but if I had to choose one pair, it'd be the metal jobs. Best to have that sacrificial spare board though - won't do your circ saw blade any good if you make an error and nick the horse underneath

[EggsBenedict]

Arnold Cunningham said:

I have this and it's decent: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/234220369377

Looks identical to the machine mart one I have, also decent.

[EggsBenedict]

ovlovlover said:

I could do with some advice from this threads extravagant tool buying experience.

My mitre saw has died. It was an Erbauer EMIS 254S which although fine was never the most accurate thing. Anywho I've stripped the thread of the blade mount thing with half a bolt left in it and the fence was bent after some stupidity.

I want a replacement for DIY purposes. Basic cabinetry, skirting, sheds etc. It'll be well used.

I'm struggling to decide what to buy. My main concern is precision and I don't want to have to adjust everytime I change the mitre setting etc.

Max £500.

Any thoughts?

TLDR mitre saw; which?

Think as your post was the last on the page, it got missed.

You're a bit unlucky as these things seem to have got way more expensive in the last few months. The saw I just bought is now £100 quid more expensive.

I bought this one's bigger brother: https://ffx.co.uk/products/makita-makita-ls1018ln-... but this one fits in your budget and I reckon will serve you well.

You may note that in my OP on this thread all those pages ago, I'd bought a Metabo saw and a matching stand. It was this saw, I think: https://ffx.co.uk/products/metabo-metabo-613305380...

That saw was great - way better than the Evolution one I was using, and the stand is still a game changer. However, I broke 2 of them. I broke them both cutting bits of irregular shaped apple wood. I shan't be doing that again with my new saw. If I hadn't done that stupid thing, I think my Metabo saw would still be going strong (noting that I'm a DIY'er and not a tradesperson who uses the tool every day and carts it about in a van.

My new Makita is this one: https://ffx.co.uk/products/makita-makita-ls1219l-2... It's definitely a step up from the Metabo one, but had I not broken the Metabo, I'd have been very happy.

So, on Metabo you can get a saw and a stand for well under 500 quid: https://ffx.co.uk/products/metabo-metabo-kgs254m-k...

All that said, I think this is a really nice saw: https://ffx.co.uk/products/bosch-bosch-gcm305-254d...

[EggsBenedict]

Danns said:

Looks like this got overlooked, I have a Bosch GCM 12 SDE - I'm sure I only paid £400&something but it appears prices have crept up a fair bit.

They bloody have too!

The 240v version of that is over 700 quid now. It's more or less the Bosch version of my Makita in earlier post.

[EggsBenedict]

PhilboSE said:

I’m going to nominate the humble step up ladder.



I do a lot of house maintenance but I only bought one of these around 4 years ago. I seem to now use it only nearly everything I do. I used to get by with a combination of a tall set of steps or by standing on a trusty chair, but this is so much better (and safer).

Brilliant things these. You can also get long ones like these: https://www.sandblasters.co.uk/2-x-plasterers-work... which are occasionally on offer for less than this. Having the extra length means not having to get off and move it so much, and having two even less so.

[EggsBenedict]

donkmeister said:

The Stanley tape in the post above reminded me...

Tape measures are becoming more available in metric only. I like an imperial mile, pound and gallon as much as the next stoic Brit, but I was honest with myself that for tape measuring purposes the inches just get in the way of the mm.

I had the epiphany years ago when watching a Spanish lady measuring some timber, realising that her tape measure probably didn't have inches. So I bought myself a chunky Milwaukee metric tape and gained the ability to measure above and below.

But just recently I bought the metric only version of that Stanley tape, on UK Amazon. So, finally they are mass market in the UK!

Now have a look at Vice Versa tapes for even more measuring convenience....

https://www.thetapestore.co.uk/advent-vice-versa-d...

[EggsBenedict]

Promised Land said:

J6542 said:

I don’t know why Stanley and others persist with putting feet and inches on their tapes. Surely they should do the opposite of what they do now, and make them all metric only apart from one type which could be the same as now. I know there is an argument that you need it for working on older properties, but most guys convert to mm anyway.

Some of us still use imperial measurements daily, add in sheet goods and doors on the whole are still imperial sizes, asking for a 2’6” door is far easier than asking for a 762mm wide door at the merchants.

Oh while I’m at the counter can I have 4 lengths of 6x2 timber at 4.8m, this is the crazy bit where both measurements are used at once, CLS timber is classed as 3x2 or 4x2 at 2.4m,3m or 4.8m lengths. Technically it is 62mmx38mm (3x2) but on the invoice it’s always written 3x2 @ 2.4m.

I’ve said before on here, this country will never go fully metric, far too many things are still imperial, building trade being one that’s a bit of both.

How many kgs do you weigh? Most wouldn’t have a scooby but they’d know on stones and new born babies weight is still lbs and ozs.

Seen any km/h or metres to junction signs in the UK recently?

This will carry on for decades here.

We buy stuff in imperial - 8x4 sheets and so on, but I've got a nice FatMax tape measure that I never use. As naturally right-handed person, it always seems to have the inches scale facing me, and that's just wrong, as we don't cut stuff to fractions of inches, so it's gathering dust on the workshop shelves while my nice and relatively cheap Advent Vice Versa tape is the one that gets all the use.