For the last few weeks I have been busy designing a new website.

I never thought that ShopNGarage was an ideal name for a website. I finally came up with a great new name that wasn’t already taken. The new site is called Garage Bulletin.

I will leave ShopNGarage in place as an archive for about a year. All of my new articles will be posted on the new site. I may add older articles to the new site as well, but they will be updated and improved versions. I want to take what I have learned over the last couple of years and use that knowledge to make a new and better site.

I invite everyone to come visit…

garagebulletin.com

My wife said she wanted to make some small wood projects, Christmas tree ornaments, etc. I picked up a used scroll saw for her today. It is a Delta model 40-560 and I gave $75 for it. The deal included quite a few boxes of blades.

I cleaned it up, lubed the bushings, and adjusted it. I’ll post pictures of her first project.

For precision sanding and grinding, a 2″ Roloc disc is hard to beat. A built-in screw secures the disc to the sanding pad. Sanding discs are available from 24 to 240 grit. Scotch-Brite discs are also available. I’ve seen the sanding pads and abrasive assortments at the big box stores, but they are much cheaper at an industrial supplier.

All automotive wiring outside of the passenger compartment should be environmentally sealed. Heating and cooling cycles, as well as capillary action, can draw moisture, salt, and road grime deep into the wire. Someone had repaired this section of wire with an insulated butt splice terminal. It was also wrapped with electrical tape. I stripped about 8 inches of insulation from the wire and found it black and corroded.

I like to seal my wiring repairs with adhesive-lined heat shrink tubing.

I spliced this wire with an un-insulated butt splice terminal. I used a heat gun to seal the repair with heat shrink tubing. Note how the adhesive lining has melted and oozed out of the end of the tubing.

I’ve been using my folding portable welding table for about a year now; it turns out the slab inside my garage isn’t very flat. I’m always shuffling the table around to find a spot where it doesn’t rock. I decided to buy some leveling feet.

I drilled and tapped the bottom of each leg. Note that the hole is offset to allow the threaded foot to screw straight into the angled leg.

Now I can put the table anywhere I choose and adjust the feet to eliminate rocking.

I went to the Home Depot to buy a Norton Rapid Strip Disc. Something has changed; the Home Depot only stocks Diablo brand abrasives. There wasn’t an equivalent product in the Diablo brand. I went to Lowe’s and found they only stock Gator brand abrasives. I picked up a Gator brand paint and rust removing disc.

I mounted the disc on my 4 1/2″ grinder and skimmed the top of my portable welding table. I also knocked the mill scale off a short piece of bar stock and angle iron. The product worked, but was about half consumed.

I guess I have to buy Norton products online.