Hello from Bangor, N.Ireland

[nelson]

Hi guys,
Can't believe I never knew about this forum! Got my first SAK when I was 16, still got that one too, then changed to leatherman when I started work and have carried their tools for most of my working life, now 45. I've managed kill a lot of my MTs through heavy use so I only have a puny collection by MT.org standards at around eight tools, but growing.

I've been reading this forum for around a month and its through reading all the stuff you guys recommend that I recently bought a Spirit thats become my current EDC and a couple of SOG tools just to see what they were like. Its gonna cost me being here, I just know it

On the lookout for a non bit-adapter wave too, my favourite past EDC.

I'll take a pic of my MTs next time I'm in the garage, but you can just spot some of them here in this tool box pic from my blog

[Grant Lamontagne]

Welcome to the forum!  We aren't just collectors here, there are a lot of users as well, so stories of how you've worn out tools and what they were are the kinds of things we are interested in too!

Def

[kirk13]

Excellent,another one from Norn Irn!Welcome in Nelson!

[Gareth]

Nice to have you here Nelson.

[nelson]

Thanks for the welcome guys, can't wait to contribute. I'll keep that in mind about the stories Grant, but any MTs I've killed have been in pretty mundane ways like lowering a jack on one or or cutting a wire that was not supposed to be live (you only do that once though!) or just plain wearing the hinges or cutting edges out.

I'm a bit wiser these days and if we are working somewhere with no access to our other tools and I find I need a hammer and only have my Surge, then I borrow one of the other guys MTs and use it.

[LooseNut]

Welcome, good to have you aboard!

Its a fierce friendly place to hang out as I'm sure you'll discover!

[J-sews]

Welcome Nelson! Hang around here very long and you'll be needing another one of those Stanley toolboxes

[Grant Lamontagne]

Thanks for the welcome guys, can't wait to contribute. I'll keep that in mind about the stories Grant, but any MTs I've killed have been in pretty mundane ways like lowering a jack on one or or cutting a wire that was not supposed to be live (you only do that once though!) or just plain wearing the hinges or cutting edges out.

I'm a bit wiser these days and if we are working somewhere with no access to our other tools and I find I need a hammer and only have my Surge, then I borrow one of the other guys MTs and use it.

If you are crushing things with a jack or cutting live wires I get the feeling you are going to fit in real well around here!  The 220v you have over there must have made the experience much more exciting than it is with our girly 110v over here!

Def

[nelson]

Welcome Nelson! Hang around here very long and you'll be needing another one of those Stanley toolboxes

That's not going to be an issue, I work for part of Stanley Black and Decker.... as the wider view of my workshop would clearly show

edit: I should add, I dont have anything to do with selling tools, I work for the security side of the business in Ireland as a senior engineer, but I do get staff discount which is a good thing for a tool junky.

[Zed]

   Welcome mate 

[Essexman]

You built that whole car using just MTs - Cooool dude!

Welocme to the forum

[MultiMat]

G'day & welcome mate  .

Very cool looking workshop mate 

[nelson]

G'day & welcome mate  . Very cool looking workshop mate 

Cheers 

Heres the money shot. I can't call it a collection, theres a couple of retirees in there, my surge, camo charge and spirit see all the hard use. Others I picked up on a whim when I visit my Dads farm in Canada and I never really got on with them.

[Craig]

Hi Nelson,

Welcome aboard 

[sawman]

Nice collection.  Welcome to MTO 

[AHB]

Good to have you here nelson.. Impressive workshop and great lineup of MTs.. 

[Mr. Whippy]

Love the Workshop!  That appears to be a very non-standard car there.  Perhaps a bit of racing going on there?

Impressive selection of MT's you have there...

I'm surprised you favor the Surge over the Charge.  Any issues with the mirrored finish on the Spirit?

[Grant Lamontagne]

Dad's farm in Canada?  That sounds interesting- what kind of farm and where in Canada? 

Def

[nelson]

Dad's farm in Canada?  That sounds interesting- what kind of farm and where in Canada? 
Def

Over on the other side from you near Meleb, about 60km north of Winnipeg.

It messes with my head the size of Canada, when Ireland is only 100miles wide and I havn't seen all of it yet!... though we do seem to have populated a fair bit of the planet from here

Used to be beef, but he's retired now, builds wild west style stage coaches and does lots of leather work for guns as hobbies and has few horses and the usual hens, pig, goat to keep his hand in.

[5hif7y]

welcome to the forum mate. your workshop looks great and you have a nice collection so far.

great pics by the way 

[Grant Lamontagne]

You aren't kidding about size- Winnipeg is the middle of the country, not the other side.

I was raised near Winnipeg in a town called Portage La Prairie.

Def

Sent from my MB860 using Tapatalk

[nelson]

You aren't kidding about size- Winnipeg is the middle of the country, not the other side.

I was raised near Winnipeg in a town called Portage La Prairie.

Def

Sent from my MB860 using Tapatalk

Well it seemed like the other side the year I drove from Toronto to Winnipeg.
The ex-wife and I decided to call it a day half way through that holiday.... it was a very very long second week !!

[Grant Lamontagne]

Toronto to Winnipeg?  I'll admit that's a bit of a hike, but that's just a small fraction of the way across the country!

Toronto to Winnipeg is about 2,000kms (1250 miles) while coast to coast you are looking at around 6500kms, or just under 4,000 miles.  Of course you had to drive several hundred kilometers north just so you could start driving west too, and that 6500kms for the whole thing is just the mainland- add in the Rock and it's a heck of a lot bigger!

Def

[nelson]

Toronto to Winnipeg?  I'll admit that's a bit of a hike, but that's just a small fraction of the way across the country!
Toronto to Winnipeg is about 2,000kms (1250 miles) while coast to coast you are looking at around 6500kms, or just under 4,000 miles.  Of course you had to drive several hundred kilometers north just so you could start driving west too, and that 6500kms for the whole thing is just the mainland- add in the Rock and it's a heck of a lot bigger!
Def

Your garden is probably bigger than my country  LOL

That first time we went the scenic route from Toronto, through the states at Detroit, up through Chicago, had our in-car-divorce about Minneapolis then up to Winnipeg (in silence), though I stopped to buy a couple of MTs on the way to cheer me up.

The cheapest way for us the past couple of years (thats with future wife 2 now) to get to Winnipeg is to fly direct to Chicago, because we get cheap flights through a friend, then drive straight up. Though we were thinking of flying to Toronto and seeing about a train this year.

I love it there, so i'm sure we'll end up in Canada permanently in the future, but we've got too many ties here at the minute.

[Grant Lamontagne]

It's hilarious when I talk to my family in Scotland- my mother is from Glasgow.  They don't always seem to grasp the vastness of Canada, while I simply can't grasp the compact size of Europe.  I look at maps and think that it can't take very long to go from one place to another because they are only a hundred or so kilometers apart, and can't fathom how it would take a good portion of a day to get from one to the other!  Heck, I used to commute 200kms (each way) every day when I was in school!

When my Aunt and Uncle visited my parents on Northern Ontario (about 500 kms north of Toronto) from Scotland a few years ago they thought they could take a day tip and drive out to visit me too.  When my parents tried to explain that you couldn't get this far in a day, they responded with "Well we'll go for the weekend then."  They obviously didn't realize that if the four of them took shifts driving, they might make it here in a weekend, but they certainly would be in no shape to visit afterwards!



Def

[nelson]

I've been in the 'no shape to visit', but live and learn

[stressmaster5000]

Great to have you here!  Nice looking shop too! 

[David]

Hi Nelson!

[badwolf]

Hello and welcome Nelson great tool selection and nice workshop fascinating what your dad does, very

[nelson]

Thanks guys, what a great welcome.

To answer a couple of questions I missed earlier.. The car is a Lotus Elise chassis that I've dropped an Audi 20v turbo engine into and fitted a motorsport body. All DIY and it is for the track, hopefully some time this year. My blog is here: www.exigeracing.com

As for the shininess of the Spirit, I really like it, its become my 'dress' multitool if know I'll mainly be in the office for the day setting up equipment, I swap for the surge and bits for the heavy work on sites and just recently bought a Wave again, one of my all time favourites.