Every have a tool break when you needed it most?

F

Fonly

Joined
Sep 24, 2006
Messages
5,010
I'll start.:D

I was on a canoeing trip back east, I was taking my girlfriend and three of her friends. We started out in the after noon, it was around 10* Celsius and the clouds were rollin in.
We had been at our camping spot for around 2 hours, had their tent set-up and my tent shelter up and going. I was collecting fire wood with my wetterlings, (had brought my #3 grohmann and a OHT firemen model SAK along as well)

Anyway as the night was going on, we..... hmm, I mean I was getting fire wood and was showing the girls in the mean time various bushcraft things, as they were making some oatmeal and marsh mellows I was removing some outer layers from an old pine tree. I would hit the head of the axe in, and not paying attetion I split the handle rite off below the head. I just stood there for a minute looking at the head stuck in the tree, and went ohh $^%$!

My girlfriend beging the person she is asked in a way she only can, "are you gonna cry":grumpy:

Though I didn't It still sucked, and let me tell you that was the time I vowed never to carry just a 4" knife, that was the hardest time I've had collecting fire wood.


So what have you got guys?
 
One camping trip, we managed to break an axe, a bowie and a machete. It was shortly after that I started looking into axes with unbreakable handles. I still prefer to have axes and a 4" knife though, I don't like big knives, there's not one big knife that can do the work of a small knife and a hatchet or good axe half as well.

For that trip, we ended up using a bowie to "buck" logs and the head of the broken axe hammered through with a log to split them..... ahh good times lol
 
Mostly just little stuff like bulbs and batteries dying, although with LEDs and that I aim to run everything of AA cells [AA to C cell converters are a blessing too], that isn't really an issue now. My Tilley lamp gave up the ghost on a remote and very exposed night fishing trip. The weather was really miserable and although that endangered nobody it put an end to the fishing fun. I've had a blocked generator tube in a stove. Again, more of a pain than anything critical. Better than the old Tilley failure though as it is inevitable and so can be controlled for easily, plus the fix is simple. Back when, the blade spring on the below snapped clean in half. POS had never done a hard days work in its life.

pos-11-24_160446957.jpg


A guy who was with me had his Leatherman shatter cutting barbed wire. Made me smile, I'd already given up on Leatherman type tools for rough use. It was also fun to point out the lawsuit regarding Leatherman made in America being distinct from assembled in America too.

I've never broken an ax handle and I doubt I will now. Technically I still own one Gransfors Brucks, although it doesn't live with me. A while ago now I started to have my reservations about them. A] Someone got wind of how trendy they have become with the reenactment crowd here in England and ramped the price up well in excess of their worth. B] I also suspected I had become victim to a mentality that so gripped my father in relation to non-stainless and natural materials. It made no sense that I have shunned that dogma with knives yet I retained it with axes. Since that realization I've gone synthetic with axes too. I've pounded them so much harder than I did the Gransfors. In fact, the most recent one I was pretty much trying to break it [within sane limits] for a while. I wouldn't have treated the pretty one like that. I know there's the school of thought about with wood you can replace the handle blah blah, but I'm now in a high state of confidence that this one isn't likely to break to begin with. And when you see the sh1t state wooden ones get into over time just through normal hard use I'm even more convinced my move is a sensible one.

Everything else I've broken I consider operator error rather than kit failure.
 
More sockets then I can count. I did kill my gerber saw though, was able to salvage it to continue wood gathering, but its done for.
 
Fonly said:
My girlfriend beging the person she is asked in a way she only can, "are you gonna cry":grumpy:
Click to expand...

You should've looked at her with a big, goofy grin, and said, "No".

When she asked you why you were smiling, you could've told her it was because she'd be keeping you warm, tonight.
 
Fonly said:
I'll start.:D

I was on a canoeing trip back east, I was taking my girlfriend and three of her friends. We started out in the after noon, it was around 10* Celsius and the clouds were rollin in.
We had been at our camping spot for around 2 hours, had their tent set-up and my tent shelter up and going. I was collecting fire wood with my wetterlings, (had brought my #3 grohmann and a OHT firemen model SAK along as well)

Anyway as the night was going on, we..... hmm, I mean I was getting fire wood and was showing the girls in the mean time various bushcraft things, as they were making some oatmeal and marsh mellows I was removing some outer layers from an old pine tree. I would hit the head of the axe in, and not paying attetion I split the handle rite off below the head. I just stood there for a minute looking at the head stuck in the tree, and went ohh $^%$!

My girlfriend beging the person she is asked in a way she only can, "are you gonna cry":grumpy:

Though I didn't It still sucked, and let me tell you that was the time I vowed never to carry just a 4" knife, that was the hardest time I've had collecting fire wood.


So what have you got guys?
Click to expand...

I cried just reading this post. No, really, I've had plenty of tools fail. Usually, as mentioned above, because of operator error. I make my living with tools of a wide variety. ANd when a tool fails, I invariably try to replace it with something better. I don't usually break them myself, but my workers do. My swinging tools, axes, hatchets, picks and sledge hammers all have synthetic handles. So do my shovels, rakes and hoes. This doesn't stop them from breaking them altogether, but it has greatly decreased breakage. The last tool broken was a hoe borrowed by my adult son. He returned it in two pieces. Fortunately I buy such tools with long term unconditional warranties. The replacement was free other than the drive to the hardware store.

Save the girlfriend's response and serve it up to her at the first appropriate opportunity. Revenge delayed is like a well aged wine... sweeter with time. Be creative though. A broken nail or mussed hair would be a waste of good chablis.:D
 
That was too bad for you, Fonly.. But it's nice to see you again!

Once the point of my ice axe broke off when I was climbing.
I sharpened the point with this file and kept going.
2008.11.23.R0017121.JPG

In winter, I always carry this one in my pack even if I forgot to carry a knife.

And once another time, my Silva compass was broken and the oil was lost.
But you know, a compass keeps working even if the oil is lost.

Other than breaking, I lost following things in the mountain. haha...
vacuum bottle
camera and wrist watch (at the same time! what a shock!!)
knife (my homemade fixed blade)
pair of shell gloves and a cap
 
One night my mate and i were running a few hours late finishing a track (damned shortcuts) and were facing a about two hours in the dark, which was fine since we both had torches with spare batteries. About half an hour after dark my torch bulb died, didnt have a spare. We had to finish the walk with one torch for two people, on a track only wide enough for one person. The track was pretty rough, so plenty of kicked toes and stumbles for all, not to mention slow going. lesson - spare batteries arent much chop without a spare torch.
 
fujita yuji said:
That was too bad for you, Fonly.. But it's nice to see you again!

Once the point of my ice axe broke off when I was climbing.
I sharpened the point with this file and kept going.
2008.11.23.R0017121.JPG

In winter, I always carry this one in my pack even if I forgot to carry a knife.

And once another time, my Silva compass was broken and the oil was lost.
But you know, a compass keeps working even if the oil is lost.

Other than breaking, I lost following things in the mountain. haha...
vacuum bottle
camera and wrist watch (at the same time! what a shock!!)
knife (my homemade fixed blade)
pair of shell gloves and a cap
Click to expand...

You too man!:thumbup:

Yeah, that is much worse than my axe breaking, I would have just sat halfway up a mountain thinking great.:rolleyes::D
 
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