Basic toolkit for college boy going off to live in a dorm

Then you need a new hearing aid, bad.

And that includes the very common situation where those who do have useful tools do get those borrowed by others in that situation.

No, just pointing out that tools do get borrowed in that situation.

And they do in my personal situation too. Everyone I know knows that I have many more tools than anyone else they know and do borrow tools from me.

Your problem, as always.

You mentioned your son is non mechanical. He's maybe 18 or so. What's to stop him from learning about some mechanical/electrical things? I'm on Social Security and keep finding out how little I know. Computer related stuff mainly. It's interesting to see what the others in this minuscule corner of the internet think about things. Most are old geezers.

Anyone who stops learning is old, whether twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing you can do is keep your mind young. [info][add][mail][note] Mark Twain (1835 - 1910)

That's the real crux of the matter. I recall the dorm dwellers building their own PBX, a frowned upon activity in the days of Ma Bell, but that was at an engineering institute. The rumor was that after being expelled they somehow found positions at Ma Bell.

We did have non-mechanical people. Most of the Indian students were from upper class families and never had the exposure of most US engineering students to tools. Brilliant kids but it was best not to let them get near a screwdriver in the labs.

My letter opener is a made in China knife the NRA handed out as a membership renewal lure. It's not good for much else.

Certainly possible but I don't know how likely. I'm shocked by the number of people who don't have a clue about how things work nor do they care.

Nice knife. I get nothing extra from NRA except American Rifleman and some firearm insurance but I have been a lifer for maybe 40 years. Do not recall cost but it was probably less than a few years cost of current membership.

Prompted me to take a picture of other goodies at my fingertips in the drawer:

Little things can do a lot. I field dressed a deer with the cheap Cabelas knife.

Plenty just don't have what it takes with mechanical/electrical stuff and it isnt actually possible for them to learn to do that.

Same with other stuff like maths and languages, some like me are brilliant at maths but hopeless at foreign languages.

I continue to shake my head about even the most basic diagnostic capability with fault finding. Most just go thru what they have heard can be the cause of the problem they are looking at and arent even capable of considering whether the effect they are seeing can be caused by the particular thing that they are considering might be the cause.

A mate of mine is brilliant at mechanical stuff, can make you a glock handgun out of metal stock, but is completely hopeless at electrical stuff for some reason, even tho his dad is very good at electrical stuff.

But not everyone can learn stuff in a particular field.

That's interesting.

I've needed #3 Phillips, square drives, Pozi drives and Robertsons in the course of my lifetime. I guess my "handyman tasks" have been more varied than yours.

All it takes is being away from home and a few decent tools for a "non- mechanical" person to become a bit more self sufficient.

I watched my 4 kids - boys and girls - grow in leaps and bounds "mechanically" once they were out of the house, with 3 of them starting out in dorm rooms. With a few ideas from Dad and a couple of decent tools, they were able to make their dorm rooms a lot more livable. Now they've got apartments and houses and they've taken those skills to the next level.

You'll note that I used the words "decent tools" twice. If you buy a newbie crappy tools - tools that make the job harder than it should be - you run the risk of turning them off from becoming mechanically inclined. They may not realize that it's the crappy tool that is preventing them from completing the task. They may blame themselves or may simply decide that being "mechanical" is "too hard". Even a POS #2 Phillips can turn someone off from trying new things.

I've gotten a couple of made in China hats, the knife, and a fleece blanket, maybe a gym bag. The fleece blanket is rather nice. I never went for the lifetime membership since I dropped my membership for a while. They are effective at lobbying but I'm not big on some of their methods.

I don't go to Cabelas very often but I actually bought something there yesterday. I'd stopped at Tractor Supply looking for a Plano toolbox to organize my Arduino pieces and parts. Then the dime dropped that what I wanted was more of a tackle box. I looked around a bit but nothing else jumped out at me. They did seem to have ammunition but not in the caliber I was looking for.

I'd have to search through the clutter on my desk to find all the toys. In addition to the fidget spinner I can see a No. 8 Opinel. Dug up an old L.L. Bean rosewood handle sort of like this without the medallion:

Then there is the Mercator cat knife for nostalgia. That was my EDC in high school. There may be more hiding. The puukko is hanging from the curtain rod next to the door for easy access. Even faster would be the Ken Onion Leek in my front pocket but sometimes a folder isn't the right tool.

The Leek is one of the reasons I don't often wind up in Cabela's. It was $10 cheaper at Sportsmens Warehouse up the road and even cheaper on Amazon. Nice knife but not ambidextrous as far as the clip goes. I thought I might be able to drill and tap but that's some tough steel.

Very likely. However, I've never had difficulty either driving or removing pozi screws with the appropriately sized single blade, single edge, normal, or whatever you want to call it screwdriver. Also, I never needed the tools you mentioned back in the days when I was an orthopedic surgeon.

Animations:

I first started mail order from Cabelas and did not know they sold so many guns. I was happy when they came to town but generally unhappy with the store and prices. Still use their card and go to store maybe once a year in January sales to cash in my credit and of late cannot get ammo and reloading supplies I want. I end up coming home with things like shoes and slippers. Do not want any more guns but related experience in trying to buy one there years ago and it was a real PITA.

I successfully fixed the Sturmey-Archer on my first 'English' bicycle. My downfall was trying to build a wheel from scratch. Trying to true an existing wheel is tedious enough.

I used to stop at the one in Sidney, NE. They're no fools and realized that truckers have money and like guns and stuff so there was plenty of

They build one in town but we already had a local sporting goods store and a Sportsmans Warehouse. The prices aren't great and their plan to buy up land for Texas style hunting leases didn't impress me. We already have a problem with private landowners trying to restrict access to public lands.

Then Scheels came to town too. I was in there once, specifically to buy a new pair of Yaktrax and couldn't find them. I'm sure they were someplace but it was crowded and I don't do crowds.

As a kid, we had a 3-spd bike where you move the pedals backwards a few inches to select the 'next' gear, where the progression was 1-2-3-1...

Not the best or most elegant design, since to get from 3->2 or 2->1 you had to take the long way, but it worked. It got disassembled every year for cleaning and new grease. No loose ball bearings anywhere.

Irrelevant to what it makes sense for a non mechanical kid to have at college.

One of the neighbour's kids presented me with a box of parts when he took one apart and couldn't work out how to put it together again. I only had a vague idea of how it worked and didn't have any internet available in those days, mid 60s but did manage to assemble it correctly using the wear marks.

Fortunately he hadn't lost any of the bits.

Honda uses #3 Philips screws to hold the rotors on during manufacturing. By the time the vehicle needs new rotors, the screws are so rusted in place that even an impact tool strips them.

Simple fix: drill the heads off with a 1/4" bit and remove the rotor. Sometimes you can get the threaded stub out with vice grips, but if not, just grab a grinder and grind it flush with hub.