[Growster...]

Tools Explained... TOOLS AND HOW TO USE THEM
 
CIRCULAR SAW:
A portable cutting tool used to make boards too short.
 
BELT SANDER:
An electric sanding tool commonly used to convert minor touch-up jobs into major refinishing jobs.
 
WIRE WHEEL:
Cleans paint off bolts and then throws them somewhere under the workbench with the speed of light. Also removes fingerprints and hard-earned calluses from fingers in about the time it takes you to say, 'Oh s**t'.
 
 
DRILL PRESS:
A tall upright machine useful for suddenly snatching flat metal bar stock out of your hands so that it smacks you in the chest and flings your beer across the room, denting the freshly-painted project which you had carefully set in the corner where nothing could get to it.
 
MULTI-GRIPS:
Used to round off bolt heads. Sometimes used in the creation of blood-blisters.
 
HACKSAW:
One of a family of cutting tools built on the Ouija board principle... It transforms human energy into a crooked, unpredictable motion, and the more you attempt to influence its course, the more dismal your future becomes.
 
VICE-GRIPS:
Generally used after pliers to completely round off bolt heads. If nothing else is available, they can also be used to transfer intense welding heat to the palm of your hand.
 
OXYACETYLENE TORCH:
Used almost entirely for igniting various flammable objects in your shed and creating a fire. Also handy for igniting the grease inside the wheel hub out of which you want to remove a bearing race.
 
TABLE SAW:
A large stationary power tool commonly used to launch wood projectiles for testing wall integrity.
Very effective for digit removal !!
 
HYDRAULIC FLOOR JACK:
Used for lowering a car to the ground after you have installed your new brakes, trapping the jack handle firmly under the car.
 
BAND SAW:
A large stationary power saw primarily used by most shops to cut large pieces into smaller pieces that more easily fit into the rubbish after you cut on the inside of the line instead of the outside edge. Also good for Digit Removal.
 
TWO-TON ENGINE HOIST:
A tool for testing the maximum tensile strength of all the dodo you forgot to disconnect.
 
PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER:
Normally used to stab the vacuum seals under lids or for opening paper-and-tin oil cans and splashing oil on your shirt; but can also be used, as the name implies, to strip out Phillips screw heads.
 
STRAIGHT SCREWDRIVER:
A tool for opening paint cans. Sometimes used to convert common slotted screws into non-removable screws and butchering your palms.
 
PRY BAR:
A tool used to crumple the metal surrounding that clip or bracket you needed to remove in order to replace a 50 pence part.
 
PVC PIPE CUTTER:
A tool used to make plastic pipe too short.
 
HAMMER:
Originally employed as a weapon of war, the hammer nowadays is used as a kind of divining rod to locate the most expensive parts adjacent the object we are trying to hit.
 
UTILITY KNIFE:
Used to open and slice through the contents of cardboard cartons delivered to your front door. Works particularly well on contents such as seats, vinyl records, liquids in plastic bottles, collector magazines, refund checks, and rubber or plastic parts. Especially useful for slicing work clothes, but only while in use.
 
The Fing Hell Tool:
Any handy tool that you grab and throw across the garage while yelling 'Fing Hell' at the top of your lungs. It is also, most often, the next tool that you will need.

[JayG]

All so true Growster! 

A couple of additions if I may be so bold:

Screwdriver with interchangeable bits:
This clever device has a selection of cross-head and straight bits handily stored in a rubber holder around the shaft, thus ensuring that you will never find the correct one for the job and can therefore drastically reduce the time it takes to strip the screw head. It is also good for improving back mobility because the spare bits keep falling out of the holder onto the floor, although eventually of course you will lose all but the most useless and damaged one.
Eventually the magnet holding the bits into the socket gives up the ghost, meaning that you can only use the tool upside down, which is great for fitting ceiling lights but considerably more awkward for other tasks.

Spanners:
Old-fashioned tools which were very popular before the invention of mole grips and parrot-jaw pliers. Available in a range of metric and imperial sizes, which guarantees you will never find the right one for the nut in question. Box spanners are useful if you are in a particular hurry to round the edges off a nut whilst leaving it resolutely un-loosened, and as a bonus there is every chance you will get to play doctors and nurses when the spanner flies off at the instant you apply maximum leverage.

[danny1936]

Because they had no reservations at a busy restaurant, my elderly neighbor and his wife were told
there would be a 45 minute wait for a table.
"Young man, we're both 90 years old," the husband said. "We may not have 45 minutes."
They were seated immediately.

[hamstergbert]

A few belated additions found in the HGB toolbox...

Soldering Iron (1):
Device for adding stylish metallic beads to your clothes without the faff of sewing.

Soldering Iron (2):
Reflex testing device to see if when you inadvertently knock it off the bench you can stop yourself automatically catching it in your bare hand.

Electric Paint Stripper:
Tool that puts out a blast of superheated air aimed at causing oil based gloss paints to bubble and melt and also causing other half to get cross when you try to use it for a fast defrost of the freezer and accidentally melt it all so the shelves no longer fit and the door won't close.

Micrometer:
This tool allows you to express to a very high degree of numerical accuracy your high degree of cutting size inaccuracy .

Vice:
Pleasurable activity, may be illegal in some areas.

Torque Wrench:
A tool (purchased by Dad at a 1940s jumble sale and last calibrated in 1932) with an archaic scale,  effective in illustrating incompetence at attempted conversion to modern units through back of an envelope arithmetic, proved by stripping through over-torque a fastening that has been obsolete for more than fifty years and for which you do not have a spare.

Bradawl:
Pointed hand tool for 'starting' a hole for a woodscrew that is always exactly 1.38 mm away from the marked dot you meant it to be at.

Rip saw :
Saw cutting so rapidly that it zips through the workpiece and bites into other half's favourite antique table that workpiece is resting on seeing as you were too idle to bother getting out the workbench.  *ahem*

[mumofstig]

Rip saws sound as if they are expensive in the long run although they may be cheap enough to buy 

[Yorkie]

Hmm, my fridge does need defrosting ... 

[Growster...]

There is always the lino cutting tool, which makes interesting cuts and marks on the palms of ones hands!

As for a rip saw, in an emergency, I had to cut a metal sheet sample for a client some years ago, wearing my best suit for a presentation later on that morning.

The meeting went well, until I leaned back in my chair, only to expose my right sock, which had been burnt to a crisp, and on trying to pull it up, it became detached altogether...

[Goosegirl]

There is always the lino cutting tool, which makes interesting cuts and marks on the palms of ones hands!

As for a rip saw, in an emergency, I had to cut a metal sheet sample for a client some years ago, wearing my best suit for a presentation later on that morning.

The meeting went well, until I leaned back in my chair, only to expose my right sock, which had been burnt to a crisp, and on trying to pull it up, it became detached altogether...

Presumably you threw away the sock because the matching one had disappeared into a black hole and went in a different time and space zone via the washing machine? May I just mention the various devices such as masking tape and other plasticky products used to stop paint getting onto bits you don't want painting. In my exhaustive experience, I have saved lost of money by not buying them, and have relied on my own steady hand, after a few tinctures of course, by which time I have lost the plot, don't care, "will scrape it off in the morning" - but actually - I am a damn good painter and can do it without any unnecessary aids. As to getting the said paint of the hands and fingers....!! As to using my OH's best screwdriver to prise the lid off a paint can - cue a BIG slap and retrieving said lid which has fallen upside down onto the newly-cleaned paving flags. Bummox!! 

[aelf]

Spirit level
used exclusively to show how far off the level that new shelf is. By 'apparently' staring at the bubble in the spirit level, one gains enough time to invent the excuse for having put the shelf up wonky, for example, 'It's an optical illusion - none of the walls are straight in this house' 

Electrical wiring/pipework detector
A novel device that, when used properly, leads one to a false sense of safety, followed by a reassuringly expensive repair bill and a comfortable trip in an ambulance to A&E. After all, it didn't bleep when I moved the detector over the wall so it must be safe to drive a screw/drill bit into the wall right there.

Tile cutter
This 'simple to operate' machine does exactly what it says - it cuts tiles to any shape or size except the shape or size that you need. millimetre inaccuracy is guaranteed. (Invented by the manufacturers of tiles in order to boost tile sales)

Tool instruction leaflets
No one has any real idea what these are for. There is a theory that they are some sort of extra padding against damage when the tools are in transit. Others believe that they are provided for people to write on. You will note that there is just enough room in the margins of a leaflet for that all-important pencil drawing /measurements/list of things you need from BnQ to finish the job. In any case, DIYers often keep these leaflets in a drawer for many years, just in case.

[JayG]

Pointing trowel:
Mostly used by gardeners, many of whom swear by it and own no other tool.

Is reputed to have a secondary use relating to brickwork, and is indeed very handy for smearing a thin layer of mortar over previously virgin bricks, and also applying even larger quantities to one's trousers and shoes (safety tip: when pointing large areas of brickwork keep moving, especially if using quick-setting mortar.)

[MalcW]

Spirit level
used exclusively to show how far off the level that new shelf is. By 'apparently' staring at the bubble in the spirit level, one gains enough time to invent the excuse for having put the shelf up wonky, for example, 'It's an optical illusion - none of the walls are straight in this house' 

A) I thought this was a measure of how one is feeling; usually simplified to 'High', and 'Low' spirits.
B) It can also refer to the level of alcohol in a glass. The result of this may also have an effect on 'A'.

[azubah]

We women also have some very interesting tools.
My mom used to buy cheap irons from the market years ago.
They were quite exciting to use, as the factories where they were made were short of insulation.
The wires were usually exposed, and not fixed together very well, resulting in crackling noises and pretty blue sparks flying.
My mom realised that it was too dangerous for me, as a small child, to be trusted with ironing dad's shirts so she used to give me damp handkerchiefs to practice on.

[Goosegirl]

We women also have some very interesting tools.

We do indeed aubah. I have one of those stainless steel gardening dibbers/seedling lifters and it has been incredibly useful for jobs such as smoothing polyfilla (instead of using a finger when I then have to chisel it out of my finger nail), removing old pointing from between paving flags then pressing down the new pointing (read the previous problem again), levering lids off paint cans, scraping stuff out from tight corners when cleaning, prodding woodwork for rot, prodding old render when looking for water ingress, various stirring activities and I wouldn't be without it - also, despite all it has been put to, it hasn't bent at all!

[azubah]

Knitting needles, coat hangers, and hooks for making rugs, can come in useful for all sorts of tasks too.

[Goosegirl]

Knitting needles - very useful for scraping out soil deposits from around a drainage flagstone. We're not daft are we!!