Greetings all,
I am Sam and I live on the mid east coast of Australia, Bundaberg to be exact. I am a semi-retired 'shop' teacher, teaching wood/metal/plastics/technical drawing/design to teenagers ("High School" in Oz.) for a couple of decades.
My interest in tools is allied to my interest in WW2 US trucks, which all had tools, at some level, issued to them.
I see I'm not the only WW2 vehicle enthusiast here (Hi, 43gpw)
Anyway, I have joined Tool Talk to help me complete some tool sets I am slowly working on. This stuff is almost non-existent here, so finding stuff in the US is my best option. And, yes, the shipping is a killer, frequently being 2, 3, or more times the price of the items, even when shipping many items at once. There are no other real options for me.
Skip mentioned the scarcity of information on tool kits. This is a place where I may be able to help those interested, as I have access to some tool lists as used by the US military in WW2.
The trucks I have, and are slowly building kits for is the Diamond T 969 wrecker and the Ward La France M1A1 Heavy Wrecker (but mine is the rarer Kenworth produced model 573, almost identical). Whilst some of the tools are more-or-less standard for the era, some are highly specialist and a mystery to most people. I am quietly hoping that after posting a picture, someone will say "I've got one of those, never knew what it was. Wanna buy it, cheap?"
When I started on the M1A1 tool kit, one decision I didn't expect to have to make was what brand of tools to choose. From what I gather, and ISTBC, pretty much every manufacturer sold to the US military at the time. I ended up going with Craftsman and that is what I'll be mostly chasing on Tool Talk.
I have a good friend in Stevensville, N.C. who stores and ships my stuff to help me with the vehicles.
Anyway, that is enough for now.
Glad to be here.
Have a nice day.
Sam.
