Check out this video to see how we are using some items that we have around the house to organize all of those little “things” you collect in a shop. I think I have about 1 million screws, nails, staples, bolts, nuts, washers, fittings, wire nuts, wire, and other random items in my shop that don’t really have a home. They tend to sit in a bucket here, a bin there, or a toolbox. One of the most frustrating things that seems to happen to me too often is not being able to find what I need while in the midst of a project. It seems that I wonder around looking for my tools, fittings, screws, and nails for about just as much time as it takes to complete the whole project in the first place!
Many years ago we rented a house from an older gentleman and in the garage he had all of these glass jars hanging from the ceiling. Each jar was filled with a type of screw, nail, nut, bolt, or other item and it was very easy to find what was needed. I wanted to mimic this here on the suburban homestead and use this idea to organize some of my random “things”. I also have been sing some old plastic coffee containers to store some of my larger items for awhile and this has also been working very well. I just need to make them look a little bit more like organizers and less like old coffee cans! As I try to get a proper shop setup here in my corner of the garage I have two main goals, make things easy to find and get that reassuring ok from my wife when it comes to aesthetics:) So it is time to turn these old coffee containers into something that looks a little bit nicer and functions better as well.
I am using the plastic coffee containers from Folgers coffee that were purchased at Walmart. If you purchase this brand at Sam’s Club you will get an even larger container but I found the Walmart size fits nicely here. The jars that I am using for the smaller items are some pickle jars and some salsa jars. You can use whatever type you normally purchase, just start saving them each week until you have enough to get started. It took us a couple of months to get the jars I am using here and probably about a year to save the coffee containers. If you don’t drink coffee ask a friend or family to save them or look for other options in your home.
This was a very easy project and I am very happy with the result. The larger containers are very easy to label and re-label as needed and hold a perfect amount of small fittings, tools, or other “stuff”. The glass jars will take me a bit to fill as I still have a pile of “things” to sort, but they are a perfect way to be able to see those items and easily grab a jar and get what you need.
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Videos are provided as a guide only. Refer to manufacturer
installation instructions and specs for complete information.
Today on this 2010 Mazda CX-7 we will be installing Curt hitch part number 12093. the first thing we want to do in preparation to installing our trailer hitch is to lower the exhaust out of the way. There are four hangers, two per side, one at the front side of the exhaust and one at the rear side of the exhaust. And then there is two in the same position on the drivers side. :19
To remove the exhaust off its hangers we are going to simply take a spray lubricant, like a WD-40 and spray down the stud. Okay, we want to repeat that process for the other three hangers as well. Before removing the fourth hanger we want to make sure we put some sort of stabilizing strap around the forward side of the exhaust tube here because once we remove all four hangers the exhaust is going to want to come down and possibly fall and damage your exhaust. :47
As you can see we have three existing holes here at the end of the frame rail here on the passenger side. It is going to be the same on the drivers side as well. What we are going to do is take the middle hole here and take a chisel and enlarge it. Now I have the hole just big enough to get both my carriage bolt into the hole and my block in through there as well. So I am going to start by feeding the carriage bolt and block combination into the rear most hole. Again, I am going to take my bolt leader, the threaded potion, we are going to feed it up through this hole and down out through the access hole. We will first take the block and thread it onto the bolt leader and then we will take the carriage bolt and wrap the threads of the bolt leader around the carriage bolt. Feed the block up into the hole, followed by the carriage bolt and pull them down into place. Next we will do the forward most hole. And then finally we will do the middle hole. And then finally we will do the middle hole. And for this we are going to feed the block on and the carriage bolt outside of the frame. Feed the carriage bolt in first, followed by the block, and pull it down into place. You want to make sure the blocks for the forward and the middle holes are not overlapping each other when in position. 2:56
With all three of those into place we want to repeat that procedure for the passenger side and then we will go ahead and put the hitch up in position. With all the bolts in place and tightened down we can go ahead and torque the bolts down. You want to check with the directions to verify the appropriate torque rating for each individual bolt. And with all the bolts torqued down our installation is complete. You want to make sure to put your exhaust back up on its hangers and remove the strap that was supporting the exhaust as well. And that will conclude the installation of Curt hitch part number 12093 on a 2010 Mazda CX-7.