Bemis & Call wrench adjustable wrench

Another tool you don't buy because its going to be useful.

Before and after

 I did a double take when I saw this. No way someone would have built a bridge to hoist an old Peter Witt streetcar up on a bridge... That's well done...

The brief.

Cast aluminum bucket opener

Just found this at an antique market. Looks like a pretty clever device but it looked pretty familiar. It looks like a copy of one of the first projects I worked on after I graduated from design school in 1990.  Previous post here.

 I just gotta wonder, the text "patent  35920" leads me nowhere.

 

Edmund Fitzgerald

 You know the song.... Gordon Lightfoot.

Wood chamfering bit

This unidentified old bit was identified in the store as a chamfering bit.  The shank is 5/8" inch diameter so it must have been intended for a heavy machine. It's probably more appreciated these days for its sculptural qualities.

Georges Irat roadster

W. Boddy, Continental Sports Cars,  G.T. Foulis, 1951

  Georges Irat was a French automaker who introduced his first model in 1921. The company seems to have been a very low production manufacturer first making luxury cars, but also smaller sporty cars as they worked to survive the depression, This particular 3 seat model was introduced in 1938, being based around the front wheel drive Citroen powertrain. The car also featured four wheel independent suspension utilizing rubber bands for suspension. It was designed as a lower-cost sports car to compete with MGs and similar. Unfortunately production was ended by the outbreak of the war and only about two hundred were built. Nice looking little car.

 More pictures of the car here.

We still make things in this country, Brown Boggs

Brown Boggs was founded in 1890 in Hamilton, Ontario to manufacture sheet metal equipment. The factory moved around the area, building new factories as needed as business increased, and operated their own foundry until 1986. 

In 2006, after a decade in Ancaster, they moved to Toronto where they continue to manufacture heavy machinery, including shears, press brakes, hand brakes, roll formers, and various presses. 

More here.

  Company site here.

 

Heineken factory, Amsterdam

 Heineken Brewery (1924-26) in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, by Bert Ouëndag. It's now the Heinekin Experience.

Old files find and a rasp

 

Just some old British-made files... When we first found these we wondered if they could have been 19th century, and of so, could they be handmade? When did files stop being made by hand?  Turns out you could get handmade files in the 1990s. If they had lasted into the 21st Century, we could be buying "artisanal" files today!

Thomas Jowitt and Sons of Scotia Steel Works, Sheffield.  Formerly Jowitt and Batty.  No history that I could find but in 1855 they exhibited edge tools. (according to Grace's Guide)

John Peace and Sons, Makers of files.

 Again, Grace's Guide has no history but in 1973 the company was bought by Spear and Jackson.

Thanks, Inno!

 Hard to make out but it reads, SPENCE & CO.  Possibly Geo Spence and Sons who started as a leather merchant in 1888 and is still in business today selling tools and hardware in Leeds UK.

  Below is the reverse side of the rasp, much finer, single and double cut.

Grumman Tiger

  Based on the Grumman F-9 Cougar, the F-11 Tiger was designed and developed by the company during 1952 and 1953 to be a carrier-based supersonic fighter. The Navy was impressed enough to buy two prototypes and assist in the development program. It was put into service with the Navy in 1956 till it was retired in 1969. 199 examples were built. 

 On a side note, the Tiger is noted for being the first jet aircraft to shoot itself down. On 21 September 1956, during a test firing of its 20 mm cannons, pilot Tom Attridge fired two bursts mid-way through a shallow dive. As the velocity and trajectory of the cannon rounds decayed, they ultimately crossed paths with the Tiger as it continued its descent, disabling it and forcing Attridge to crash land the aircraft; he survived.