Useful Things Around The House

Interesting - I took an old Oral B powered tootbrush apart last week.  The small motors are fairly high RPM but you are right - they have to be useful for something.

 

I've made a ton of stuff out of the plastic tops of spray cans and such . . . tanks, quonset huts, and some other wierd stuff . . .

 

I have an old strainer from the kitchen I am saving to make a radar dish for a military installation I will eventually have. 

 

I am using a plastic ball about 8" in diameter cut through the middle to make a Palomar-type observatory on the peak of a mountain. 

 

I used some cheap plastic beads left over from Halloween costumes and wire to make old globe style Victorian era look streetlights.

 

We get fruit in these plastic net containers: cut them up and they make acceptable looking fencing for farm scenes, etc. 

 

 

Perhaps you could use one for a replacement fan motor for your U-boat? 

No - I'm convinced that my U-boats are jinxed!  I'm not going to touch them for fear the virus could spread.  I even keep them on a bottom shelf now, because I'm convinced anywhere else they would probably fall off and break further.

 

I was playing with a less expensive Oral B toothbrush that just vibrates.  Haven't taken it apart, but I did notice that if I hold it against a sheet of styrene just right, I can get a plastic cow to move across it just like in the Lionel accersory set where they move through the corral - that has possibilities, too. 

Thanks for validating saving those toothbrush motors.  My wife thinks I'm nuts.  Ok.  She KNOWS I'm nuts.

So....I'm down running trains in the basement one afternoon when I hear a strange vibration coming from the water pipes leading to the bathroom. I quickly shut off the nearest valves, both hot and cold. The noise is still there.

 

I shut off the main valve to the whole house - still that noise.

 

I go upstairs and look under the sink - everything seems to vibrating!

 

I finally get up and feel the faucets - vibrating like crazy!

 

Just as I'm about to call a plumber, I notice that my wife's larger-than-normal-sized toothbrush is resting against a faucet. I grab it and sure enough, it feels alive!

 

That was my introduction to power toothbrushes that seemingly can turn themselves on at will!!!

 

I don't want to think of how red my face would have been if a plumber or the town water department had discovered it instead!

 

 

Jim

Hey at least you caught it. We had a guy on one of our crews that lets just say wasn't the brightest candle in the box. Back when we had pagers he was called into work but declined because he was having problems with his refrigerator making a loud buzzing noise. He said a repairman was on his way.

Come to find out he and his wife had been to church service that mourning and he put the pager on vibrate and when he got home he set it on top of the refrigerator.
65 bucks and a good bit of embarrassment later not to mention the lost overtime money which was about 60 bucks an hour on Sunday. The repair man handed him his pager and a bill.

David

Like I always say guys; I never made a smart mistake in my life.

Has anybody figured out how to get the little flywheel (that makes the brushes go brusha-brusha) off the motor shaft, without bending the shaft???

 

I posted a photo a while back of a shower faucet valve I've put to use as a piece of machinery, but can't find the photo now.  Guess I'll have to back these claims up with some pictures!

 

more later

Ooh I love this stuff. (I wish the Scroungers Corner column still ran in OGR.)  I save the little plastic spools from the doggies poop bags.  Pipe loads? Cylindrical pieces are always useful. Just recently I built a old-timey wooden gondola almost entirely out of Starbucks coffee stirrers.  The side posts are matches with The heads cut off.

Take the cap from a nose spray bottle apart and add an HO F unit engine fan on top of the cap to make a outside A/C unit for your Houses. I use a HO F unit engine fan for a Diesel engine A/C units on top of the cabs.

I take a daily shots and the cap on the end of the needle works for vent pipes on roofs on buildings. The plastic box that some watches cone in make good electric transformers.  If it's made out of plastic I keep it.

After I put a modern Lionel Rocket Launcher on my layout, I was sent (by mistake) a casing for a double undersink water filter. The company didn't want it back and I was all set to throw it away when I got an idea. I painted it white, put NASA decals on the two "tubes" and installed LED bulbs on top. Instant rocket fuel storage tanks!

I have used my hayfever pill lid for a vent on a building.  Just sand the letterings off the top and paint.