From "Watching Perfectionist Restorers As They Work Is Incredibly Soothing" (NY Magazine).
Example highlighted in the article, which I watched in its 17-minute entirety is "Rusty Deadlocked Vise - Perfect Restoration":
July 19, 2021
"He appears to be a machinist, at least by avocation and possibly professionally. He has access to very good tools: a lathe, a sandblasting cabinet, a milling machine, drill bits he keeps intimidatingly sharp."
"He must have obsessive tendencies, but somehow he wears them lightly, at least onscreen. (We never see him except for his hands.).... He abhors any rough edge.... We periodically see him heat brass parts with a blowtorch (captioned '300°C,' in case you needed to know the exact temperature) and then dunk them into oil to give them a smooth brown-black coating. Most significant of all, though, are his level of craft and his eye for the smallest detail work. If a part is too far gone, he will often give up on straightening it out, and reproduce it exactly (and I mean exactly) out of a billet of brass or steel. In the brief explanatory captions he adds to his video, he usually shows the wrecked piece, explains that it was beyond fixing, and then appends the phrase 'I make a new one.' (His English is the only thing in these videos that is the least bit bent.) Those words have reached the catchphrase level; he now sells T-shirts that read I MAKE A NEW ONE."
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19 comments:
portly pirate writes:
"He's frighteningly good at what he does. When you watch other restorers at work who don't have all the power tools and expertise that the My Mechanics guy does, it's glaringly obvious. Watch repair videos are also entertaining in a similar way."
Temujin writes:
"Loved that video. I like watching videos of real craftspeople at work. It seems as though they are fewer and fewer. It always makes me feel as though they are a throwback to another time when it was more common to have those skills. I may be wrong. Maybe there's a lot of these types of skilled people still around, but from what I see it's mostly people with nose rings making videos of themselves dancing.
"ASMR has nothing on videos of craftspeople doing their craft. "
Daniel writes:
How I've been surviving COVID...
On YouTube:
EngelsCoachShop - a bit of talking
Mr. Chickadee - no talking
Sampson Boat Co - a parrot, this week a lot of talking
Hand Tool Rescue - you can become a patron for more talking
Uncle Doug - an engineer talking and cats and guitars.
I've been putting on 8-hour videos like this — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymFIjrV-usM — of rain falling on a pond.
Fred writes:
"For irrelevant reasons, I have been browsing Reddit recently. I am now addicted to the Welding and Machinists subreddits. (I used to be a machinist).
"The attention to detail, to approaching perfection, tempered with solid practicality, is an antidote to the politician's bs we are constantly flooded with. For which, see your post about the BLM street art.
"Remember Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance? Pirsig makes a lot of points about the split between folks who understand how plastic the material world is, and those who don't."
oyo writes:
"... you should enjoy this antique 1890s mortise lock restoration (watched every minute of it some time ago)."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzRe8cfHoZw
Art asks:
"Artisan or Craftsman?
"I watched all 17 minutes too!
"I would argue he’s a craftsman."
I answer:
I don't see a significant difference... other than that I already had a tag for "artisans" and don't like tag proliferation.
I found this statement of the difference: "Artisans and craftsmen work in an artistic capacity, both creating items with their hands. However, artisans tend to work on more unique projects designed for aesthetic appeal while craftsmen master the creation of functional, mass-produced items."
It is a unique item as he works on it.
Steve writes:
"I like 'Hand Tool Rescue' for a similar level of skill with humor thrown in."
James writes:
"Contrast and Compare the obsessiveness of the dog placement wardens and the perfectionist restorer."
madAsHell writes:
"I was recently dismayed to learn that the shop classes at my former Junior High have been dismantled. The workbenches, forge, and anvil have been displaced by desks only suitable for note-taking.
"I learned more wearing a leather apron while hammering on a hot piece of steel than I ever learned in an English course."
Curious George writes:
I’m a hobbyist woodworker and for the last decade or so have replaced all my modern machines with vintage stuff. It really gets in your blood. I have a machine that dates to the 1890s, but most are early to mid-1900’s.
Mostly I buy complete machines and I like to leave them as is, and restore only to the level of functionality, (replacing bearings etc.) but have done complete restoration on a few things, like a rare Victor patternmakers vice. I’m not a metal worker so I don’t “make new one”, but buy an old one if I need parts. Because of this, like I said, I buy complete stuff in good working order.
I watch the video, yep, cool stuff. He was working on a pretty good casting. Most castings have a lot of filler to make them smooth, and when you media blast it takes out that filler. Which means you need to apply new filler like he did and sand it smooth. It’s auto body filler. A lot of work, not fun.
I could be wrong, but I don’t think that raised lettering was originally painted a different color, but most restorers do paint them just for the cool factor. I don’t use a paint brush or tooth pick though. Sharpie makes paint markers with tips from bold to fine, very easy to use.
I also wouldn’t use WD-40 is a penetrating oil, although it will help. I use a product called Aero Kroil. Awesome stuff for rusted on bolts or parts.
Pete writes:
"Those of us who are car nuts follow Arthur Tussik, the Russian auto body repairman equivalent of that guy:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJDyqaoyVtWKhCiTPZVOoyA
"He's amazing (although criticized for not restoring full OEM strength/crush resistance to the repaired cars)."
Scott observes:
"He has remarkably undamaged hands and fingers."
vinarce writes:
"I hate it when one of these restoration videos pops up in the YouTube thumbnail side panel. I uncontrollably click it and...there goes twenty minutes. They are absolutely mesmerizing."
Mezzrow writes:
Happy Monday, A.
This is as much a note to you as a comment…
You’re in my wheelhouse with this one. There’s My Mechanics (he’s Swiss, and has a machine shop in his garage), Tysy Tube, BOM, Meine Mechaniker (he’s in England), Gear Show – this is just a few pulled from my YouTube history. Add to that the fine art restorations from Baumgartner Restorations in Chicago, the furniture repair with Tom Johnson in Maine, and the hours watching guys take watches apart, clean them, put them back together, regulate them (I’m prone to the Nekkid Watchmaker for these). I watch a guy who sounds just like me but is a generation and a half younger mill logs into lumber on the Georgia fall line (that would be FALL LINE RIDGE).
How did I get here? I spent several months recovering from throat cancer treatment, and had enough time and inclination to just give in to my inner OCD nature and enjoy it while I held my misery at arm’s length. Just as I began to emerge from this, COVID hit and we were subject to several more months of house arrest. I should also mention that I took to my shed upon retirement several years ago and started overhauling clarinets, much in the way these guys overhaul old vises and bench grinders. The need to escape the madness of daily news and world affairs Is greater than ever, and the ability to read Althouse’s daily MSM dispatches, see what Tom Johnson dragged into his shop, or see Julian Baumgartner clean centuries of grime off of a previously dark and nasty old oil painting gives us some kind of hope for the future, I think. If you listen to today’s words, you will despair. If you watch today’s artists and craftsmen at work, you know it will some how be all right when you’re gone.
Maybe I just need a camera and a plan. In the 21st century, we can all be the star of our own internet. Ever see somebody restore an old Buffet or Leblanc clarinet from the 50s, then play some Mozart with it when he’s done?
If I just knew someone who knew how to create an effective online persona…
Mezzrow
P.S. Baumgartner is a place you might like to fall into. He’s really good at the video part, and even better at his business.
Thomas writes:
"He does not have the hands of a machinist. The hands of a machinist are normally stained and calloused, bearing the scars of mistakes and misjudgements. I suspect he is a hobbyist with very deep pockets to fund a workshop befitting a very talented machinist. I'd also note that his tools and workspace are too clean to be those of someone who works as a machinist all day every day. I saw no dried blood on any of the work surfaces.
"For forty years I restored antique outboard motors, a hobby I abandoned recently when my eyesight abandoned me and Parkinson's messed with my fine motor skills. My garage workshop was limited by space and money, so I became friends with several local machinists. My local friends had extraordinary skills and ingenuity. They were often able to repair damaged parts and craft new parts for outboards manufactured in the 1920's and 1930's. They shared my joy in bringing a long abandoned outboard found in a dirty barn back to life. But most of all, they shared my curiosity with how those old motors worked and how they were designed. There are many very talented small town machinists in America. Most of them love their profession because it requires them to be resourceful and ingenious every day."
Louis writes:
"I actually watched that video over a year ago. (During the "stay at home" period here in California.) I love those videos. There was also a show on Netflix a few years ago called Rick's Restorations. That was pretty good. And another one on Netflix called, The Repair Shop. I love repairing and restoring old technology. Before Covid hit, I had purchased a Seeberg LS2 jukebox (1968-1969) and a 1969 pinball machine made by the Chicago Coin Company. It was named, Action, and had a race car theme. You should look it up on the internet. The art on it is fantastic. I actually sent the back glass out to be professionally restored and replaced all the rubber bumpers in it. I can actually play it, but it won't keep score correctly. I went online and bought the schematics for it, but they're not detailed enough. I'm at a stopping point now because there is a severely melted plastic plunger on one of the key score keeping solenoids. (A solenoid is a wire coil that pushes out a metal shaft when the proper power is applied. It's the key to pinball technology.) It's really weird shaped and I haven't been able to find a replacement online or been able to figure out what it looked like before it melted. Also, the LS2 jukebox is really cool looking, too. The person I bought it from said that it worked when he placed it in the outdoor shed many years ago, but it doesn't work now. That's the equivalent of someone saying "ran when parked" when they try and sell an old VW bug. But I will get all my retro stuff working at some point. When I retire, I hope to spend a lot of my time repairing old technology....and teaching others how to repair old technology."
Chris writes:
"One word, one man, amazing production values and wonderful work:
"Clickspring. The Antikythera mechanism project, clockmaking, and ancient technologies tested by doing them."
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCworsKCR-Sx6R6-BnIjS2MA
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