Don Terrill’s Speed-Talk

We're having a patio built and the contractor was trying to save a few bucks on the installation of the plastic edging which holds it all in place. The edging strip looks like a 2" X 2" angle with 3/8" holes. The fastener is a 3/8" X 12" spike which costs .65 each and is driven in vertically to anchor the edging. The holes are 5" apart, which means a bunch of those spikes.

I checked the scrap yards for 3/8" round rod, but only found a few pieces. Then, the light bulb went on. We've a bucket full of miscellaneous used pushrods. Stovebolt six, Ford FE, BBC all work well and I used what we had of those, but believe it, Packard V8 pushrods make a perfect anchor spike for patio edging.

PackardV8 wrote:We're having a patio built and the contractor was trying to save a few bucks on the installation of the plastic edging which holds it all in place. The edging strip looks like a 2" X 2" angle with 3/8" holes. The fastener is a 3/8" X 12" spike which costs .65 each and is driven in vertically to anchor the edging. The holes are 5" apart, which means a bunch of those spikes.

I checked the scrap yards for 3/8" round rod, but only found a few pieces. Then, the light bulb went on. We've a bucket full of miscellaneous used pushrods. Stovebolt six, Ford FE, BBC all work well and I used what we had of those, but believe it, Packard V8 pushrods make a perfect anchor spike for patio edging.

Now that is RE-PURPOSING at its best ...

When i moved my shop to its current foundation it had a 10 foot wall. I wanted to raise it up 3 feet with a pony wall. I used about 100 SBC and BBC head bolts to fasten the 2x6's together. Still had to go buy nuts and washers though. Doesn't it give you such a good feeling to save a few bucks and re-use something that would otherwise be scrap iron? Good job.
Brian

Years ago when I moved into Pete Oliver's steel hauling truck compound shed for our trucks and gunning equipment, the shed was two put together one of our trucks was taller than the other so Pete's crew just took a chainsaw and cut the roof off of the low end shed and cribbed the roof up an extra two feet. They used a great big crane and picked the roof up in one piece and did their thing.

Way cool by me.

pdq67

PS., at one time, I think Pete had 1500 flatbeds hauling steel around the Country and he was located in good ol' Mexico, MO.

You always knew his trucks because the rear mud-flaps had, "Stolen from Pete Oliver", on them,, He, He!!