- Joined
- Oct 31, 2014
- Messages
- 444
I found myself without a supply of various retaining rings and got tired of heading to the hardware store every time I needed one or two -
So I ventured to the mythical land of eBay and bough an assortment of assortments of C-Clips, E-Clips, internal and external snap/retaining rings in Metric and Imperial - you know, the XXX pieces for $Y bargain bin parts . . . .
And when they arrived, although the picture showed them nicely ensconced in a plastic box with dividers to keep the various sizes separated - the retaining rings had an independent streak and the various sizes migrated throughout the box due to poor tolerance in the slide-in divider pieces.
Remind me to never do this again - I spent several hours sizing and sorting the parts so my $8 boxes of fasteners was no bargain at all - even at minimum wage.
Worse still, I planned to re-situate the parts into the standard-sized multi-compartment stacking boxes I use for other parts - but even these 'good' boxes had 'leakage' of small, thin parts from compartment to compartment. . . . Ugh!
So, how to keep these thin little buggers from migrating?
Maybe not a unique solution but I attached small high-power permanent magnets to the underside of the compartmented case, right in the middle of each compartment that was going to house the really thin parts.
Worked like a charm! These tiny 3 and 4 mm snap rings stay put just fine and I think the problem is solved!
So I ventured to the mythical land of eBay and bough an assortment of assortments of C-Clips, E-Clips, internal and external snap/retaining rings in Metric and Imperial - you know, the XXX pieces for $Y bargain bin parts . . . .
And when they arrived, although the picture showed them nicely ensconced in a plastic box with dividers to keep the various sizes separated - the retaining rings had an independent streak and the various sizes migrated throughout the box due to poor tolerance in the slide-in divider pieces.
Remind me to never do this again - I spent several hours sizing and sorting the parts so my $8 boxes of fasteners was no bargain at all - even at minimum wage.
Worse still, I planned to re-situate the parts into the standard-sized multi-compartment stacking boxes I use for other parts - but even these 'good' boxes had 'leakage' of small, thin parts from compartment to compartment. . . . Ugh!
So, how to keep these thin little buggers from migrating?
Maybe not a unique solution but I attached small high-power permanent magnets to the underside of the compartmented case, right in the middle of each compartment that was going to house the really thin parts.
Worked like a charm! These tiny 3 and 4 mm snap rings stay put just fine and I think the problem is solved!
