Holy Crap Bruce.... Thank you for posting those pictures because now I have ammunition to fire at the wife. When she asks if "don't you have enough stuff?", I can now show her your pictures, so thank you.
I see you have a set of 3 Mitutoyo digital micrometers. I have the 1" but was just looking at the sets last night. Love how well they work.
Hi Neil,
Glad to help if it smooths things over with your wife! Yes, those Mitutoyo's are very smooth. I have a number of Fowler ones also which have served me well. Just my personal preference, but I like the tumbler-style digital mic's. Can't zero out at a given number like an electronic digital, but the batteries never run out. . .
I got interested in collecting Erector sets (old construction toy) about 18 years ago and went WAY overboard. Wanted examples of every set sold, and they were sold from 1913 - 1988. I had over 350 restored (as they left the factory) sets. Many, many chemistry, microscope, puzzle, slot car (A.C. Gilbert company made slot cars also), American Flyer trains, etc. Goggle "Bruce Hansen Erector Set" and it'll confirm my issue . . .
About 27 years ago, my wife and I went to a woodworking shop auction, shop closing down. This was before Mapquest, so drove down a gravel road and hit the cross road where the auction was being held. Looked left, no cars, looked right and they were lined up on both sides of the road. Parked behind the last in line and walked about 1/4 mile to the auction. I was looking for a Delta Unisaw or something like that. Closest I got to anything was about 3 guys deep away. There were at least 500 at the auction. We turned around and left, there wouldn't be any deals there.
I had a buddy in the Erector set club who passed away close to 10 years ago. He was an avid toy train collector, had a 40 foot wall with probably 15 rows of track and it was all full. Had three layouts around 6' x 10' with mountain scenes, city scene and a general train yard. I didn't go to the estate sale, but a mutual friend did. He got there an hour before the auction and there were two cars in the drive. Checked the flyer, yup, right day. Two other cars pulled in later. Naturally, it takes two at an auction to drive prices up. So the buyers got together and hammered out who was getting what as only two were interested in the train stuff. It went for less than penny's on the dollar. Problem was not too many people were interested in what he'd collected.
Point being, I won't stick my wife with the same problem. I got over the "gotta get 'em all" mentality toward the toy collecting and started disposing of my collection 4 or 5 years ago. Still have a third of it, so more work to do. I've been flipping the toy collection into stuff for the shop. Our son will inherit my shop at some point, and whatever (maybe the whole shop?) he doesn't want will easily be disposed of by my wife. Lots of folks are still interested in tools.
A lot of laziness on my part too. Do I need screw pitch mic's and both lathes which set 5' apart? Of course not. But I can easily afford them so have duplicate tooling at both machines. It would be a lot smarter to have a dedicated measuring tool roll away with mic's, calipers, etc. and move the measuring equipment around to where I'm standing, but I went the inefficient doubled up tooling route.
Again, love the smoothness of the Mitutoyo's and glad to help if you can use me for a hoarding example to your better half to expand your own shop!
Bruce
Guess it depends on what tooling you're asking about . 
