Page:Popular Mechanics 1928 01.pdf/157

 

In order to prevent my goldfish from leaping out of the aquarium, which they tried occasionally, I made a cover for the top of the glass bowl. The cover is nothng more than a piece of ordinary mosquito wire screening stretched over a pair of wooden embroidery hoops in the same way that the ladies adjust a piece of cloth when they do embroidery work. After the screening was placed upon the smaller hoop I forced the larger hoop over it until it was only halfway in place. Then the wire screening is trimmed off neatly about $1/8$ in. from the edge of the hoop. When the larger hoop is forced all the way down into proper position, the entire cover is as tight as a drum without a single sharp end of screening protruding beyond the edge of the hoop.—W. C. Michel, Jersey City, N. J.

 



The illustration shows a number of different ways in which old valve springs can be made to give additional service after they have been discarded from the car. The ends of the spring can easily be bent into the required shape by heating them with a blowtorch or bunsen burner and bending them while hot. After being bent, the ends should be heated to a dull red heat and plunged into cold water or oil to restore the temper.

 



Where a steep roof overhangs a sidewalk or other passageway, there is danger in winter from snowslides. To obviate this trouble one home owner utilized some wire devices, as shown in the drawing. A number of 18-in. lengths of No. 10 wire are pointed at each end by cold hammering on an anvil and afterward bent in the manner described. The nail points of each device are driven into the roof with a blow or two of the hammer, and, with the loops thus attached to the surface, about 10 ft. apart, the snow or ice will remain stationary until it melts.

 

A Wisconsin contracting carpenter claims to have greatly increased the efficiency of his men while engaged in lathing, by merely spraying the bundles of lath with water as they are opened for use. Bundles of pine or hemlock, as they come from the mills or yards, are full of fine, loose splinters that often penetrate the workmen's hands, causing considerable annoyance. Spraying them with water not only softens the splinters but prevents loose particles of wood and dust from flying about when the laths are nailed on.

