Closet Extremist

In answer to you question

Ran across this post by TNT (aka: Bee-Dubya) wherein she asks:

What would be your favorite tool?

I'm glad you asked. My favorite hapens to be a little widgit known as the Jimmy Bar. For working on large elevators, there's nothing better.

If you've got a thousand-pound peice of steel that you are trying to line up to another thousand-pound peice of steel in order to bolt them together, you use the pointed end and stick it through the holes of both peices of steel. The taper allows it to fit into holes of all different sizes, and let's you move the two parts in any direction. Once you get the bolts through another hole, you just pull it on out, and put a bolt in the hole where it was. Simple. The flattened end is used when your parts are close to something that you can pry against. We also use it to adjust the alignment of parts that have a slotted hole. Works wonderfully well, as that is what it was designed to do.

Iron workers use this tool all the time, and although I am not classified as one, there's a lot of similar activity's in building an elevator. Steel alignment, welding, anchoring metal to concrete, all like that. They mostly focus on keeping what they build solid, but ours has to move, and be solid. Pretty cool, I think.

So TNT, if you're interested in learning more about this implement, the next time I see you, you can play with my "Jimmy". ;^)