Whatsit?

[DJH]

Ha ha. Love it...

Anyway Dick van Dyke would call it a development plate. It's used in conjunction with a pair of dividers to mark a lead pipe prior to soldering a branch into it. I've taken some action photos to try and illustrate how it was used...

The lead pipe is coated in plumber's black (also known as smudge or soil) which prevents excess solder from running onto and sticking to parts of the pipe where you don't want it.



I've used a piece of plastic waste pipe just as an example and marked it with marker pen as if it was the blacking. Depending on the diameter of the the pipe that is going to have the branch put on it and the size of the branch pipe, the relevant hole is selected in the development plate and a line is scribed using one point of the dividers onto the blackened pipe. The area of blacking within this line is scraped back to clean lead and the new branch is placed in the hole of the main pipe and is connected on to it with a wiped solder joint.



Doug

 

[Penners]

Thanks Doug. That's really interesting.

 

[DJH]

No problem Penners. Here's another.....



to use them you would also need these well not all of them, but still a clue?

 

[Jellyfire]

Still not sure I understand the plumbers one, now the corset solution I can grasp!

 

[philpjuk100]

We used to call the items in the first pic "struggle bars" (for aligning holes).? sometimes called "podgers"

 

[DJH]

Yes. I know what you mean. Not right though but thanks for suggesting podgers. It was only the other day I was talking to someone and couldn't for the life of me remember what they were called.

 

[LadyArowana]

Yes. I know what you mean. Not right though but thanks for suggesting podgers. It was only the other day I was talking to someone and couldn't for the life of me remember what they were called.

Quite an unusual name, are you sure they aren't called Rodgers and you just mid heard ? :lol:

 

[philpjuk100]

Nope they are "podgers" if you google them make sure you have "safe search" selected! available from amazon!

 

[Penners]

Interesting regional variations here - when I were but a lad doing an engineering apprenticeship in Ipswich, they were called "prodgers". But they were straight, not bent.

 

[DJH]

Ok guys and gals here's the clue. It's another thing an old plumber would have in his tool bag...

 

[Jellyfire]

For bending lead/copper pipes?

 

[DJH]

Close again Jelly but just not quite there. The lower knives are a mixture of knives for cutting lead sheet or slots in lead pipes, that's the ones with a hooked end, and the others are both lead chipping knives used where say a sheet of lead overhangs an edge by a small amount and is difficult to cut with snips or shears. They are also used as hacking knives to remove hard putty from glazed windows. At one time plumbers used to cut glass and glaze windows as part of their job and if they didn't have those tools in their kit they weren't paid full rate of pay.

The items in the top picture are 'Bent Bolts' which were used along with the development plate to fix a branch into a larger or even same size lead pipe. The correct size of slot for the pipe used was cut in the main pipe and the bent bolt was then inserted into the slot and the edges of the slot were brought up as shoulders by hitting the back of the bolt with a hammer. You can see where the hammer has hit the back of the bolt in the photos. The edges of the hole were formed up to the correct size to accommodate the branch pipe and then everything was joined together with a wiped solder joint.

Just an aside, I found the knife at the bottom right under the boards of a lead roof I renewed at my local church in the UK. It must have been thrown in there as no good anymore as It had taken a fair few blows on the back edge of the blade and the tangs had parted company.

Doug

 

[Moo]

It was only the other day I was talking to someone and couldn't for the life of me remember what they were called.

We all know how that feels, Doug. As an old friend of mine says, your brain won't let you in.

 

[Jellyfire]

My metalworking knowledge is expanding faster than my brain can cope with (it started at zero though), I'm slightly worried that something else will be pushed out to make way for it though!

 

[Penners]

As an old friend of mine says, your brain won't let you in.

An excellent turn of phrase. Sometimes I spend ages knocking, ringing the bell, beating on the door... to no avail.

 

[DJH]

Ok, time for another one Jelly. Does anyone else have anything to show on here to get us guessing?

 

[Penners]

A log "grenade"? Hold it point down on the end of the log and welly it with a sledgehammer.

I'm a bit unsure about this because it looks a little insubstantial for that job, but it's all I can think of.

 

[JoceAndChris]

It's a metal bill for a duck robot!

 

[Jellyfire]

Driving in rivets or nailheads so they're flush?

 

[DJH]

Nope. It's that old plumbers tool again.... :twisted: