I need a big beefy magnet for retrieving dropped tools from rivers – spanners, hammers etc. Also for picking nails out of my fire grate after burning pallets. And probably lots of other useful tasks. Any ideas where to get such a thing? Are the magnets in large speakers powerful? Cheap would be good, so no neodynium or owt like that.
Cheers!

Big speakers from the impaud are your friend… Get down there and see what you can find.

Just out of interest, why would you want to go fishing for tools?

You could try not doing DIY over moving water?

Knackered speaker should be ok. Tricky bit will be not lifting up all the other crap out the river.

Aximinster tools do a big hand held magnetic swarf gathering thing, with a pull-lever thing so that it’ll let go of what its picked up. Handy when the handle of your big organiser box full of screws fails and scatters a couple of thousand screws into grass around the tyres of your van.

Costs about a tenner

An old (or new) speaker magnet would be ideal, even from the small shelf speakers you’d get in a car.

here: http://www.magnetsales.co.uk/

they are just up the road from me

For the latter task, take an old hard disk to bits.

Cool, thanks guys. Tools in the river is one of the hazards of working in the river and not really avoidable. Having spanners on tethers was tried and dismissed fairly quickly.

Will try a hard drive for the nails.

Cheers!

Any chandlery should be able to sort you out. My old boy got one that was easily able to pick his outboard off of the sea floor

here: http://www.magnetsales.co.uk/

I’ve got this image of a postman unable to get a package out of his van, ’cause its stuck to the floor 😀

If you go to a marina you can by pretty powerful magnets designed for retrieving things out of the water. Can’t remember the make of the one i’ve got.

Acme do massive ones.

I’ve got this image of a postman unable to get a package out of his van, ’cause its stuck to the floor

😆

Ditch magnet

We use em in the workshop for ensuring that swarf and nails etc does not damage tires or hurt folk !

Magnotron from a Microwave 🙂

Every flytip has one 🙂

I know you don’t want a rare earth jobbie but they are great for trawling in water and you would not need a very big one. There used to be a brilliant youtube vid of a couple of inbreds with a pair of child’s fist sized neodyniums for trawling for shopping trolleys for scrap bringing them together and shattering their fingers and not being able get them apart again.

Think that Winchester hospital might have one you can borrow, its not in A1 conditon though

http://www.hantsfire.gov.uk/stories.htm?newsid=61306

I’ve got this image of a postman unable to get a package out of his van, ’cause its stuck to the floor

😆 +1

Sea seacher is the make i’ve got, priced around £25

http://unitednuclear.com/

Lots of cool stuff on there.

Acme do massive ones.

lol!

i get mine down the kings head in a pint glass

The local Infirmary?

http://unitednuclear.com/

Lots of cool stuff on there.

What an attractive site 😉

Do you have an old hard drive lying about. The magnets in hard drives are extremly strong. They are small though and don’t have a large field range. Once stuck on though they don’t let go.

*edit* btw hard drive magnets are neodymium I believe

Bought this for the river job:

web linky
Will report back once I’ve found a steel girder to hang from to check the ‘130kg’ bit…