Tristan, apologies for the late reply, the Capybara had a mild case of the bends after our trip out to the Green Island reef and required decompression, all is well now. Will you be attending next Tuesday? The Concubine has made a large batch of the pate you enjoy and will bring along several pots. Hope to see you then. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Bobert! The spuds aren't ready for Mother Earth Gaia. Old frosty, mustachioed with the fresh white stuff, ensured a false start. Ebbs and flows, you understand. No ragrets. xox.
Hi AvE, I have it on good authority they made a prototype of the grease gun with indicator. They found in trials that the gun was never refilled and remained nearly empty. When the gun was picked up to use, the person saw it was nearly empty. They put it back and left it for some other smuck to refill and went to find a gun that had grease in it. 🤣
Or, they put just enough grease in for what they need. That way it’s nearly empty for the next guy. Takes real talent to always get it a couple pumps away from sucking air.
of course. an indicator on the grease gun is just a waste, it is always going to be active. Imperical evidence shows that all grease guns are empty, all of the time. Next hypothesis: let's go on a smoke brake, and see if it will refill itself if left alone.
I have my greese gun hung on the wall on an old analog fish scale. On the wall is written the empty weight and full weight for it to remind me the range, as its hanging on the wall i can see how full it is based on the weight its displaying on the fish scale.
Genius! Excellent idea and I must say that publishing a million dollar idea in hopes SOMEBODY will take the hint what has the paper says he can engineer stuff he will never practically use, pay chiner to mass produce the shit out of it and times the cost to produce each one by 333 to deduce the price we will pay in the US. And have it available for you to use at your convenience, I can appreciate the humility, and like you said. More confirmation the system is broken. We need a easy way to sell a great idea to the highest bidder just like an auction and a group of people record the auction and store the idea blueprint and outline and prosecute anyone present at the auction or their affiliate from producing the idea or slightly different rendition thereof, unless they purchased the idea or some of the right to produce it from the purchaser who will be required to track the statistics and add them to the portfolio of the brain that came up with the idea. We demand reform!
I just grab the plunger handle and gently pull it out; when it gets hard to pull you're starting to compress the spring, so you know how full it is based on how far the handle went out.
My father asked me once (exactly once) to refill the grease gun. He had already removed the empty tube and I didn't realize the new one would fit inside. And I had just learned how to hand pack wheel bearings the previous weekend.
place i used to work was run by cheap bastards that bought moly grease in a 20 gallon barrel. had to fill the gun by hand if you wanted to use it, so we rarely did. it still managed to be empty every time i grabbed it. i got to the point where i'd just stick the tube in the keg, cover one end with my hand and pull it back out. you get what you get.
@@Psi105 Yup. I have my grandfather’s “shorty”, and you have to hand pack it. He never bought a tube of grease, always a tub. I think this is why I hate the sight of a grease gun to this day. Now I’ve got to go wash my hands, because all I have to do is LOOK at a grease gun and I’ve got it all over me…..same with roofing tar….
The plunger tells you when it’s empty, used to use it as a measure tool for filling bearing cavity. The plunger shows you how much is left. Pulls all the way out when full, doesn’t pull out at all when empty. If you pull the plunger before each time you can judge how much is left from how far out the plunger is pulled. If you stop the grease gun when the plunger handle hits the end cap stop greasing refill and not have to bleed the air out of the air bound pump.
@@jakeolden1014 yeah I’m confused how more people in the comments didn’t bring this up? I figured it was common knowledge since I learned it from my grandpa who’s like 80 years old and still works 72 hour weeks.
I was kind of confused why he didn't bring this up as well. Cant get any cheaper or easier to use than the plunger to tell you if you have grease in the gun. Just pull out the handle and look at the distance it comes out, and it is already installed and very fast to use.
Learned this years ago, put a tube and a half of grease in my equipment at shutdown every night M-F so no matter what I have to change at least 1 tube a day so its not a big ordeal less than a minute of inconvenience and the plunger floats where the grease lvl is so stop a couple pumps early and no air to purge as Frank mentioned above
Revenue subscription model? WiFi enabled to automatically order you a new proprietary and expensive tube o' lube when half empty. Tools-As-A-Servive could be huge, easily valued into unicorn territory. 🦄
They would make the grease gun not work without proprietary grease, with the little chip on the tube, and there's also use the counter at the end of life, even though without a computer it still would have worked fine.
The reason they don't meter off of piston movement is because of the roughly 300 pumps, 12 cap removals, and 4 different tubes it takes to get the grease ot come out of the damn thing in the first place.
I'm an equipment operator and before I became one, I had a hell of a time getting grease guns to work. Now, it's zero problem whatsoever. Like anything, practice and understanding is essential. 2 things though, any time a grease gun isn't working it because of air and the heavier the spring in the gun the better. Those cheap guns with light springs make things way worse. It needs to be difficult to draw the spring back when loading and then always purge the air and you're golden. I go from pumping air to pumping grease in a new cartridge in less than a minute every time and nearly every day of work.
The one we have at work, if you turn the handle 1/4 turn, it locks into the plunger, and you can just push hard on the handle and get the air out instantly instead of relying on the spring force. Actually AvE's gun is one of that kind.
Keep a gravity-powered scale out in the workshop. Weigh the grease gun when it's full and when it's empty. Write the weights on a tag. Weigh it when you bring it back after you've used it and compare that weight to the full and empty weights to see where you stand on greaseness.
I thought it was simple. I turn the rod to disengage from the plunger and the amount of rod that sticks out is the level. That's how I always check it and it works. Maybe yours is different but over many decades I never saw one that wasn't b/c then the rod would stick out when full.
I just want to point out that on the official English captions does indeed say "neo-diddlium" at 2:17 . That makes it officially accepted (although it has been in our hearts for ages).
Alternative B to circumvent having to put batteries in the thing: Hot glue a clear tube on the side of the thing with a small bearing ball in it. If everything work correctly the ball should follow the magnet around
I've always just pulled the rod back until it requires force, it gives you an accurate indication of how much grease is in the gun, and only requires what is already there.
Heck, if you put it in the right place and remember to do it before its completely empty, you can run the tube around and refill the grease gun _with itself_!
A spring loaded rod that sits on the lid would be more simple. Once the plunger gets to the top, it pushes against the rod pushing it up indicating it is almost out, then eventually out.
A strip of magnetic field viewing film would let you see the level at any time rather than just when it's getting low. It can also be checked at any time by pulling the rod back to see how far it moves before contacting the plunger.
Suggestion for an improvement: If you put a strip of magnetic viewing film on the line that the magnet travels you would be able to see the position of the magnet in real-time. On top of that, there would be no battery/electronics.
@@scumbaag Your comment on coin cell batteries got me thinking. If you buy them in bulk (100 pack) they're like 19 cents a piece. I wonder if they work in vending machines. I know the game tokens from a place I worked at as a kid worked in the toll booths. I was a game tech there, so I had like 20lbs of the coins when they went out of business. I would suspect that being a power source that fits in the coin hole, and will likely roll right back out after a barrage of tests end up in a fail condition. It would provide the right person internal, non-contact, access to the inside of the machine, if the coin mech isn't sufficiently EM hardened (the battery is likely going to be attracted to a magnet, and that will cause a rejection on its own).
@@scumbaag Boring a viewing window in the tube would probably work just fine- neglecting the stress exerting on the plastic by the pump- The problem with the magnet, is steel has an excellent (magnetic) permeability. If you "Air gap" the magnet with an insulator or brass (copper and aluminum should work somewhat) from the piston then some reasonable fraction of the magnetic flux should traverse the window. The ignorant (unoptimized) design would just make the piston and body out of brass. From a magnetic standpoint measuring the fields would be the same as measuring in open air. Nd(...) Magnets can be quite strong in those sizes. Orienting the magnet as to force the poles in to be along the direction of travel may be a preferable configuration. As an added note, reed switches are awesome, but hopelessly fragile. using a basic hall effect sensor is likely the better play for mechanical robustness. The cheap "digital" ones would be excellent for this
@@c3h867 a small window in the tube doesn't help because u add a tube of grease inside the guns tube also if you were tu use it without the tube and glass inside face will have to be perfectly flat as the pump is a vacuum and if there is scoring or cracks it will just never prime
The plunger let's you know when it's almost out. Next time you go and use your Milwaukee grease gun, pull the plunger out to where it stops on its own, don't pull it all the way out like you're changing grease. You'll see marks on it that tells you how much you have left. You can leave it out and pump grease and watch it suck the handle in.
This is what I came here to say. If the plunger pulls out easily on its own halfway then you know you have half a tube of Grease left. If it pulls out nearly all the way, then your tube of grease is almost full. And if it barely pulls out at all, then you should probably bring a fresh tube of grease with you because you're going to need it after greasing a couple fittings. That's how I've always checked the level of Grease before heading out to the field.
A BINGO light for your grease gun! I love it! By the way, the commentary of this video made my morning. A genuine laugh and the reassurance of knowing I'm not the only one who acts like this in the empire of dirt. Kudos and thank you.
Inspied by your acts of tool dissection I cracked open my Makita DHP483 and moved the LED to the handle base so I am no longer in the shadows when wood touching with my short drill bits. Didn't even need to cut a wire. Much thanks
I love the idea of a magnet on the piston. But not just for telling the operator when the gun is empty. Needs to trigger a 120dB alarm when the jeezless thing is hung back up on the wall empty.
Needs one more thing, if hung back on wall empty thus triggering horn there also be a mild(excessively strong) electric charge to the prick hangin her up empty.
@@andyreid7274 not so hard, make the hook part of a NC set of korntacts with a calibrated springamathing set for the standard weight of a schmoo dispenser plus 10 percent (give or take). Corral about 240 angry pixies and it ought chooch nicely. Hang ‘er up quick! 😝
Maybe combine it with RFID ID badges for enforcement purposes. That way some schmuck 1000 miles away can send you a nasty email to tell you how to do your job.
The plunger can rotate, so your magnet may not always end up in the same position. You could just have a momentary switch on the cap that is triggered by the end of the plunger shaft. All of these are redundant in any case as the plunger handle, being against the cap, is a pretty good indicator of shmoo to air ratio.
Or a counter that sets off an alarm when getting low. But then you would have to remember to reset the damn thing. I like the pull out the handle on the spring the best.
@@--_DJ_-- . . . right. Keep going. So when its FULL, when you twist it and pull it out it pulls all the way out easy. If it were empty, it would not pull out easy, you'd be engaging the spring again quickly, and half way if its half full. . . That's how I check.
If I was going to revolutionize the grease gun, my idea would be to go with a slotted window the length of the can(sight glass) and pack grease in a clear plastic sleeve instead of cardboard. Of course I'm old school
I imagined that was the way grease guns already worked, based on my experience with caulking guns. I suppose there's a good reason they can't work that way.
Years of following.... you're my second favorite canook 😉 I know you're not my dad but you do take us to school.... and I'm showing my boys your videos so they can learn more! Thank you AvE
With someone so far involved in TH-cam, you'd think he'd watch a video about it. Someone should tell him no one uses grease anymore anyways. He should invent a greaseless pin system
Okay, I have now watched virtually all of the video, and I am wondering why not just put an el-cheapo tally counter on it if you want to count strokes? Strictly mechanical, no batteries. The delivery of grease guns vary. I have my plant standardized to 40 pumps per ounce so that if I say '12 pumps' I know what they are going to deliver, and the delivery is small enough that it is unlikely that the unwashed are going to find the energy to radically over-grease anything. I use pistol-grip guns with a flexible lead, so you have one hand for the hose and one for the trigger. This way it takes more strength so it's harder to blow seals, and you can get into nooks and crannies that a lever gun can't get into. Anyway, so if you have a 40 pump gun with a standard 14 ounce cartridge then that is a total of 560 pumps per cartridge (on average). A tally counter can let you know when you're near the end. You could just learn the number of pumps for your gun as you go and scribble the number on the gun. OR... have a hanger where you store the gun that has a spring under it so that if the gun isn't heavy enough to pull the hanger down to a contact it doesn't turn on the green light, so you have to change the cartridge when you return it. Or just have a crappy old school balance scale to tell you if the gun is too light. The possibilities abound.
Worked on a project years ago called the GreaSee that was a transparent tube for this reason. It was actually disposable to prevent cross-contamination of different types for aerospace reasons, but the visual aspect was 75% of the innovation.
"For aerospace reasons". I once saw a field service manual written by an aerospace company on how to place an added spare part into the spare parts drawer. It was 30 pages long. I am glad not to work in aerospace.
I have a electric grease gun by Lincoln that gives the quantity of grease used. You can reset it after each new tube or keep count through multiple tubes so you know what to bill the customer.
Once upon a time in Desert Storm I left Germany assigned to ride in the back of a Soft side cargo Humvee (HMMWV) then we arrived in country... and I get assigned to drive the old Motor pool 5 ton Dump truck. All it’s Services were Rumored to have been paper whipped... so my first job was to do the initial inspection and operator PMCS (Preventative Maintenance Checks and Service) 22 tubes of grease later ( I’m not joking about it either) I was done with the Lube section and then 3 days after the start of that we took off from the sea shore and headed to the desert! Later on it broke the Jack Shaft and twisted and broke the Bell Housing. The shifter tore the steel floor board and beat up my right leg before I bailed out!!! I was bruised up from it but got salvaged parts and some new ones and put it back together again!
@@A6Legit I’ll add that I had sore Arms and blisters on my right hand. Some Months later somewhere in the Iraqi Desert, I was taking the truck over to a Track on our Perimeter that had run dry on fuel overnight (some one fell asleep on duty), and I was taking a Track Mechanic with me to use the Air system to pressurize the tank and push fuel to the injectors. We were just going about 200 meters, and I put it in Gear let out the Clutch and BAM the Shifter rips out of my hand and starts beating my right leg! I think it’s gone full run away and we both bailed out of the truck... I hit the sand in quite the shock of the moment and full of Adrenaline... as we figured it out because was back to idle... upon getting my leg beat I hit the accelerator peddle and used it to push out of the door to my Left . The Jack shaft busted and the Domino effect was the transmission breaking away from the bell housing and the shifter tearing through the metal of the floor and hitting my leg and then my reaction pushed the truck to full throttle. All within like 3 tents of a second! The sore leg I got had a Bruise the size of a ping pong paddle the next day! With some scrounging Iraqi trucks and repair parts clutch Pressure plate, bell housing and a New Jack shaft from the Transmission to the Transfer case, we had it up and running again in a week or so!
The Orion branded grease gun model 596C1 I use at work has a little display that shows you how much grease you have used and how much is left in the tube.
When I get off of work early, I can indulge in a few more beverages than usual. The result is the solving of world problems such as this one. The downside is that I may or may not remember them in the morning. If I do end up recalling such revelations, they are soon forgotten when filling my gas tank on the way to work the next day.... realizing that the world has much bigger problems. Great video as always! 👍
Oh man! The screw that wouldn’t catch! That moment went on forever in my head. It was like a suspenseful movie and scratching a chalkboard at the same time… :-)
This reminds me of the BBC employee who came up with the walking with dinosaurs nature program that had become a global phenomenon earn't millions for the BBC yet the employee just got his salary of 50k per annum.
And thats why I keep my ideas to myself I may never be able to afford to make it but nobody is likely to make it ether if they do fuck it at least they did the work or better for them to be screwed than me.
I invested in a 20v lithium lincoln years ago, digital display tells me how much grease i've used, stunningly accurate and even after years of 2 1/2 oz bearings and abused CAT loader pins still runs, battery doesn't last all day anymore but at least I can order one of those
Hit me up if you need someone to hang around the shop to blame stuff on, I'm good for that. Love your videos and from one Canadian to another I really appreciate your sense of humor, keep doing you buddy 🤌👌
The clear grease gun tubes are cool when you switch to bulk grease refilling. I bought a lifetime supply of grease for 200 bucks (15 gallons) and a 60 buck hand pump to do the refilling.
That's what we do on the farm. Pump our grease guns full from a 5 gallon bucket. It goes pretty smooth end-of-summer but the couple of times where you have to fill a grease gun in the winter, oh man is it a workout lol. Almost have to stand on the handle of the pump and it still barely moves.
Good theory anyway. Hey I learned that when a magnet would be around shavings, to put a cloth over the magnet first. When done remove the cloth....and don't re-use the cloth on the magnet. Thanks for posting & thumbs up!
A plastic bag, plastic wrap, masking tape or gaffer's tape are also decent options. Peel 'em off and toss when you're done. The plastic bag doubles as a collection vessel if for some reason you want to save the shavings.
And if you DO get schmoo on your magnet - use some duct tape to take it off... (..not ideal, but beats trying to pick it off, anyway. Better to try and avoid beforehand than solving the issue afterwards) Like.. I glued neodiddlium magnets to my (battery powered) drills and impact drivers (at the base). To hold screws and such. ...works like a dream, but when you start drilling metal, sometimes (less often than you'd think) the shavings avoid gravity, and choose the magnet instead. In which case; BOOM! Duct tape.) Anyhoot... That is all. Keep yer moose in a hoose. ..Or something like that..
All of our grease guns were bulk fill when I learned to use them, I was about six or so. Had to plug them into a pump attached to a 15gal grease barrel and pump them full. Then while using, pull out the rod to see how much grease it still had in it. The cartridge type refills came along in the early 60's. I would think that a little rod down thru the cylinder plug (where the fill zerk used to be) that would be pushed up by the piston could be an indicator. A small compression spring would hold it in as the pressure TO the pump piston is fairly low. Just a thought. Not tryin to be a buzzkill, but the rod pull method works fine. LOL Michael in Colorado.
Hi Ave, deck greaser here on a cruise ferry. Im using SKF (or Lincoln) grease gun which has a screen with the amount of grease that have passed through! Saves a lot of steps and gets you to coffee break early lol
I can tell if there's grease without taking anything apart. The spring presses on a piston The piston compresses the grease The rod is used to compress and hold the spring otherwise pushed in for convenience. I just pull the rod till it hits the piston. The distance traveled out is length of grease left in the tube.
Pair of hose clamps retaining a pair of large handle clips that hold a second tube of grease on each side is the way to go. Honestly we just had a floor foot pump can that sucked buckets and we'd keep a bucket extra warm to top it off every day. But I'll tell you a secret. When you empty one, see where the point is where it'll fall off the bench with the pump end hanging over the edge, mark it about 3/4 of an inch towards its ass from there and all you gotta do is lay it over the edge of your hand and see if it falls off. If you've ever seen one with a wrapped line of duck, duct, packing, electrical or fuckit-tape that's what its for.
My grandfather had an old grease gun you had to load the grease into, not a cartridge like today's. But on the side was a long thin glass window showing how much grease was in it. I have scoured the internet looking for one like it but have had no luck. This was back in the 60's and he had had it for many years before.
Like anything, if you know how it's designed to operate, it's easy to figure out. I go through about a tube a day of grease and have zero problems with the gun. Get a good gun with a heavy spring and you won't have problems.
I learned to just pull the plunger handle back. When it doesn't come back you are out of grease. We had a small dairy farm in the central valley of California. And we greased all the equipment by hand. It was one of my jobs.
The magnetic idea is great, although I'd probably just tape some magnetic indicator paper to it so I didn't have to worry about powering it. Alternately you could use a magnet that was attracted to the steel casing normally, but repelled by the magnet in the grease gun so that you could move a pysical indicator as the magnet closed in on the indicator.
@@russelltom2087 Pretty cool, I tried this with some high powered magnets and found they did not repel on thicker steel. With high powered neodymium magnets on a thin steel ruler the magnets still repelled each other, albeit less than usual. Magnets that powerful would be a real problem unless you liked random metal dust, shavings, and screws stuck to your grease gun all the time not to mention it getting stuck to everything. The idea still works for aluminum cased grease guns, or for steel grease guns if the area with the magnet was capped with brass or aluminum - in those scenarios if the plunger is still steel you would only need a single magnet to show an indication that plunger is at / near the top.
You started with the solution, so simple it's inevitable to overlook it. Just peg the damn thing at your apprentice. Comes back filled up. Always works. That and/or a grease refill holster for the side of the gun.
makes sense, only problem with AvE or your idea is locating the magnet to path of the tube consistently. if from the ground up it could be keyed into location only other way that I could think of would be like use a system similar to water towers, have a ribbon/wire extend as the plunger extends and have indicator marks that decrease as its pulled.
@AvE Surely the easiest way to tell when you're nearing the last few squirts of grease is to take a tip from cash registers. When they're about to run out of the roll of paper that they print your till receipt on there's a splunge of pale red ink that appears on the last 20 or so receipts. It's not dark enough to interfere with the printing but it's unmistakable if you know what you're looking for. So you could do the same with the grease in the cartridge. A distinctive colour change for the last few pumps. No modifications needed. No need to buy a new grease gun or retrofit some aftermarket add on. Just buy the replacement cartridge with the "I.C.E." (Indicated Cartridge End) system. No grease gun works so well that some won't be obvious. You could even use the luciferin / luciferase reaction (the bioluminescence glow stick technology) so it shows up at night! 😃
I have essential tremor. Fun explaining to people all the time! And it makes soldering that much more enjoyable. Not even going to attempt TIG welding.
I replaced the plug in the top of my Milwaukee grease gun with a fitting to bulk fill it, but this is a straight in 1/8" npt hole in the top. Make an indicator that screws in there, a spring loaded plunger, that when the grease pusher plunger gets near to the top gets pushed up indicating a low grease level. Or just pull the plunger handle before you crawl under stuff to grease it.
Certain hall effect sensors require specific orientation relative to the polarity of the magnet. That's why it only picked up in certain positions/orientations
Me? Your wall hook for the grease gun has a scale integrated in it. Each time you hang up the grease gun it gets weighed but the wall hook. You would have to determine the empty weight and set up a warning light to indicate "low grease".
Chemist here, just started working on my own cars and building some fishing toys and molds My Question is : "it's probably stupid" would a thick plexiglass window at the end of the cylinder do the job and let the worker know when the piston is almost at the end ? " Love your channel 😍😍
This wouldn't work on a gun that uses a cartridge, as the cartridge is a plastic tube that would obscure the window. Also, a window may not be possible to fit on a bulk fill gun (one that doesn't use a cartridge) as the plunger/piston needs to seal well inside the tube, I suspect it would be difficult to install a window that maintains a good seal to the plunger, and that also keeps the grease in the cylinder👍
Just a metal plunger in the cap, spring loaded high enough to resist grease, but weak enough that the big plunger can move it, have it sealed against grease (which may be the hard part) and have a red ring on the outside of the little plunger. When the big plunger pushes on the little one, it pushes it out of the cap and the red ring shows up. No batteries required.
To the best of my recollection, those Milwaukee grease guns pump 1 gram of grease per stroke. We only use polyrex em at work so it wouldn’t be to hard to calibrate the sensor for that. But do other kinds of grease come with more or less in the tube??? It would probably require the 200 lb gorilla to manually enter how much grease was added when and if a new tube was put in. So inevitably it would be a failure.
All it needs is a spring loaded pin in the pump end, which would get pushed up as the piston travels the last 1/2". Stick it in a clear plastic cap and you have something to protect the indicating pin so it can indicate perhaps the last inch of travel.
Yes I thought this would be a shoulder bolt, a nylock nut and a spring. Drill hole in top of gun . When plunger hits spring loaded nut on end of bolt, it pushes the head of the bolt up. Spring holds bolt head down maybe with o ring stops leak..
Replace the priming handle with a clear one, put the LED and hall effect sensor inside that, add a magnet to the cap. When the handle gets close to the bottom, aka, out of grease, the handle will glow
How about a series of sensors and an Arduino controller sending grease level to a cloud app collecting stats from the sensors, tracking grease usage in the he shop and sending alerts to helper to refill the gun and to purchasing department to order more grease?
all grease gun have indicaters on them already. after you load it just pull the plunger handle out with out Securing it to the end cap. as you use it it will pull itself in.
I use about a tube per day and an indicator is completely irrelevant. Ives it's not pumping, purge the air. If no air is purged, replace the cartridge. It's a very simple machine
Ave I'm a big fan of yours . The manual grease gun does have a indicator built in already. Next time you pick up one to use just pull out on the plunger handle the distance it pulls out indicates how much grease is left in the gun. If it doesn't pull out easily it's empty.
Fap-Off’s Blue Point pneumatic grease gun has a little bypass valve that pops when it’s out of grease. Had it for about 15 years now and works perfect 👍
Lock Picking Lawyer would be proud of your creative use of magernets.. As a commenter below has stated. The plunger would rotate so the magernet may not be in line to trigger reed switch.. Perhaps a small speaker magnet on the end of the plunger....? Instead of an LED a piezo buzzer....?.. Many years ago -1983. My dad was wiring an alarm to a ford Sierra of his brother. Did you know they used a mercury switch to operate the boot light? He found it when taking the rear panel off to install a pin switch. ⁰
You stepped over the even simpler method of having a sharpie next to it and trusting everyone to tally up how many pumps they've given it. How could anyone ever mess that system up!
You can tell how much grease is left by turning the follower rod until it's free from the plunger, pulling it out, giving it a half turn and pushing it in until it hits the plunger. The depth it goes in tells you where the plunger sits and how much grease is left. Then you just turn it until it aligns with the slots in the plunger and push it back in.
AvE, my favorite ADHD engineer (probably) and tinkerer who invents new and hilarious words. Stuperglue, hindicator, and so many new words in this one vid alone. Yet his videos actually made more sense than some other channels.
in my humble experience, it comes down to shots per minute, if you get too aggressive, you invariably have to wait 45min or so before you discover many more shots still available!
How about, instead of just an indicator, a filling station? So when you put the gun away at the end of the day the station pumps grease into it ready for the morning therefore it's always full and ready to go, no indicator required.
![ถ้าพี่วุ้นท้อง แป้งจะท้องไปด้วยกัน !!!! [ดูคลิปเต็มหน้าช่อง] #Short | PANG ORNHIRA](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/FeyEnVMwitA/mqdefault.jpg)
Tristan, apologies for the late reply, the Capybara had a mild case of the bends after our trip out to the Green Island reef and required decompression, all is well now. Will you be attending next Tuesday? The Concubine has made a large batch of the pate you enjoy and will bring along several pots. Hope to see you then. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Bobert! The spuds aren't ready for Mother Earth Gaia. Old frosty, mustachioed with the fresh white stuff, ensured a false start. Ebbs and flows, you understand. No ragrets. xox.
I know a conversation has happened here, but I'm just not sure what.
@@incredulousd9408 and yet......I cannot look away
I feel as if I have been attacked
@@tristangraves867 I too feel attacked.
Hi AvE, I have it on good authority they made a prototype of the grease gun with indicator. They found in trials that the gun was never refilled and remained nearly empty. When the gun was picked up to use, the person saw it was nearly empty. They put it back and left it for some other smuck to refill and went to find a gun that had grease in it. 🤣
No truer words!!
Because fuck the next guy!
Or, they put just enough grease in for what they need. That way it’s nearly empty for the next guy. Takes real talent to always get it a couple pumps away from sucking air.
of course. an indicator on the grease gun is just a waste, it is always going to be active. Imperical evidence shows that all grease guns are empty, all of the time. Next hypothesis: let's go on a smoke brake, and see if it will refill itself if left alone.
Fucking helpers!
I have my greese gun hung on the wall on an old analog fish scale. On the wall is written the empty weight and full weight for it to remind me the range, as its hanging on the wall i can see how full it is based on the weight its displaying on the fish scale.
BINGO... WOW! Great answer.
Genius! Excellent idea and I must say that publishing a million dollar idea in hopes SOMEBODY will take the hint what has the paper says he can engineer stuff he will never practically use, pay chiner to mass produce the shit out of it and times the cost to produce each one by 333 to deduce the price we will pay in the US. And have it available for you to use at your convenience, I can appreciate the humility, and like you said. More confirmation the system is broken. We need a easy way to sell a great idea to the highest bidder just like an auction and a group of people record the auction and store the idea blueprint and outline and prosecute anyone present at the auction or their affiliate from producing the idea or slightly different rendition thereof, unless they purchased the idea or some of the right to produce it from the purchaser who will be required to track the statistics and add them to the portfolio of the brain that came up with the idea. We demand reform!
I just grab the plunger handle and gently pull it out; when it gets hard to pull you're starting to compress the spring, so you know how full it is based on how far the handle went out.
@@erroneum Thats what i do. I bet not many realize you can use it as a indcator rod for level of fullness also.
You're a fucking genius.
My father asked me once (exactly once) to refill the grease gun. He had already removed the empty tube and I didn't realize the new one would fit inside. And I had just learned how to hand pack wheel bearings the previous weekend.
Oh no 🤦♂️
yeah, I could see little me doing the same. 😂
place i used to work was run by cheap bastards that bought moly grease in a 20 gallon barrel.
had to fill the gun by hand if you wanted to use it, so we rarely did. it still managed to be empty every time i grabbed it.
i got to the point where i'd just stick the tube in the keg, cover one end with my hand and pull it back out. you get what you get.
Really old ones did actually work that way, they didn't use refillable cartridges
@@Psi105
Yup. I have my grandfather’s “shorty”, and you have to hand pack it. He never bought a tube of grease, always a tub. I think this is why I hate the sight of a grease gun to this day.
Now I’ve got to go wash my hands, because all I have to do is LOOK at a grease gun and I’ve got it all over me…..same with roofing tar….
The plunger tells you when it’s empty, used to use it as a measure tool for filling bearing cavity. The plunger shows you how much is left. Pulls all the way out when full, doesn’t pull out at all when empty. If you pull the plunger before each time you can judge how much is left from how far out the plunger is pulled. If you stop the grease gun when the plunger handle hits the end cap stop greasing refill and not have to bleed the air out of the air bound pump.
I was waiting for him to say this...I had to check and make sure this wasn't an Aprils fools joke. wtf???
@@jakeolden1014 yeah I’m confused how more people in the comments didn’t bring this up? I figured it was common knowledge since I learned it from my grandpa who’s like 80 years old and still works 72 hour weeks.
So few of us 🤫
I was kind of confused why he didn't bring this up as well. Cant get any cheaper or easier to use than the plunger to tell you if you have grease in the gun. Just pull out the handle and look at the distance it comes out, and it is already installed and very fast to use.
Learned this years ago, put a tube and a half of grease in my equipment at shutdown every night M-F so no matter what I have to change at least 1 tube a day so its not a big ordeal less than a minute of inconvenience and the plunger floats where the grease lvl is so stop a couple pumps early and no air to purge as Frank mentioned above
Revenue subscription model? WiFi enabled to automatically order you a new proprietary and expensive tube o' lube when half empty. Tools-As-A-Servive could be huge, easily valued into unicorn territory. 🦄
Damnit I read your comment after I left a similar one. Great minds...
You can bet your sweet TaaS
juicero meets printer cartridge
@@sagopalm279 meets Mac/Snap-Off
They would make the grease gun not work without proprietary grease, with the little chip on the tube, and there's also use the counter at the end of life, even though without a computer it still would have worked fine.
The reason they don't meter off of piston movement is because of the roughly 300 pumps, 12 cap removals, and 4 different tubes it takes to get the grease ot come out of the damn thing in the first place.
Secondly it probably would be wrong anyway because they calibrated it using the grease you aren't using.
I'm an equipment operator and before I became one, I had a hell of a time getting grease guns to work. Now, it's zero problem whatsoever. Like anything, practice and understanding is essential. 2 things though, any time a grease gun isn't working it because of air and the heavier the spring in the gun the better. Those cheap guns with light springs make things way worse. It needs to be difficult to draw the spring back when loading and then always purge the air and you're golden. I go from pumping air to pumping grease in a new cartridge in less than a minute every time and nearly every day of work.
The one we have at work, if you turn the handle 1/4 turn, it locks into the plunger, and you can just push hard on the handle and get the air out instantly instead of relying on the spring force. Actually AvE's gun is one of that kind.
@@felixar90 yea adept ape pointed that out too
@@Torchedini An ounce of NLG 2 is the same volume as one of NLG 3 isn't it?
Keep a gravity-powered scale out in the workshop. Weigh the grease gun when it's full and when it's empty. Write the weights on a tag. Weigh it when you bring it back after you've used it and compare that weight to the full and empty weights to see where you stand on greaseness.
No one seems to be talking about Dewclaw! Hope we still get him in from time to time. Love the two of you together
I thought it was simple. I turn the rod to disengage from the plunger and the amount of rod that sticks out is the level. That's how I always check it and it works. Maybe yours is different but over many decades I never saw one that wasn't b/c then the rod would stick out when full.
That’s how I always check them.
exactly what I was thinking the whole time I was watching.
BINGO......
Don’t be fawking the premise up with reason! 🤣
Yeah I thought everybody knew that lol
I just want to point out that on the official English captions does indeed say "neo-diddlium" at 2:17 . That makes it officially accepted (although it has been in our hearts for ages).
as an aprrentice's apprentice in the use of tools I take full responsibility for cross threading the cap.
Alternative B to circumvent having to put batteries in the thing: Hot glue a clear tube on the side of the thing with a small bearing ball in it. If everything work correctly the ball should follow the magnet around
Ingenious! Love it.
I've always just pulled the rod back until it requires force, it gives you an accurate indication of how much grease is in the gun, and only requires what is already there.
^ this.
the milwaukee grease gun actually has markings on the rod that say how much of a tube of grease is left
Yup, that's the one.
I was about to say why you don’t just put 0 - 100% markings on the rod...
@@them2545, because I'm not that anal retentive, I know my grease gun and how long the tube of grease is.
just put a zurk fitting on the grease gun so you can fill it up with a grease gun.
Yes! the answer I was looking for :D
Genius. Someone will do it 😂
this guy is going places.
This is how we will ours out of a drum using a pneumatic pump.
Heck, if you put it in the right place and remember to do it before its completely empty, you can run the tube around and refill the grease gun _with itself_!
A spring loaded rod that sits on the lid would be more simple. Once the plunger gets to the top, it pushes against the rod pushing it up indicating it is almost out, then eventually out.
A strip of magnetic field viewing film would let you see the level at any time rather than just when it's getting low. It can also be checked at any time by pulling the rod back to see how far it moves before contacting the plunger.
Suggestion for an improvement: If you put a strip of magnetic viewing film on the line that the magnet travels you would be able to see the position of the magnet in real-time. On top of that, there would be no battery/electronics.
Had that very same thought. I learned of the magnetic viewing film's existence from this channel.
this, except i dont think viewing film is sensitive enough.. im all for anything to avoid those damn coin cell batteries ave suggested though!
@@scumbaag Your comment on coin cell batteries got me thinking. If you buy them in bulk (100 pack) they're like 19 cents a piece. I wonder if they work in vending machines. I know the game tokens from a place I worked at as a kid worked in the toll booths. I was a game tech there, so I had like 20lbs of the coins when they went out of business. I would suspect that being a power source that fits in the coin hole, and will likely roll right back out after a barrage of tests end up in a fail condition. It would provide the right person internal, non-contact, access to the inside of the machine, if the coin mech isn't sufficiently EM hardened (the battery is likely going to be attracted to a magnet, and that will cause a rejection on its own).
@@scumbaag Boring a viewing window in the tube would probably work just fine- neglecting the stress exerting on the plastic by the pump- The problem with the magnet, is steel has an excellent (magnetic) permeability. If you "Air gap" the magnet with an insulator or brass (copper and aluminum should work somewhat) from the piston then some reasonable fraction of the magnetic flux should traverse the window. The ignorant (unoptimized) design would just make the piston and body out of brass. From a magnetic standpoint measuring the fields would be the same as measuring in open air. Nd(...) Magnets can be quite strong in those sizes. Orienting the magnet as to force the poles in to be along the direction of travel may be a preferable configuration. As an added note, reed switches are awesome, but hopelessly fragile. using a basic hall effect sensor is likely the better play for mechanical robustness. The cheap "digital" ones would be excellent for this
@@c3h867 a small window in the tube doesn't help because u add a tube of grease inside the guns tube also if you were tu use it without the tube and glass inside face will have to be perfectly flat as the pump is a vacuum and if there is scoring or cracks it will just never prime
The plunger let's you know when it's almost out. Next time you go and use your Milwaukee grease gun, pull the plunger out to where it stops on its own, don't pull it all the way out like you're changing grease. You'll see marks on it that tells you how much you have left. You can leave it out and pump grease and watch it suck the handle in.
He will have that plunder bent into a “5” before lunch if he did that
This is what I came here to say. If the plunger pulls out easily on its own halfway then you know you have half a tube of Grease left. If it pulls out nearly all the way, then your tube of grease is almost full. And if it barely pulls out at all, then you should probably bring a fresh tube of grease with you because you're going to need it after greasing a couple fittings. That's how I've always checked the level of Grease before heading out to the field.
It always surprises me how many people I come across who don’t know this.
Yeah. This was my first thought.
Too easy a solution for an enginerd.
A BINGO light for your grease gun! I love it! By the way, the commentary of this video made my morning. A genuine laugh and the reassurance of knowing I'm not the only one who acts like this in the empire of dirt. Kudos and thank you.
Inspied by your acts of tool dissection I cracked open my Makita DHP483 and moved the LED to the handle base so I am no longer in the shadows when wood touching with my short drill bits. Didn't even need to cut a wire. Much thanks
I love the idea of a magnet on the piston. But not just for telling the operator when the gun is empty. Needs to trigger a 120dB alarm when the jeezless thing is hung back up on the wall empty.
The alarm on the wall could be a scale set for almost empty weight come on guys/gals there has to be enuff brain power to figure it out
Needs one more thing, if hung back on wall empty thus triggering horn there also be a mild(excessively strong) electric charge to the prick hangin her up empty.
@@andyreid7274 not so hard, make the hook part of a NC set of korntacts with a calibrated springamathing set for the standard weight of a schmoo dispenser plus 10 percent (give or take). Corral about 240 angry pixies and it ought chooch nicely. Hang ‘er up quick! 😝
Maybe combine it with RFID ID badges for enforcement purposes.
That way some schmuck 1000 miles away can send you a nasty email to tell you how to do your job.
@@phillyphakename1255 Just make sure it uses blockchain technology, because... distributed... ledger... chain... reasons.
The plunger can rotate, so your magnet may not always end up in the same position. You could just have a momentary switch on the cap that is triggered by the end of the plunger shaft. All of these are redundant in any case as the plunger handle, being against the cap, is a pretty good indicator of shmoo to air ratio.
Or a counter that sets off an alarm when getting low. But then you would have to remember to reset the damn thing. I like the pull out the handle on the spring the best.
I have never had a gun that left the rod sticking out the rod always disengaged from the piston and slid all the way in.
cant be that much pressure in there, 2-3 bar? make it clear. Add peep sight, whatever. aint tee herd
@@--_DJ_-- . . . right. Keep going. So when its FULL, when you twist it and pull it out it pulls all the way out easy. If it were empty, it would not pull out easy, you'd be engaging the spring again quickly, and half way if its half full. . . That's how I check.
@@--_DJ_-- what if there was a line connected to the piston and when it got pulled to the end of throw or near the end of throw it closed a circuit.
If I was going to revolutionize the grease gun, my idea would be to go with a slotted window the length of the can(sight glass) and pack grease in a clear plastic sleeve instead of cardboard. Of course I'm old school
I imagined that was the way grease guns already worked, based on my experience with caulking guns. I suppose there's a good reason they can't work that way.
@@ashleyzinyk4297 probably cost
Years of following.... you're my second favorite canook 😉
I know you're not my dad but you do take us to school.... and I'm showing my boys your videos so they can learn more! Thank you AvE
Now you get to yell at the guy who didn't change the battery or the grease! Keep adding to it until all three strikes happen at once
Same way it's always been done: pull the f'ing plunger and see how far it comes out!
If it's less than a half inch you're almost out!
With someone so far involved in TH-cam, you'd think he'd watch a video about it. Someone should tell him no one uses grease anymore anyways. He should invent a greaseless pin system
Judging by his recent excavator video, he doesn't use grease very much lol
@@macbook802 no one uses grease? Clearly partner you haven't seen any of the shops I have
@@jeffhall768 ask your mom
@@KnowledgePerformance7 I've seen
Okay, I have now watched virtually all of the video, and I am wondering why not just put an el-cheapo tally counter on it if you want to count strokes? Strictly mechanical, no batteries.
The delivery of grease guns vary. I have my plant standardized to 40 pumps per ounce so that if I say '12 pumps' I know what they are going to deliver, and the delivery is small enough that it is unlikely that the unwashed are going to find the energy to radically over-grease anything. I use pistol-grip guns with a flexible lead, so you have one hand for the hose and one for the trigger. This way it takes more strength so it's harder to blow seals, and you can get into nooks and crannies that a lever gun can't get into.
Anyway, so if you have a 40 pump gun with a standard 14 ounce cartridge then that is a total of 560 pumps per cartridge (on average). A tally counter can let you know when you're near the end. You could just learn the number of pumps for your gun as you go and scribble the number on the gun.
OR... have a hanger where you store the gun that has a spring under it so that if the gun isn't heavy enough to pull the hanger down to a contact it doesn't turn on the green light, so you have to change the cartridge when you return it.
Or just have a crappy old school balance scale to tell you if the gun is too light.
The possibilities abound.
Worked on a project years ago called the GreaSee that was a transparent tube for this reason. It was actually disposable to prevent cross-contamination of different types for aerospace reasons, but the visual aspect was 75% of the innovation.
"For aerospace reasons". I once saw a field service manual written by an aerospace company on how to place an added spare part into the spare parts drawer. It was 30 pages long.
I am glad not to work in aerospace.
I have a electric grease gun by Lincoln that gives the quantity of grease used. You can reset it after each new tube or keep count through multiple tubes so you know what to bill the customer.
aaah yes, metal shavings inside a grease gun... I don't see anything wrong with that, especially when you are refilling it during sand storm.
And a magnet to automatically replenish them at every stray opportunity
i was going to comment the same thing. but you were almost 12 hours faster than me. well done!
Once upon a time in Desert Storm I left Germany assigned to ride in the back of a Soft side cargo Humvee (HMMWV) then we arrived in country... and I get assigned to drive the old Motor pool 5 ton Dump truck. All it’s Services were Rumored to have been paper whipped... so my first job was to do the initial inspection and operator PMCS (Preventative Maintenance Checks and Service)
22 tubes of grease later ( I’m not joking about it either) I was done with the Lube section and then 3 days after the start of that we took off from the sea shore and headed to the desert! Later on it broke the Jack Shaft and twisted and broke the Bell Housing. The shifter tore the steel floor board and beat up my right leg before I bailed out!!! I was bruised up from it but got salvaged parts and some new ones and put it back together again!
@@andrewostrelczuk406 22 tubes must be a record. Bone dry lol
@@A6Legit
I’ll add that I had sore Arms and blisters on my right hand.
Some Months later somewhere in the Iraqi Desert, I was taking the truck over to a Track on our Perimeter that had run dry on fuel overnight (some one fell asleep on duty), and I was taking a Track Mechanic with me to use the Air system to pressurize the tank and push fuel to the injectors. We were just going about 200 meters, and I put it in Gear let out the Clutch and BAM the Shifter rips out of my hand and starts beating my right leg! I think it’s gone full run away and we both bailed out of the truck... I hit the sand in quite the shock of the moment and full of Adrenaline... as we figured it out because was back to idle... upon getting my leg beat I hit the accelerator peddle and used it to push out of the door to my Left . The Jack shaft busted and the Domino effect was the transmission breaking away from the bell housing and the shifter tearing through the metal of the floor and hitting my leg and then my reaction pushed the truck to full throttle. All within like 3 tents of a second!
The sore leg I got had a Bruise the size of a ping pong paddle the next day!
With some scrounging Iraqi trucks and repair parts clutch Pressure plate, bell housing and a New Jack shaft from the Transmission to the Transfer case, we had it up and running again in a week or so!
The Orion branded grease gun model 596C1 I use at work has a little display that shows you how much grease you have used and how much is left in the tube.
When I get off of work early, I can indulge in a few more beverages than usual. The result is the solving of world problems such as this one. The downside is that I may or may not remember them in the morning. If I do end up recalling such revelations, they are soon forgotten when filling my gas tank on the way to work the next day.... realizing that the world has much bigger problems.
Great video as always! 👍
Not only will we be looking for another tube of grease but also a battery to go with it
Or just look at when the handle gets to the end?
Yeah. My thought was well
Oh man! The screw that wouldn’t catch! That moment went on forever in my head. It was like a suspenseful movie and scratching a chalkboard at the same time…
:-)
All the grease guns at work had an indicator that they were empty; you could find it out in the open and not stashed away by someone.
Finally someone who actually knows how patents work. I’ve got 3 and didn’t even get a coffee mug from my employer.
That's because while employed they own all your work.
Working for the wrong color....aim for a higher wavelength....
This reminds me of the BBC employee who came up with the walking with dinosaurs nature program that had become a global phenomenon earn't millions for the BBC yet the employee just got his salary of 50k per annum.
Not even a badge?
And thats why I keep my ideas to myself I may never be able to afford to make it but nobody is likely to make it ether if they do fuck it at least they did the work or better for them to be screwed than me.
I invested in a 20v lithium lincoln years ago, digital display tells me how much grease i've used, stunningly accurate and even after years of 2 1/2 oz bearings and abused CAT loader pins still runs, battery doesn't last all day anymore but at least I can order one of those
It looks like the ducks guts.. Compared to the milfuckee I've got
There is hope yet that they still make things like the used to....
Im using this on a daily basis on a ship. We have a milwaukee too but Lincoln is like a rolls royce of grease guns!
found myself gripping my phone tighter and tighter waiting for that self tapper to sink...
Hit me up if you need someone to hang around the shop to blame stuff on, I'm good for that.
Love your videos and from one Canadian to another I really appreciate your sense of humor, keep doing you buddy 🤌👌
The clear grease gun tubes are cool when you switch to bulk grease refilling. I bought a lifetime supply of grease for 200 bucks (15 gallons) and a 60 buck hand pump to do the refilling.
That's what we do on the farm. Pump our grease guns full from a 5 gallon bucket. It goes pretty smooth end-of-summer but the couple of times where you have to fill a grease gun in the winter, oh man is it a workout lol. Almost have to stand on the handle of the pump and it still barely moves.
@@keithyinger3326 Gotta switch to the NLGI #1 in the winter, it'll save your pumpin' arm for the important tasks.
Good theory anyway.
Hey I learned that when a magnet would be around shavings, to put a cloth over the magnet first. When done remove the cloth....and don't re-use the cloth on the magnet.
Thanks for posting & thumbs up!
A plastic bag, plastic wrap, masking tape or gaffer's tape are also decent options. Peel 'em off and toss when you're done. The plastic bag doubles as a collection vessel if for some reason you want to save the shavings.
@@mattwheeler8356, agreed; I use take-out cups, boxes, bags, etc. and use my shop rags for my delicate fingers. 🤭 😂
Just don’t put the cloth on backwards
And if you DO get schmoo on your magnet - use some duct tape to take it off...
(..not ideal, but beats trying to pick it off, anyway.
Better to try and avoid beforehand than solving the issue afterwards)
Like.. I glued neodiddlium magnets to my (battery powered) drills and impact drivers (at the base).
To hold screws and such.
...works like a dream, but when you start drilling metal, sometimes (less often than you'd think) the shavings avoid gravity, and choose the magnet instead.
In which case; BOOM! Duct tape.)
Anyhoot...
That is all.
Keep yer moose in a hoose.
..Or something like that..
@@Everfalling I accidentally did that once. And let me tell you, it wasn't pretty.
All of our grease guns were bulk fill when I learned to use them, I was about six or so. Had to plug them into a pump attached to a 15gal grease barrel and pump them full. Then while using, pull out the rod to see how much grease it still had in it. The cartridge type refills came along in the early 60's. I would think that a little rod down thru the cylinder plug (where the fill zerk used to be) that would be pushed up by the piston could be an indicator. A small compression spring would hold it in as the pressure TO the pump piston is fairly low. Just a thought. Not tryin to be a buzzkill, but the rod pull method works fine. LOL Michael in Colorado.
Hi Ave, deck greaser here on a cruise ferry. Im using SKF (or Lincoln) grease gun which has a screen with the amount of grease that have passed through! Saves a lot of steps and gets you to coffee break early lol
Did you ever notice that when the grease is about gone the grease gun doesn't weigh as much?
That's too complicated for the helper. That's my excuse for the project
@@FROG2000 Because the helper is too busy checking his phone lol
And an electric gun is too heavy for that to be reliable
For me it's quite simple. If I need grease for something, it's empty.
@@robertthomas5906 embrace the bulk gun
I can tell if there's grease without taking anything apart.
The spring presses on a piston
The piston compresses the grease
The rod is used to compress and hold the spring otherwise pushed in for convenience.
I just pull the rod till it hits the piston. The distance traveled out is length of grease left in the tube.
4:26 ….oh you gotta be kidding …..poor Dewclaw
Pair of hose clamps retaining a pair of large handle clips that hold a second tube of grease on each side is the way to go. Honestly we just had a floor foot pump can that sucked buckets and we'd keep a bucket extra warm to top it off every day.
But I'll tell you a secret. When you empty one, see where the point is where it'll fall off the bench with the pump end hanging over the edge, mark it about 3/4 of an inch towards its ass from there and all you gotta do is lay it over the edge of your hand and see if it falls off. If you've ever seen one with a wrapped line of duck, duct, packing, electrical or fuckit-tape that's what its for.
Good intentions. The length of the piston arm tells me all I need to know every time I use it.
I'm my own worst journeyman apprentice helper, guilty as charged, but it wasn't me.
The magnet thingie suffers from the fact that that the steel cylinder is such a good shunt to the magnetic flux lines.
My grandfather had an old grease gun you had to load the grease into, not a cartridge like today's. But on the side was a long thin glass window showing how much grease was in it. I have scoured the internet looking for one like it but have had no luck. This was back in the 60's and he had had it for many years before.
Beautiful thought process as always, AvE. Condolences on Dewclaw's departure.
What happened to the bastard? Missed it thru the video
@@proksalevente lol he ain't dead, he just left for greener pastures apparently
what... did dewclaw get married? ... and move out of the shop? No more elect chicken for the Haas?
With the Milwaukee you can quickly check how much grease you have by pulling back on the handle.
Yep pull it out quarter turn and it locks in
Like anything, if you know how it's designed to operate, it's easy to figure out. I go through about a tube a day of grease and have zero problems with the gun. Get a good gun with a heavy spring and you won't have problems.
I learned to just pull the plunger handle back. When it doesn't come back you are out of grease. We had a small dairy farm in the central valley of California. And we greased all the equipment by hand. It was one of my jobs.
My condolences to the declaws departure, will miss our favorite elechicken.
Doesn't the length of the rod sticking out tell you how much grease is left?
Yes. Yes it does.
Yes they have a Grove in the rod
Yeah, the Milwaukee rod is even labeled in quarters lol
That would be breaking the rule about making it as complicated as it needs to be.
@@flyingled3176 an orange Grove? Cool!
Ima get one of those.
The magnetic idea is great, although I'd probably just tape some magnetic indicator paper to it so I didn't have to worry about powering it. Alternately you could use a magnet that was attracted to the steel casing normally, but repelled by the magnet in the grease gun so that you could move a pysical indicator as the magnet closed in on the indicator.
Magnets don't work that way, steel between them means they won't repel. That is how magnetic shielding works.
@@russelltom2087 Pretty cool, I tried this with some high powered magnets and found they did not repel on thicker steel. With high powered neodymium magnets on a thin steel ruler the magnets still repelled each other, albeit less than usual. Magnets that powerful would be a real problem unless you liked random metal dust, shavings, and screws stuck to your grease gun all the time not to mention it getting stuck to everything.
The idea still works for aluminum cased grease guns, or for steel grease guns if the area with the magnet was capped with brass or aluminum - in those scenarios if the plunger is still steel you would only need a single magnet to show an indication that plunger is at / near the top.
Stick tape to a grease gun, hmm that'd be a neat trick on its own.
Some brands of battery grease gun do have an indicator of how much has been pumped on the display. The Lincoln ones we use at work do.
So glad I found your channel after recommendation from a good friend. Fuckin love you man
You started with the solution, so simple it's inevitable to overlook it. Just peg the damn thing at your apprentice. Comes back filled up. Always works. That and/or a grease refill holster for the side of the gun.
Just put a clear tube with a ball bearing in it, on the outside. It'll follow the magnet inside and not need any wiz bang electronics.
makes sense, only problem with AvE or your idea is locating the magnet to path of the tube consistently. if from the ground up it could be keyed into location
only other way that I could think of would be like use a system similar to water towers, have a ribbon/wire extend as the plunger extends and have indicator marks that decrease as its pulled.
@@matthewmenteer5673 Easy, make the magnet a ring all the way around
Not complicated enough
@AvE Surely the easiest way to tell when you're nearing the last few squirts of grease is to take a tip from cash registers.
When they're about to run out of the roll of paper that they print your till receipt on there's a splunge of pale red ink that appears on the last 20 or so receipts. It's not dark enough to interfere with the printing but it's unmistakable if you know what you're looking for.
So you could do the same with the grease in the cartridge. A distinctive colour change for the last few pumps.
No modifications needed. No need to buy a new grease gun or retrofit some aftermarket add on. Just buy the replacement cartridge with the "I.C.E." (Indicated Cartridge End) system.
No grease gun works so well that some won't be obvious. You could even use the luciferin / luciferase reaction (the bioluminescence glow stick technology) so it shows up at night! 😃
I have essential tremor. Fun explaining to people all the time! And it makes soldering that much more enjoyable. Not even going to attempt TIG welding.
I replaced the plug in the top of my Milwaukee grease gun with a fitting to bulk fill it, but this is a straight in 1/8" npt hole in the top. Make an indicator that screws in there, a spring loaded plunger, that when the grease pusher plunger gets near to the top gets pushed up indicating a low grease level.
Or just pull the plunger handle before you crawl under stuff to grease it.
P
does the spring loaded plunger at the backside not give a clear (and even rather progressive) indication of the amount left in there ?
I think his point was how to over-complicate something simple, without getting and goddam results. THIS IS A GOOBERMENT OPERATION.
A round/ ring shaped washer would work good too, wouldn’t have the issue lining up to the sensor. But great idea !
Certain hall effect sensors require specific orientation relative to the polarity of the magnet. That's why it only picked up in certain positions/orientations
Me? Your wall hook for the grease gun has a scale integrated in it. Each time you hang up the grease gun it gets weighed but the wall hook. You would have to determine the empty weight and set up a warning light to indicate "low grease".
Got one of those Milwaukee grease guns at work, awesome tool 👍
Didn’t know the WEF was still letting this channel upload. Pleasant surprise to the ole video drip feed. Palette cleansing.
Chemist here, just started working on my own cars and building some fishing toys and molds
My Question is : "it's probably stupid" would a thick plexiglass window at the end of the cylinder do the job and let the worker know when the piston is almost at the end ? "
Love your channel 😍😍
This wouldn't work on a gun that uses a cartridge, as the cartridge is a plastic tube that would obscure the window. Also, a window may not be possible to fit on a bulk fill gun (one that doesn't use a cartridge) as the plunger/piston needs to seal well inside the tube, I suspect it would be difficult to install a window that maintains a good seal to the plunger, and that also keeps the grease in the cylinder👍
I’ve always been able to tell by the weight, they do get lighter as they run out
I always learn so much on this channel, ha ha ha.
Just a metal plunger in the cap, spring loaded high enough to resist grease, but weak enough that the big plunger can move it, have it sealed against grease (which may be the hard part) and have a red ring on the outside of the little plunger. When the big plunger pushes on the little one, it pushes it out of the cap and the red ring shows up. No batteries required.
To the best of my recollection, those Milwaukee grease guns pump 1 gram of grease per stroke. We only use polyrex em at work so it wouldn’t be to hard to calibrate the sensor for that. But do other kinds of grease come with more or less in the tube??? It would probably require the 200 lb gorilla to manually enter how much grease was added when and if a new tube was put in. So inevitably it would be a failure.
All it needs is a spring loaded pin in the pump end, which would get pushed up as the piston travels the last 1/2". Stick it in a clear plastic cap and you have something to protect the indicating pin so it can indicate perhaps the last inch of travel.
ding ding ding! we have a weiner!
Yes I thought this would be a shoulder bolt, a nylock nut and a spring. Drill hole in top of gun . When plunger hits spring loaded nut on end of bolt, it pushes the head of the bolt up. Spring holds bolt head down maybe with o ring stops leak..
An excellent idea 💡
Your one of a kind man and I mean that as a compliment.
Replace the priming handle with a clear one, put the LED and hall effect sensor inside that, add a magnet to the cap. When the handle gets close to the bottom, aka, out of grease, the handle will glow
As a bonus, it also glows when Orcs are near.
How about a series of sensors and an Arduino controller sending grease level to a cloud app collecting stats from the sensors, tracking grease usage in the he shop and sending alerts to helper to refill the gun and to purchasing department to order more grease?
@@rok1475 That would need to go through a government agency first, four levels of approval, with quintuplicate paperwork at each step in the process.
all grease gun have indicaters on them already. after you load it just pull the plunger handle out with out Securing it to the end cap. as you use it it will pull itself in.
I use about a tube per day and an indicator is completely irrelevant. Ives it's not pumping, purge the air. If no air is purged, replace the cartridge. It's a very simple machine
Want to say thanks for making me feel better about the mess on my bench
Ave I'm a big fan of yours . The manual grease gun does have a indicator built in already. Next time you pick up one to use just pull out on the plunger handle the distance it pulls out indicates how much grease is left in the gun. If it doesn't pull out easily it's empty.
4:33 Only in canada, can one drill a hole with the drill in reverse.
Movie magic; it's all smoke and mirrors!
He does, with the special reverse bits.
Ricky Berwick is a national treasure!
Fap-Off’s Blue Point pneumatic grease gun has a little bypass valve that pops when it’s out of grease. Had it for about 15 years now and works perfect 👍
Lock Picking Lawyer would be proud of your creative use of magernets..
As a commenter below has stated.
The plunger would rotate so the magernet may not be in line to trigger reed switch..
Perhaps a small speaker magnet on the end of the plunger....? Instead of an LED a piezo buzzer....?..
Many years ago -1983.
My dad was wiring an alarm to a ford Sierra of his brother.
Did you know they used a mercury switch to operate the boot light?
He found it when taking the rear panel off to install a pin switch.
⁰
You need a good sphincter magnet donut shaped to eliminate rotation issues
As a Texan, I can honestly say that it would scare the shit out of me to see "anyone" on the side of a milk bag! RIP Mr. Dewclaw.
milk... bag?
@@DFPercush I believe it's a Canadian thing. And by believe I mean I know it's a thing in, at the very least, Canada.
Grease guns we always use you can pull the plunger back out and feel where it has "resistance"/ where the grease is
I worked as engineer on factory trawlers working in the Arctic for 20 years I would of sold my soul for a pixie powered grease gun
You stepped over the even simpler method of having a sharpie next to it and trusting everyone to tally up how many pumps they've given it. How could anyone ever mess that system up!
Or a clicker counter in the handle.
are we talking about Deu Claw or the grease gun?
You can tell how much grease is left by turning the follower rod until it's free from the plunger, pulling it out, giving it a half turn and pushing it in until it hits the plunger. The depth it goes in tells you where the plunger sits and how much grease is left. Then you just turn it until it aligns with the slots in the plunger and push it back in.
My electric SKF grease gun has a read out for how much has been pumped. Now I just need a light to remind me to zero it out when I change tubes ☺
I had an import grease gun long ago that had a clear window in the tube
AvE, my favorite ADHD engineer (probably) and tinkerer who invents new and hilarious words. Stuperglue, hindicator, and so many new words in this one vid alone. Yet his videos actually made more sense than some other channels.
in my humble experience, it comes down to shots per minute, if you get too aggressive, you invariably have to wait 45min or so before you discover many more shots still available!
How about, instead of just an indicator, a filling station? So when you put the gun away at the end of the day the station pumps grease into it ready for the morning therefore it's always full and ready to go, no indicator required.
I can usually tell when I'm down to my last couple of strokes.
You meant you let your "better half" tell you...