What Else Do You Collect Besides Knives?

[TPK]

OK.....

Tom, you and Joe (FRJ) should compare knots.
viewtopic.php?f=21&t=63250&start=120#p753300

Good to know I'm not the only knot nut.

[bestgear]

I don’t check into this thread as often as I should - y’all collect some pretty interesting things - sometimes I wonder if this thread will become like the TV show “Oddities” and one day we’ll see someone’s fingernail collection or even worse. I’m actually quite intrigued about the motivations behind certain collections which I’m sure are generally well intentioned. Keep em’ coming, I love knowing that I’m not the only collector of things besides knives….

[TPK]

Added Hawaii to the barn door this evening.

I'm normally too tired to do much of anything after work as a general rule of practice, but I do make an acception from time to time for important stuff.

Like putting license plates on a barn door. That's important! "GIT-R-DONE!"

[Just Plain Dave]

No old clocks or watches but I seem to collect Timex and Casio watches.

[jmh58]

I have picked up these oilers thru the years and put them up on the garage I beam!!
John

[steve99f]

Those are cool John, I have a couple thru accumulation rather than by design, like my knife pile.

[jmh58]

Those are cool John, I have a couple thru accumulation rather than by design, like my knife pile.

Thank You Steve.
John

[New_Windsor_NY]

Old school shaving......

From a May 1950, New York newspaper.
Caption(s), if any, are on the BOTTOM of the corresponding picture(s).

[Maddogfl]

I like to buy old American made mechanical clocks and get them running again. I am certainly not a clock maker, but I can make about 2/3 of the dead ones I buy run. They usually just need cleaning, lubricating and adjusting and sometimes just talking nice to them will make them run. When they exceed my abilities, which doesn't take a lot, I will give the carcasses to a real clock guy for parts. You can buy a nice 100 year old pendulum clock, running, for a hundred bucks, but if you have to take it for repairs the price gets crazy. I have about 15 wall clocks that I keep wound, and about the same number of mantle or kitchen clocks that I don't wind often. My wife is a saint.

I also collect WWII era American military binoculars. There was a day, not long ago when they could be bought cheap. There again, I am not a binocular mechanic, but I am not afraid to disassemble one and clean 80 years of dust out of them. If they are badly out of columniation, I am usually screwed as I don't have the tools or training to repair them, and again, professional repairs are expensive. The trick is to know when you are licked and don't obsess over failure. I mastered one trade in my life, but i like to piddle in places where I don't belong.

I go by the theory that if I buy something that is broken, I can only improve it because it is has already been discarded as broken, and you can't break broke. I picked up an old Victrola that looked goo but was not working, and with a little guidance from a friend from NY on another forum, I got that old gal running and sounding great. You would not believe how much sound you get out of these unamplified music machines until hear one working.
Apparently the Victrola's are a lot more common up North as I don't see many of them, and when I do, the sellers think that they are made of unobtanium.

I also collect Mosin Nagant rifles, though I quit buying them about four years ago when the prices went through the roof. For once in my life I got on to something when it was cheap. I have a pile of the things that I paid under $100.00 each for. They are now my 401K and have beat the pants off my other investments.

[TPK]

I like to buy old American made mechanical clocks and get them running again. I am certainly not a clock maker, but I can make about 2/3 of the dead ones I buy run. They usually just need cleaning, lubricating and adjusting and sometimes just talking nice to them will make them run. When they exceed my abilities, which doesn't take a lot, I will give the carcasses to a real clock guy for parts. You can buy a nice 100 year old pendulum clock, running, for a hundred bucks, but if you have to take it for repairs the price gets crazy. I have about 15 wall clocks that I keep wound, and about the same number of mantle or kitchen clocks that I don't wind often. My wife is a saint.

I also collect WWII era American military binoculars. There was a day, not long ago when they could be bought cheap. There again, I am not a binocular mechanic, but I am not afraid to disassemble one and clean 80 years of dust out of them. If they are badly out of columniation, I am usually screwed as I don't have the tools or training to repair them, and again, professional repairs are expensive. The trick is to know when you are licked and don't obsess over failure. I mastered one trade in my life, but i like to piddle in places where I don't belong.

I go by the theory that if I buy something that is broken, I can only improve it because it is has already been discarded as broken, and you can't break broke. I picked up an old Victrola that looked goo but was not working, and with a little guidance from a friend from NY on another forum, I got that old gal running and sounding great. You would not believe how much sound you get out of these unamplified music machines until hear one working.
Apparently the Victrola's are a lot more common up North as I don't see many of them, and when I do, the sellers think that they are made of unobtanium.

I also collect Mosin Nagant rifles, though I quit buying them about four years ago when the prices went through the roof. For once in my life I got on to something when it was cheap. I have a pile of the things that I paid under $100.00 each for. They are now my 401K and have beat the pants off my other investments.

Sorry I didn't see your post back when it was made but I must say you collect very beautiful things.
Thanks for sharing! I enjoyed seeing them & reading your nice post.

[TPK]

Thought I'd show you folks how my license plate collection is coming along. They are inside my car port on a small wooden door that opens up into my barn. I pitch my firewood up into this part of the barn. Which I had to do yesterday after work. Anyways, there is a picture of the door open and closed just so you can see. Looks like I can get about 4 more plates on this door. If I move Penn. down and to the right, then I can get one more on the left side of the door & three more on the right corner above Alabama. And when it's full..., I still have plenty of room on the other side of the carport for more.
Oh, and Steve Warden sent me one (Ohio) from his first car. It has arrived at my Mom's house in Maryland. Very cool! Thanks Steve! I look forward to adding it to my collection!

The first 2 pictures are of the door when it is open.
Third picture is when it's closed.
Fourth picture is the other side of the car port where I have plenty of space to expand my collection.

[Dan In MI]

Nice collection of plates, Tom! If I ever hit the flea markets, I'll see about getting hold of a Michigan plate for you.

I don't know about most other states, but in Michigan, the plate stays with the owner when ownership of the vehicle is transferred. In California, where I lived previously, regular issue plates stay with the vehicle. (Special interest plates typically stay with the owner.)

[Steve Warden]

NJ plates have to be turned into the MVC when you sell, trade or otherwise get rid of the car. Can't keep the plates.

[TPK]

Nice collection of plates, Tom! If I ever hit the flea markets, I'll see about getting hold of a Michigan plate for you.

I don't know about most other states, but in Michigan, the plate stays with the owner when ownership of the vehicle is transferred. In California, where I lived previously, regular issue plates stay with the vehicle. (Special interest plates typically stay with the owner.)

Thanks Buddy! Appreciate it!
I enjoy looking at them so I thought..., Why not collect a few just for fun?

[TPK]

NJ plates have to be turned into the MVC when you sell, trade or otherwise get rid of the car. Can't keep the plates.

Good fact to know. So if I see any NJ plates at a fair price on eBay I should grab them.

[TPK]

NJ plates have to be turned into the MVC when you sell, trade or otherwise get rid of the car. Can't keep the plates.

I just checked eBay. Only found one with a year sticker on it from 82. It's in rough condition & cost €27 shipped. I try to get tags that are not more than €10 shipped. I'll be on the lookout for one of them.
Thanks for the Tip!

[Dan In MI]

NJ plates have to be turned into the MVC when you sell, trade or otherwise get rid of the car.

What does MVC stand for? California has the Department of Motor Vehicles. I know Washington registrations are (were?) handled by the Department of Licensing. Michigan gets really odd; it's the Secretary of State here. And I'm pretty sure that a plate can be transferred from one vehicle to another. As I haven't bought a car up here (mainly due to insipid rust issues), I don't say that with certainty, though.

[Steve Warden]

NJ plates have to be turned into the MVC when you sell, trade or otherwise get rid of the car.

What does MVC stand for? California has the Department of Motor Vehicles. I know Washington registrations are (were?) handled by the Department of Licensing. Michigan gets really odd; it's the Secretary of State here. And I'm pretty sure that a plate can be transferred from one vehicle to another. As I haven't bought a car up here (mainly due to insipid rust issues), I don't say that with certainty, though.

The full abbreviation is NJ MVC -- New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission.
It used to be NJ DMV -- NJ Department of Motor Vehicles. Changed in 2003 to MVC.

[zzyzzogeton]

NJ plates have to be turned into the MVC when you sell, trade or otherwise get rid of the car. Can't keep the plates.

I just checked eBay. Only found one with a year sticker on it from 82. It's in rough condition & cost €27 shipped. I try to get tags that are not more than €10 shipped. I'll be on the lookout for one of them.
Thanks for the Tip!

Germany must be censoring fleabay - I did a search using "new jersey license plate" and got 2000+ hits, which includes a bunch of non-car license plates.

[TPK]

NJ plates have to be turned into the MVC when you sell, trade or otherwise get rid of the car. Can't keep the plates.

I just checked eBay. Only found one with a year sticker on it from 82. It's in rough condition & cost €27 shipped. I try to get tags that are not more than €10 shipped. I'll be on the lookout for one of them.
Thanks for the Tip!

Germany must be censoring fleabay - I did a search using "new jersey license plate" and got 2000+ hits, which includes a bunch of non-car license plates.

There is an "eBay Germany" that only shows me sellers in Germany or sellers who will ship to Germany. In most cases, I will then filter out sellers outside of the EU because I have to pay Import taxes for anything that comes from outside of the EU.

Add: It's the same way with American made knives. Let's say I search for Case knives. I might get anywhere from 0 - 5 hits for sellers in Germany but often zero. GEC, S&M, Queen, Camillus, Imperial (USA) ect. 0 - 2 hits but normally zero hits. Ulster, Kutmaster, Colonia, Western ect. normally zero hits. Of course there are a lot of hits for Solingen & a few for England but England is also no longer in the EU. Just to give you an idea why I am often excited when I buy an American made knife. They are not "impossible" to find but not easy to find either. And of course there is competition to get your hands on those that do show up.

[TPK]

Latest collection update.:

My little collection continues to grow.

When I started collecting plates (not too long ago) I spread them out pretty far to take up space. Today I changed my stratagie & went into the "Crunch--Time" mode so that I can get more plates onto my limited door space. I also changed out some of the screws I had used before because I had two types of screw heads in use so I reduced that to just one sort of screws. Which will make things easier whenever I am rearranging things as I was today.

Today I added two plates that were Bombed on me by our very own JerryD.
Placed them in the top right corner. Illinois & FL. Go Marines!!!

Next to them is a smaller FL plate that was on my dark green Honda motorcycle right up until I joined the U.S. Army in November of 1990.

The Pennsylvania plate shows the area where I will mount the plate that was donated to my collection by Steve Warden (U.S. Air Force). It's at my Mom's house in Maryland right now. Once I get it mounted there will be plates that belonged to three AAPK members who served in three branches of the military united in my collection. I'm pretty stoked about that fact & I will gladly add the plates of any other members who wishes to get in on the fun. Looks like there is room for about 6 more plates. Five more if I subtract the one from Steve. We'll see what shows up in my price range on the Bay this month.

Thanks for looking friends! Hope you enjoy the pictures.

[Steve Warden]

Lookin' pretty cool, Tom!

[TPK]

Lookin' pretty cool, Tom!

Thanks Steve! IMO it looks better with each new addition.
Think I'll skip over to the Bay & see what states are floating around.

[Dan In MI]

Lookin' good, Tom!

[TPK]

Lookin' good, Tom!

Thanks Dan!