ArcaMax

I’ve been helping several single women for the past few years. One has been featured in this column at least once in the past year. I’m pleased to report that she’s gaining confidence and tackling projects on her own now. My late father-in-law’s saying rings true: “Nothing builds success like success.”

I think you’ll enjoy a recap of an encounter I had with this woman about three years ago. She purchased a bidet toilet seat and thought she’d try to install it herself. All she had to do was loosen the nut on the shutoff valve under the toilet that connects to the flexible supply hose. She struggled to do this for two hours with no success.

My phone rang, and she asked me to help her. I arrived at her house and could tell she was frazzled. It was a combination of having to call in the cavalry and her having wasted time. She wanted me to take away all the pain, but I refused to do that.

"What tool were you using?" I asked. She handed me a channel-lock pliers. I grimaced. No wonder she couldn’t loosen the nut. She didn’t have the hand strength to compress the jaws so they wouldn’t slip on the nut. She should have been using an adjustable wrench. This tool has parallel jaws that you adjust to fit the flat surfaces on the nut. Once adjusted, you apply a small amount of pressure counterclockwise on the wrench handle, and the nut turns with ease.

“I’d like you to use my adjustable wrench and see what happens,” I suggested. The look on her face telegraphed that she was not happy about trying, but she was polite enough not to reject my request since I was there as a favor.

Within 10 seconds, the nut was off, and she couldn’t believe how simple it was. She’s very smart; however, while growing up, she never received in-depth training on tools, how and when to use them, and how the right tool with a tiny amount of skill produces professional results.

Last week she texted me. She decided to install a second bidet toilet seat, and had no idea where the main water shutoff valve was in her home. On a live video call, I pointed it out within seconds. An hour later, she had successfully installed the seat. Good for her!

But in the process, a small piece of sediment dislodged in the water line, causing the toilet fill valve to malfunction. I told her it was much better to install a new one with better technology. I knew she was in a bind because of a recent death in her family. I happened to be going to a big box store to get something else, so I picked one up for her and offered to help her install it.

I knew to take a wide assortment of tools for the job. Normally, a regular open-end wrench and channel-lock pliers are what you need to do the job in just a few minutes. However, someone had installed a set of shelves above the toilet. The legs supporting the shelves extended to the floor just a few inches away from the sides of the toilet tank.

This made it very hard for larger tools to have enough room to work. Fortunately, I had brought along a small adjustable wrench as well as a short channel-lock pliers. These inexpensive tools saved the day, and they’ll do the same for you should you experience similar conditions.

Last week, I helped a single mom baby-proof a home they were moving into. This house was built in the 1970s. It sported an open concept with a loft space. The railing in the loft was only 32 inches tall, as were the railings next to the stairwell leading down from the loft. The stair railings only had a few parallel pieces of wood to keep an adult from tumbling down the steps. We had to block off the openings so the baby wouldn’t fall.

This woman had tried to install netting using zip ties to make the area safe for her crawling one-year-old. That was a dismal failure, as her baby could easily fall through places where the netting was unsecured. I suggested we install 1/8-inch plexiglass, and it worked very well.

She wanted to cut away the zip ties she had attached to the finished wood railings without causing damage, and she texted me asking how to do it. I told her I’d bring my inexpensive flush-cut wire cutters that have sharp tips on the jaws. This tool is perfect because the sharp tips can get under the zip tie while the rounded opposite edge glides on the fragile wood. I snipped off the zip ties in seconds without marring the wood.

What other tools should you have in your tool bag? I’d suggest you have a 14-inch pipe wrench. This allows you to turn off the gas on the house side of the gas meter if you suspect a leak. This same wrench can be used to tighten the compression nuts on p-traps under your sinks.

An assortment of flat-head and Phillips screwdrivers is a must. Putty knives, a 5-inch drywall taping knife, a simple plastic drywall mud pan, and a few sponge-core sanding blocks allow you to do simple wall and ceiling repairs before painting. These tools can save you hundreds or thousands of dollars in less than one year.

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©2025 Tim Carter. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.