Summer Apron

[gee-dub]

I'm one of those folks who tends to run hot. This is probably why I spent every weekend snow-hiking during the winters when I was a decade or two younger. At any rate, I have HVAC in the shop but keep it around 76 degrees when we are having triple digit temps.

I love my Veritas apron and have now become addicted to it. I became rapidly frustrated in not having it on due to the heat. I am spoiled by having a few key items right at hand no matter where I am in the shop. I gave this one a try . . .




It has rapidly become a favorite warm weather substitute. For under $15 you can hardly go wrong.

[Von]

On 8/4/2023 at 10:19 PM, gee-dub said:

I love my Veritas apron and have now become addicted to it. I became rapidly frustrated in not having it on due to the heat. I am spoiled by having a few key items right at hand no matter where I am in the shop. I gave this one a try . . .

Question about the Veritas apron: does stuff in the upper pockets stay put when you bend over to pick something up?

I have a Rockler apron (old version I don't see on their site currently) and that is one of my two big gripes: no matter how much I try to snug stuff down, inevitably something falls out of the chest pockets when I bend over. 

My other gripe is that the Rockler apron has doubled pockets (one on top of the other) and I spend a fair amount of time having to fish both pockets to find things.

[Mark J]

41 minutes ago, Von said:

My other gripe is that the Rockler apron has doubled pockets (one on top of the other) and I spend a fair amount of time having to fish both pockets to find things.

If you don't need both pockets, I supose you could stitch or glue one closed.  Doesn't help the bend over problem, though.

[BillyJack]

For years I wore a leather framers tool pouches for installation and in the commercial shop, but as soon as I started working in my personal shop ai stopped and won’t again.,I’ve got multiples od square, tapes, etc from working and my personal shop , I just scatter them around tye shop and never have to look

[gee-dub]

On 8/5/2023 at 4:46 AM, Von said:

Question about the Veritas apron: does stuff in the upper pockets stay put when you bend over to pick something up?

I keep a couple of pencils in the tall narrow one.  A 4" double square in the center one, and a chalk holder / chalk in the horizontal one.  Everything seems to stay put.  I forget what I was trying to keep in the center chest pocket when I first got it but whatever it was it would fall out.  The 4" double square stays in fine.  I don't find the short vertical chest position very useful.  I tried putting a magnet in it to hang on to random items but it never really worked out for me.  They show a 6" rule in it in the catalog but I found that to be dangerous

[BillyJack]

20 years ago at old working forum get together. I think I'm the only woodworker that wore one..

 

I don't want you to think I'm against wearing one..

[Tom King]

I thought to take pictures of mine today.  This is the belt I've used for over 30 years.  It's like the axe that George Washington chopped the Cherry tree down with.  All parts have been replaced several times, but it's original.

Everything is modified so it doesn't hang down so far.  I do a lot of squatting down, and it doesn't work for things like a hammer handle to hit the floor.  One bag is Occidental leather that was short to start with but not short enough.  The other is some cheap brand that has been modified with a pocket to hold a block plane, and shortened.  Pencils are always a no. 3 and a no.4 Berol Mirado.  Pencil sharpener in the little pocket above the block plane.  8" Klein end cutting nippers are the red handles-for pulling nails.   Utility knife Lenox.

Hammer loop is Occidental leather made to carry the hammer high.  Combination square has a stainless steel blade-forgot to put it in it's pocket for the pic as well as the two sizes of nailsets.   The square goes right behind the nail pockets on the left bag.  I can grab the square with left hand and pencil with right in one movement and put them back exactly where they go without thinking about it. 

I forget who made the belt, but it's another toolbelt manufacturer.  Pam has the name and number written down somewhere so she can call when I need to replace it.  The tail is shortened with a hot knife to not have any extra sticking out.  The two grommets on the other end are just to fix the length of that end so there is no tail sticking out of the buckle.

The tape holder has been modified so it doesn't cut into my belly when I bend over.

The hammer is slid over in the wrong position in the picture.  It goes over by the right pocket when I'm wearing it.

Hammer is Estwing 16 oz. that the bell face with beveled edge has been ground down flatter with no bevel around the head.  I can hit something in a tight corner with it like this if I need to.  Everything about this rig has been modified some kind of way.

I don't wear it often these days, but if I'm building something, it saves a lot of steps.  I've built more than a few million dollars worth of stuff wearing this tool belt.

I have another smaller nylon one set up just for standing seam roofing, but forgot to take a picture of that one.

Edited to add:   I said 30 years, but I know it's been at least 40.  I remember a particular incident when I was wearing it.  A Pella window salesman stopped by a house I was building in 1982.  He handed me a handful of carpenters pencils with Pella logo on them.  I was wearing my tool belt.  I told him I couldn't do anything with those, and he asked me why.  I pulled the combination square and a pencil like I still use, drew a fine line on a board and asked him if he wanted me to take the line, leave it, or split it down the middle.  He said split it.  I did.  He said, "no wonder you do such good work".  I remember because my Uncle was there and he died the next year.  

Figuring I probably wore a tool belt for 600 hours a year, I have at least 24,000 hours wearing this type of tool belt.  I know exactly where everything is without having to think about it.  It's more like breathing.

 

[BillyJack]

I thought about getting an Occidental to do my roof, but I won’t wear ir long enough to be worth it. If I wear my tool pouches in my shop I catch on everything  and isn’t worth the trouble in a 6OO sq ft shop. I just keep several tapes around the shop.,

[Tom King]

Yeah, I don't wear this in a shop either.  I did wear it when we were building cabinets for the houses I was building, but those were built in the houses that were set up for just making those cabinets, making door jambs, and such.