My penchant for old gear always seems to lead me to a Mexican standoff with an old nemesis...in the form of one (or more) stuck Phillips screws...
For what it's worth, here's a short list of cheats/hacks/tips I've collected over the years -- hopefully one or more of the following will help lower your frustration level while working on this stuff --
1) You're doing a field repair, and all you got is your backup set of tools with you. They aren't worn out, but not the good stuff back in the shop. Meanwhile, most of the phillips screws came out, but there's the last couple that are just begging to strip out at the slightest slip.
The solution? Use this stuff to increase the grip between tool tip & screw head:
A little dab will do ya. Cheap, and a 3 oz tube takes up almost no room in your toolbox.
(NOTE: This works with a normal screwdriver and/or an
impact screwdriver. Really saved my bacon on numerous occasions.)
****
If you read about the
history of the phillips screws, they are actually designed to 'cam-out' to avoid over-torquing during assembly. Of course, this does us no good when faced with one or more screws frozen in place for years. To help overcome this design feature when you really need to remove instead of destroy a fastener, make sure you have on hand one of the anti-camout bits:
The ridges provide 'bite'.
And for the fully-manual folks out there, here's a good example of a
screwdriver that comes with the anti-camout feature:
FWIW, sometimes I've combined the valve grind compound + anti-camout bits for the really stubborn stuff.
Last but not least, while digging through old Electronics magazines for info on vintage test equipment, I happened across an ad illustrating the virtues of switching from slotted to phillips fasteners in your manufacturing process:
(Late '40s tip of the hat to NavLinear.)
I, for one, will never again look at phillips screws in quite the same way.
:0)
3D
