Tom Tidy keeps his tools well-organized in their drawers.File photo by Brian Hartz
There seem to be two types of mechanics who work out of service trucks: Tom Tidy and Harry Haphazard.
Tom Tidy has all his wrenches and sockets arranged in racks according to size. The wood cribbing blocks he keeps in the bed are stacked neatly. His power cords are looped over pegs according to length. Extra parts are kept in bins that use an alphabetic or numerical location system.
Tom power washes the floor of the bed once a week.
Harry Haphazard’s truck has racks for all his wrenches and sockets, but they’re invisible under a pile of wrenches and sockets. Many of his compartments feature “auto-unload,” as in, when the doors are opened, tools and parts stacked randomly inside the compartment unload themselves onto the ground. To access large tools or bulky items at the front of the bed, it’s easier to climb onto and walk atop the side compartments than to risk life and limb crawling over the jumble of tools, parts, broken pieces and empty, leaky five-gallon buckets piled in the bed of Harry’s truck.
No one has seen the floor of the bed since the second day got it.
In my mind, I’m Tom, but the sad reality is that I’m more like Harry.
— Dan Anderson