vzandt wrote:My father alternately called them Dikes and diagonals. I suspect it went back to his WWII and Korean service in Aviation Propultion work.
I always took Dikes to be a shortened form of diagonal cutters or something like that. Kind of like Truck GP, General Purpose, became Jeep.
You be correct! It is slang for diagonal cutting pliers. Not to be confused with lineman's side cutting pliers. One has slanted sides(dics!?) and the other square. I never considered how to spell it! Do not know what they are called(nippers?) but another cutting plier cuts straight across the end and a variation cuts at an angle.
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Goldie(Bought New SN 377425)/4" jointer/6" beltsander/12" planer/stripsander/bandsaw/powerstation /Scroll saw/Jig saw /Craftsman 10" ras/Craftsman 6" thicknessplaner/ Dayton10"tablesaw(restoredfromneighborstrashpile)/ Mark VII restoration in 'progress'/ 10E[/size](SN E3779) restoration in progress, a 510 on the back burner and a growing pile of items to be eventually returned to useful life. - aka Red Grange
JPG40504 wrote: Not to be confused with lineman's side cutting pliers. but another cutting plier cuts straight across the end and a variation cuts at an angle.
Why would you want to cut wire at an angle? Wouldn't lineman pliers be the standard cutters (straight)? Lineman's are also handy for removing the little tab in the gang boxes.
honeywell wrote:Why would you want to cut wire at an angle? Wouldn't lineman pliers be the standard cutters (straight)? Lineman's are also handy for removing the little tab in the gang boxes.
The reason for them being 'diagonal' is NOT so as to cut a wire diagonally, but rather so as to provide an angled approach to the wire when cutting.
Similar to the reason box end wrenches are not flat, but the ends are angled so that there is room for your hand(knuckles) .
Hold your hand in front of you as if to cut a wire running straight across in front of you. Look at the 'angle' of your wrist'. Is is easier to squeeze the pliers at that (angled) neutral position of your wrist than twisted so as to be at a right angle to the wire.
Cutting wires is not he only thing a lineman's pliers are designed to be used for.
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Goldie(Bought New SN 377425)/4" jointer/6" beltsander/12" planer/stripsander/bandsaw/powerstation /Scroll saw/Jig saw /Craftsman 10" ras/Craftsman 6" thicknessplaner/ Dayton10"tablesaw(restoredfromneighborstrashpile)/ Mark VII restoration in 'progress'/ 10E[/size](SN E3779) restoration in progress, a 510 on the back burner and a growing pile of items to be eventually returned to useful life. - aka Red Grange
If the term is of military origin that could explain why I have never heard it before. I fell between Korea and Nam. I was a kid during Korea and by the time Nam got really hot I was married with about 3 kids. My father tried to enlist at the start of WW II but they didn't take him. Foot problems and a hernia must have looked too expensive. He was also farming full time by then and they wanted to keep farmers farming. He spent WW II farming and testing aircraft engines 12 hours a day, seven days a week. By the time of Korea he was getting a little old and still had the same problems. He became an electrician about 1949 to make extra money for a hernia operation. Some time after the surgery he and another guy were carrying a huge electric motor down to the basement of a grain elevator/mill they were rewiring and my father was going first. The guy on top tripped and my father ended up with the full weight of the motor and the other guy both. Ripped the hernia open again. Finally got it fixed again about 20 years later.
I always just called them "side cutters" except when we used a special kind of side cutters to clip the needle teeth on baby pigs. Those we called "nippers". Everybody hold up their hand if they have ever used a pair of "ear notchers".
I have never referred to any of my lineman's pliers as side cutters or any kind of a cutter. They were always just "lineman's pliers". I don't recall ever seeing a set without a wire cutter.
I'll have to ask my son if any of the guys that work for him use the "dike" term. His crew mostly does heavy underground trunk lines like subdivision feeds or commercial installations generally under contract for Indianapolis Power and Light. I know that they use a zillion terms for things that I have never heard of.
Of course I may be a tad out of date... Other than a little residential work and stuff here on the farm I have not done a lot of wiring for maybe 40 years.
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farmer
Francis Robinson
I did not equip with Shopsmiths in spite of the setups but because of them.
1 1988 - Mark V 510 (bought new), 4 Poly vee 1 1/8th HP Mark V's, Mark VII, 1 Mark V Mini, 1 Frankensmith, 1 10-ER, 1 Mark V Push-me-Pull-me Drillpress, SS bandsaw, belt sander, jointer, jigsaw, shaper attach, mortising attach, TS-3650 Rigid tablesaw, RAS, 6" long bed jointer, Foley/Belsaw Planer/molder/ripsaw, 1" sander, oscillating spindle/belt sander, Scroll saw, Woodmizer sawmill
JPG40504 wrote:The reason for them being 'diagonal' is NOT so as to cut a wire diagonally, but rather so as to provide an angled approach to the wire when cutting.
Similar to the reason box end wrenches are not flat, but the ends are angled so that there is room for your hand(knuckles) .
Hold your hand in front of you as if to cut a wire running straight across in front of you. Look at the 'angle' of your wrist'. Is is easier to squeeze the pliers at that (angled) neutral position of your wrist than twisted so as to be at a right angle to the wire.
Cutting wires is not he only thing a lineman's pliers are designed to be used for.
I want to thank all of you for the kind words regarding my surgery. I appreciate them all.
However, due to no fault of my own, my surgery did not happen as planned. It has been rescheduled for this Friday at noon. I guess that should reaffirm that the doctor does not consider this an emergency. Needless to say, I have mixed feelings.
"Making Sawdust Safely" Dusty
Sent from my Dell XPS using Firefox.
a1gutterman wrote:I do knot know how local that term might be. As a kid, here in the state of WA, "dikes" was the only name I knew for any size side cutters. It was knot until I went to work (12yrs old, worked there for 8yrs) for an wholesale automotive tool distributor that I found out otherwise. I wonder...Maybe there was a company called Dike at one time that was well known for their sidecutters. You know what I mean]Or I could be completely wrong in my theory[/URL] (see second paragragh).
As a "general" rule I have always tried to refer to tools by the names used in catalogs. One deviation from that is using brand names as generics as someone mentioned like "Channel-locks" or "Crescent" wrenches.
Much of my patterns came from passing tools to my father as he was working on farm machinery. I didn't truly understand fractions then but by age 5 or 6 I knew every wrench in the big tool tray personally. There were certain wrenches that he prized highly and they had their own references. I still have his matched pair of 11/16ths x 5/8ths inch Blue Point box end wrenches that he bought around 1948. Still excellent wrenches today. Another great wrench he had bought from a coworker by the last name of Wise. Wise had electro-engraved his last name in the wrench and it was always referred to as the "Wise wrench". I still have that one too. In fact I still have almost all of his tools. Of course I have probably 10 to 20 times as many tools as he ever had. I just like tools and garage sales and auctions.
BTW, I have about three "Cecil Kendall" bars. Don't try to Google that... Cecil Kendall was the carpenter that first showed my father his simple sturdy flat ended drive in pry bar that impressed my father so much that he ran out and bought one. From that point on those were always "Cecil Kendall bars".
A Cecil Kendall bar is much like the one on the left in this picture but a little larger and heavier. http://www.houstonindustrialtools.com/mm5/graphics/00000001/cat_prybars.jpg
In the farm/mechanics shop I make frequent use of the "Smoke Wrench"...
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farmer
Francis Robinson
I did not equip with Shopsmiths in spite of the setups but because of them.
1 1988 - Mark V 510 (bought new), 4 Poly vee 1 1/8th HP Mark V's, Mark VII, 1 Mark V Mini, 1 Frankensmith, 1 10-ER, 1 Mark V Push-me-Pull-me Drillpress, SS bandsaw, belt sander, jointer, jigsaw, shaper attach, mortising attach, TS-3650 Rigid tablesaw, RAS, 6" long bed jointer, Foley/Belsaw Planer/molder/ripsaw, 1" sander, oscillating spindle/belt sander, Scroll saw, Woodmizer sawmill
