Whats been the most waste of money tool you've got?

Well... the small hand fork magically reappeared...it hid UNDER a small container.. With that and the kitchen spoon I will be fine I think. Limited now as my illness ( CFS/ME) is in aggressive mode and the weather is aiding and abetting it. So I may stick at the flower patch at the front. At the back I grew potatoes well my first year here simply under hay so …..we shall see; too poorly even to dream of it now! Poooooooooooooor islander!

 

A stainless steel hoe that wouldn't cut butter. A hoe is possibly the one tool from which I would not want to be parted, but why are they made so blunt? Many spades are the same. Fortunately, I have a rusty old hoe that I can sharpen with a sharpening stone. If that goes I don't know what I'd do. Is there anywhere that sells sharp hoes? I was also wondering if you can buy an effective tool-sharpening attachment for a lathe, perhaps one that would even sharpen stainless steel.

 

Thanks for reminding me of another useless tool, a s.s. hoe bought reduced from Tesco for about 30p, but the handle is plastic, lightweight and having no weight behind it doesn't bite into the ground. It needs the handle replacing with a wooden one.

 

While I have to agree about the bulb planter, mine only cost around $3 so I probably got what I paid for.

Similarly, an electric mulcher my mum scrounged for us was pretty much worthless but cost nothing and the motor was repurposed to repair our air compressor so overall a win.

Probably the biggest waste of $$$ was a $100 flame weeder - a gas canister powered blowtorch that the husband bought to weed our gravel path. It kind of works, but you need to live with the sight of the scorched dying weeds for several weeks afterwards. Much simpler to hand weed.

 

I bought one of those too, seemed ideal. But I have heavy clay and the handle bucked on the first hole I attempted to make ...

This sort of rubbish - change from £3.50


I now have a Bulldog stomp-on one instead, which I use a lot - makes a perfect sized hole to drop a plant from a 9cm pot into - its built like a brick outhouse ... and enough metal on it that I have been able to grind and file it sharp.

 

I got a cheap flame thrower thing. It's rubbish on weeds - by the time the weed is scorched, the brickwork or whatever else behind is getting way too hot. It's brilliant for starting bonfires with though, so it still has a purpose.