Figure this is a good excuse to start going through my toolboxes. I take care of my tools, and do use them. They don't sit on a shelf, and unlike I see in many "creative" magazines, I don't wreck them and turn them into folk art. Heck I recently read an article in such a magazine that was titled "Make art with rusty junk".
The sources from my tools are various. A lot of them were my Granddad's and great-Granddad's. Some were found on a property we used to lease (and ironically, half I found were my Granddad's--the guy who owned that property originally tended to borrow a lot of my Granddad's stuff and never returned it), and a lot bought at flea markets. A few were super-steals from the big auction site. Very few are bought new. You hear of people who decide not to become mechanics because they can't afford the tools. You don't need to buy new, and you sure as heck don't need to settle for Harbor Freight.
And this isn't even the start....
Yeah, I do stuff with my "rusty junk". I keep things here from going to heck in a handbasket by fixing them.
The Eifel Plierrench is a design that is over a hundred years old, and was only officially discontinued about eight years ago, after the designs went through a chain of owners and constant tweaks. It was an early attempt at creating self-locking pliers.
This one is a 1942 version I think, 8-inch. This one was cheap, and I only got the pipe jaw. There was a HUGE variety of jaws allowing you to do basically anything with it. I plan to splurge and replace this one with one of those.
Trimont Manufacturing "Trimo" 8-inch pipe wrench. From the '30s to late '40s.
Around the shop, we have 8, 10, and 12, inch versions. The 8 and 10 eventually ended up in various toolboxes of mine, and Granddad has kept the 12-incher. These were left here in the '60s by the previous owners. These still work great. For pipe, I mostly use a 10" Knipex Cobra (which also has replaced 440 Chanellocks--and also is used as a wrench also for bolts and nuts), but these stay in the box as a backup.
AP Robertson Tack Hammer. My smallest hammer--used for jobs when something needs striking, but I don't want to use the monkey with a hammer approach. Supposedly magnetic, but that has since been pretty much worn out. Originally my great-granddad's. The main use, small nails, and light riveting jobs. I am sort of wondering if this would be good to peen knife pins with, or should I buy a more specialized hammer?
My great-Granddad's Channellock-type pliers--1960s Craftsman and Proto 243. The red box I use regularly is the only box I own to not contain any Channellock pliers. It has a 10" pair of Knipex Cobras, and then these two. I've used both heavily.
Hoof rasp--probably 100 years old. The barn we have was built in 1927, and I found it 4-5 years back. My folks have been living here since 1969 and didn't even realize it was there.
The mark is basically an arrow with "TRADEMARK" stamped under it.
I use it for filing bits of wood down, mostly.
I have no idea who made it, and I've found nothing online about the marking.
You can see all the wood chips on the floor. Then I went over it a few times along the grain with a smoothing plane to get the cross hatch marks out of it. After it was 98.3% flat, I glued various sized dowels into the 18 holes (yes - 18) that had been drilled through the top for whatever reason. Then I put wood filler into all the dents and gouges and sanded it all down with 80, 120, then 220. I ordered some Waterlox, and I will finish it with 4 or so coats of that. Now I will have a flat surface with no gaps for small parts to fall through. Next step will be to buy a wood vise to install. 
J.O'.
