Old fashioned bushing/seal driver

[Kevin Mienke]

Let me start by saying that I once owned a real nice set of store-bought bushing drivers. I've determined that my brother now owns them. He likes to borrow things.
Anyway, a couple of days ago I discovered that I no longer have this nice set of drivers and was faced with driving new bronze inner axle bushings into place. I considered using a large socket when my dad spoke up and suggested an old school method. It was so simple and practical I thought I would pass it along.

Find an old wooden baseball bat, determine the OD of the bushing and then cut the bat off at that diameter. Because a baseball bat is tapered the entire length, your only limits are the minimum diameter at the handle and the maximum diameter at the barrel. The typical bat would give you the ability to make drivers ranging from 1 inch diameter to 3 inch diameter.

Cut the other end off at the appropriate length for your particular application. The driver I made for the inner axle bushings was 2" diameter and about 10 inches long. Five or six calculated hits with a 2lb. hammer drove them squarely in.

My brother has a nice set of drivers, but he's got nothing on me.

[Ron in Indiana]

Sounds like you made a home run with that trick. I have a piece of hickory from a sledge hammer handle that I find comes in very handy every now and then. Besides it keeps the sockets from getting beaten up and yes I'm guilty of that bad practice too.

[Kevin Mienke]

Sounds like you made a home run with that trick.

It would be the only home run I ever got with a baseball bat.

There was an occasion, when I played high school ball, that I really got into a pitch. I thought it was a home run when I hit it, but there was this left fielder known as Fat Dan Robinson. Fat Dan had a vertical leap ability of about 2 inches. Fat Dan kept it in the park and I never hit a ball that far ever again.

The bat I used that day just might have been the same bat I cut up the other day.

[Ron in Indiana]

Well there is some justice in this world. Vertical leap of two inches, that's funny. How's Dad doing by the way? 21 years ago Wednesday my Dad went home to glory.

[Steve G]

Kevin, about 2 miles south of you there is a set of bushing drivers in my garage. But it's always fun to come up with ways to do things with the stuff that you already have, called ingenuity!