DIY tools may refer to tools a person makes for a certain application, or it may refer to tools used for DIY projects. In the latter case, many DIY tools are the same as tools used by professionals. A trip to the hardware store will offer countless tools for professional and home use, but some tools can be made cheaply and quickly at home with little material or money investment. Paint stirrers, for example, are simply strips of thin wood that are used to mix paint before it is used. You can buy such a tool at the hardware store, or you can simply strip the bark off a small tree branch, as long as the branch is dead and dry.
A rolling cart or dolly for the home workshop is perhaps one of the most useful DIY tools, and also one of the easiest to make. A few scraps of 2x4 lumber, some plywood, a small carpet sample, a few strong nuts and bolts, and some casters bought from the hardware store should be enough to make a decent dolly. The 2x4s can be cut to the length and width of the dolly, and then the plywood can be mounted on top of them. The casters can be mounted to the bottom of the 2x4s, and the carpet sample can be glued or stapled onto the top of the plywood to provide a soft surface for items that are being moved. Like most DIY tools, this dolly is inexpensive and extremely functional, not to mention easy to store when not in use.
Jigs are DIY tools that can also be made from scraps of lumber. The size, shape, and function of the jig often depends on the specific DIY project. Jigs are used to support or otherwise steady pieces of material being worked on, and they can hold two or more pieces of material together during gluing or other types of binding processes. Most jigs have some sort of mechanism that will hold the jaws of the jig in place to apply pressure to the materials being bound or otherwise worked on.
DIY tools that can be purchased from the store are commonly used tools for everyday applications. A socket set, for example, can be useful when changing the oil on the car, building or adjusting furniture, and working on other projects with bolts in need of tightening or loosening. Wrench sets are also commonly used, as are screwdrivers, hammers, drills, circular saws, and so on.
