How To: Magnetize Any Screwdriver

Putting together Ikea media cabinets or taking apart electronics to hack certainly requires a whole lot of tiny metal (and easily lost) screws. Take your trusty, heavy-duty screwdriver and give it a little magnet power with this DIY project.

Sure, you could hop up to a big-box store and buy a pre-magnetized screwdriver. But if you've got a well-built tool already in your toolbox, use this little DIY project to make it magnetized and keep you from losing a million tiny screws.

The project, posted over at Instructables, involves only your tool and a strong magnet (the author says a pickup tool works best). Check out the full instructions here.

(Image: Flickr user Yo Spiff under license from Creative Commons.)

Some Cool Stuff to Build with your New Magentized Screwdriver:

Comments (2)

They make magnetize/demagnetizes for screw drivers and are usually very inexpensive. However, in a pinch, you can always tap the metal end of the screw driver on a hard surface like a concrete floor and achieve brief magnetization.

posted by huntera3 on November 11th 2009 at 5:39pm
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if you magnatize that screwdriver, don't use it on electronics after that point. most of the time you won't have a problem, but you don't want to screw anything up that isn't needed.

on a different note, you guys actually put your ikea furniture together with a hand screwdriver, or basic tools in general? Power tools is where it is at, that is how i built the entire office I am sitting on right now.

I even built a special thing to screw the legs to our tables together, the only way to put them together is literally screw them on a 3 foot screw... so i made a chunk of cardboard into a "bit" that stuck to the table legs, and powered it up.

posted by jmorey on November 12th 2009 at 12:45pm
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