Searching for bits – how to do it better ?

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Searching for bits – how to do it better ?

This topic has 16 replies, 14 voices, and was last updated 17 April 2023 at 09:38 by William S.

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16 April 2023 at 14:07 #641486
gerry madden
Participant
@gerrymadden53711
I have many frustrations in life but one that comes up again and again is the time it takes to find just the right part on the web to help make the perfect repair.

Todays 'waste of time' involves the search for some double coil spring washers for the lamp unit on my Meteor drill grinder.

When I enter this term into google I get tons of irrelevant rubbish. I thought the way to be more specific was to put the key words in inverted commas. When I do this I still get tons of irrelevant rubbish including 'single coil' washers which I'm not interested in.

So my question is: how should I refine my searches so that I can see only sellers / products that I require ?

(Specifically I'm looking for a double coil spring washer with a bore of around 3mm. These don't look to be too popular (hence the mess on my grinder, probably) but I feel someone, somewhere, must have what I need.)

Gerry
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16 April 2023 at 14:07 #29139
gerry madden
Participant
@gerrymadden53711
16 April 2023 at 14:15 #641487
Martin Connelly
Participant
@martinconnelly55370
Search for "Imperial Double Coil Spring Washers Thackery" on Ebay.

Martin C
16 April 2023 at 14:34 #641488
Nick Hughes
Participant
@nickhughes97026
These are the smallest I could find after a 5 min search:-

ebay 9/64" Thackery Washer

Not listed directly on BA Bolts Ltd website (that I could find) for some reason though.

All I did to help refine the search, was to add M3 to the start of your "search term", but still had to sift through quite a bit of dross.

Edit:- found the listing , but still does not include 9/64"

BA Bolts Limited

Edited By Nick Hughes on 16/04/2023 14:54:36
16 April 2023 at 14:54 #641494
peak4
Participant
@peak4
You could try searching for 6BA ones
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/324951181485

I often search in Google, when I'm not sure of the exact description, but search on "Images" rather than "All"
Obviously this then shows a series of photos, from which it's often possible to extract other useful search terms.
e.g. a search for "Double Spring Washers", shows several photos including the word "Thackery", so you can then add that to the search box to narrow the field a bit; similarly you might even find the BS or DIN number.

Bill
16 April 2023 at 14:55 #641495
Nicholas Farr
Participant
@nicholasfarr14254
Hi, what you need to search for is double coil rectangular section spring washer Double coil spring

Regards Nick.
16 April 2023 at 15:06 #641498
Bill Phinn
Participant
@billphinn90025
Posted by gerry madden on 16/04/2023 14:07:25:

When I enter this term into google I get tons of irrelevant rubbish.

On eBay I only got 11 results, including this one. They were all double coil spring washers.

Did you put the search terms within quotes?

Edited By Bill Phinn on 16/04/2023 15:07:50
16 April 2023 at 15:28 #641500
SillyOldDuffer
Moderator
@sillyoldduffer
By default search engines look wide and broad but the syntax can be tightened. Or, the user can fill in an advanced search form, this one is google's.

Dave
16 April 2023 at 16:55 #641518
Richard S2
Participant
@richards2
I have original imperial unused blackened Thackerys of 3/16" bore in my stock if they would help?.
16 April 2023 at 18:44 #641532
bernard towers
Participant
@bernardtowers37738
Best I can do is 5/16 they are left overs from fitting 40 DCOE’s
16 April 2023 at 18:47 #641534
old mart
Participant
@oldmart
I tried googling "types of spring washer" and found this site with a good selection:

**LINK**
16 April 2023 at 20:34 #641540
Bazyle
Participant
@bazyle
I'm sure people have mentioned a way of providing Google with a picture and telling it to find similar pictures….??
16 April 2023 at 21:13 #641546
Michael Gilligan
Participant
@michaelgilligan61133
Gerry

Once upon a time [long, long, ago] you could force Google search to include a specific term, by including the + symbol

… and force it to exclude a specific term, by including the – symbol

All quite logical

But then they invented Google plus [whatever that is] and decided to kill the + functionality “to avoid confusion”

The use of quotation marks works [after a fashion] but is not as powerful as + was

Thankfully – does still seem to work, so you should be able to exclude the word single from your search results.

Hope that makes sense … give it a try !

MichaelG.
16 April 2023 at 22:21 #641553
peak4
Participant
@peak4
Posted by Bazyle on 16/04/2023 20:34:40:

I'm sure people have mentioned a way of providing Google with a picture and telling it to find similar pictures….??

There's several different methods.
If you open a conventional Google search box, there's a camera icon at the right hand end.
https://www.google.co.uk/ 
Click on that, and you can either paste an image's URL into the search box, drag an image into it or upload a file.
You can therefor photograph something yourself and upload the picture for a similar image search.

Depending on your browser, you might be able to install Tin Eye, which is a reverse image search tool; right click on an image and select Tin Eye from the drop down menu.
It can also be used in a similar fashion to Google from its own web page.
https://tineye.com/

One website I use regularly is SmallSEOTools, which again works along similar lines.
https://smallseotools.com/reverse-image-search/
This one however simultaneously searches Yandex, Bing, and Google Images, though the latter seems a little more limited than Google Eye.

Bill

Edited By peak4 on 16/04/2023 22:22:48
17 April 2023 at 08:16 #641574
larry phelan 1
Participant
@larryphelan1
I needed some such washers a few years back and found it very difficult to get them locally, or even not so locally.

They seem to be not so much used now, but I always found them to be very useful for similar jobs to the one mentioned. No point in trying your local D I Y shop, I think !
17 April 2023 at 08:44 #641577
Michael Gilligan
Participant
@michaelgilligan61133
Update for Gerry …

I have just tried a Google search for:

spring washer, double coil

[exactly as that ^^^, with no quotes or other tricks]

Loads of results, many with pictures

MichaelG.
17 April 2023 at 09:38 #641585
William S
Participant
@williams
Type- 6ba ( 1/8” ) Double Coil steel spring washers x 10 in to eBay and a listing for what you require should appear
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