Funnel system gets lubricant to tight spots It's amazing how many neat tricks used in U.S. plants have their roots in automobile repair and maintenance. Take David Torbett's idea, for example.  He came up with a way to get lubricants into hard-to-reach machine reservoirs at the McKee Foods plant in Collegedale, Tenn.  The industrial engineer cut the bottom out of a plastic, one-quart motor oil bottle and cut an inexpensive garden hose to a length needed to reach a machine reservoir.  The hose's female connector screws securely onto the bottle's male threads.  The makeshift funnel system neatly sends lubricant to those difficult areas. "I came about it in a strange way," he says.  "I had put a kit on my truck to flush out antifreeze.  It came with a little plastic lid to cover the place where you hook up the hose.  The plastic lid broke and I couldn't find a replacement.  I had a quart of motor oil in the truck.  I looked at the cap and said, that looks awful close in size.  So I took the cap and it fit perfectly onto that hose connection. "It dawned on me, if that works, I bet you could hook a hose to a motor oil bottle.  I said, gee, that could come in handy at work.  We've got gearboxes under machinery and in tight spaces.  After a few trial runs, and cutting out the bottom of the bottle for venting, I had something that worked." This article appeared in the December 1999/January 2000 issue of MRO Today magazine.  Copyright, 2000. Back to top Back to Ideas that make sense archives