Hot MacGyverisms Posts

How To: Refill an Air Duster Can with a Bicycle Pump

In this life hack video, I am going to show you how you can refill your air duster can with a bicycle pump.

How To: 20 Simple Solutions to Life's Most Irritating First World Problems

Just because a problem is small or superficial doesn't mean it can't annoy the living crap out of you. Others may think you're overreacting, or even have the audacity to roll their eyes, but you're in your own personal hell.

How To: Make a Soda-Box Soda Cooler

For some reason, there's only ever one person in a group of friends that has a cooler. Every time there is a hangout or BBQ, that friend is called and has to lug his expensive, huge plastic cooler around for everyone. Not really fair, is it?

How To: Make a DIY Home Theater Projector and 50" Screen for Only $5 (Great for March Madness!)

Today's project will show how you can convert your laptop, smartphone, or tablet computer into a makeshift projector—just in time for March Madness! It's super cheap to build, and can add a little bit of creative fun to your next sports party.

How To: Fix Your Broken Vertical Blind Slats MacGyver-Style

Most of you probably have a set of blinds at home, the most popular being horizontal or vertical. They're great for keeping the sun out of your eyes and maintaining privacy, but unfortunately, each comes with its own set of problems.

How To: Make Sticky or Stubborn Wooden Drawers Slide More Smoothly

When I was moving into my current apartment, I had to store some of my things in my ex-roommate's garage for over a month while I was getting settled. One of those things was my dresser. Upon moving it into my new place, I realized something was horribly, horribly wrong—none of the drawers seemed to fit quite right anymore (if they fit at all). The combination of the differences in temperature and humidity in the garage caused them to swell and change shape. Several months later, they fit bet...

How To: Dry Your Soaking Wet "Hand Wash Only" Clothes Faster

Let’s be honest: you’ve thrown a few delicate, "hand wash only" clothes into the wash with your jeans. Maybe you’ve even ruined a sweater or two. There are so many things to look out for when doing laundry, and they’re easily ignored or forgotten, especially when it comes to drying.

How To: If You've Run Out of Shaving Cream, Give These 10 Household Items a Try

Running out of any shower necessity is just a temporary annoyance, but it always seems worse when it's an empty can of shaving cream or gel. Sure, you could dry shave or use whatever liquid toiletry item is in hands reach, but if you want a truly smooth shave without irritation, you'll want to try one of the following alternatives. Some of them might even work better than your can of Barbasol or Skintimate.

How To: Inflate Any Ball Without a Pump or Needle

What happens when you find your ball deflated and there's no pump or needle in sight? You could always cancel your plans of kicking around the soccer ball or starting that pickup football game in the park. Better yet, you could be terribly clever and find another way to get air into the ball. From a pen to a balloon to a gas station, there are ways to inflate it.

How To: Remove Water Rings on Wood Furniture with Toothpaste

Most wood furniture is long-lasting, durable, and resistant to great wear and tear over the years. However, set a single sweaty, wet cup or bottle on the surface of your favorite wood dining table, or your prominently placed wooden coffee table, and you'll end up with a round water ring stain that is difficult to get rid of.

How To: Fix the Worn Out Heel Linings in Your Ragged Shoes & Sneakers—MacGyver Style!

The worst thing about running shoes is that they're expensive, but you're supposed to abuse them. Even if you're not a runner, everyday wear and tear takes its toll. No matter how well you take care of them, if you use them enough, they're eventually going to wind up looking like this: And it's not just running shoes. I have a pair of Vans that I've worn for almost four years, and the heels are just about ripped all the way through.

How To: Make a Homemade Bee & Wasp Trap (Kill or No-Kill)

Bees are the key to pollination and healthy vegetation, and wasps may help by assisting in pest control, but despite their benefits in the world, they're still a real pain in the ass if they're in your face.

How To: 5 Clever Ways to Make a Simple No-Kill Trap for Mice & Rats

Once when I was a kid, my dad used a glue trap to catch a mouse in our basement. The result was so awful for the mouse that my mom and I made him promise to never use that kind of trap again. Call me a softy, but I'm a firm believer that you don't have to kill pests to get rid of them.

How To: 10 Ultra-Practical Uses for Your Hair Dryer (Besides the Obvious)

Hair dyers are pretty straightforward tools, but they can actually do way more than just dry your wet hair or defog your bathroom mirror. From the kitchen to the backyard, a blowdryer can help you solve common problems around the house and beyond, and here are our 10 favorite uses.

How To: Remove Scratches & Scuff Marks in Your Car's Paint Job with Toothpaste

Whether you drive a new or used car, discovering a new dent, scratch, or scuff mark can send you into a frustration spiral. While there are many DIY ways to deal with dents, scratches and scuff marks are trickier because using the wrong stuff could make your car's paint job look even worse.

How To: Use Vinegar & Baking Soda to Fluff Up Worn-Out Bath Towels

It feels great to wrap up in a big, fluffy towel after a steamy shower, but it's frustrating when that towel isn't quite up to the job. Over time, towels lose their ability to hold water and dry as needed thanks to daily use and the biggest culprit—laundry detergent.

How To: How You Should Really “Fold” Socks to Prevent Stretching Them Out

I don’t buy socks—I get a pack from my parents on Christmas Day, so I’ve got to make sure they last all year. Other than losing them mysteriously in the dryer, the biggest threat to my limited sock collection is a stretched out cuff. Nothing's more frustrating than a loose sock sliding down into your shoe.

How To: Turn Any Ammo Box into an Awesome Set of Portable Speakers

Believe it or not, an ammo box can still be of use to you once its rounds are gone. You can use it for storage, as a toolbox, or possibly even as a Faraday cage. But if you want to use it as more than just a container, why not turn it into a portable set of speakers that you can take with you anywhere? The ammo can speaker pictured above was made by Instructables user Dustin White. He started with an empty .50 cal box, though you could probably even use thinner 5.56 or 7.62 mm cans. He remove...

How To: Use Nuts to Repair Small Nicks & Scratches in Your Wood Furniture

Furniture gets beat up—it's a fact of life. Your beautiful tables will end up scratched, the legs of your chairs will grow nicked, and you'll find interesting dents and damage in other places around the house, too. Yet if most of your furniture is made of wood, you don't have to live with unsightly scratches. In fact, you can remove years of damage with a simple snack food: nuts.

How To: 10 Life Hacks That'll Make Your Life Easier & Stress-Free

Life hacks are tips and tricks to help make life easier. Shortcuts and clever workarounds for life's daily problems. Sometimes common sense isn't so obvious until you've actually seen it. In this video, I'll be sharing with you 10 life-changing hacks you can use right now, from finding your lost smartphone to sleeping better at night.

How To: Make a 40 Watt Electrical Generator from Common Household Items

There's no charge for this electricity! All you'll need for this project is... Now, watch and learn how to make your own emergency power if you find yourself in a bind.

How To: Easy DIY Fire Starters, Plus 9 More Ways to Reuse Old Wine Corks

Always downing a glass of red wine in the evening? Don't be ashamed. Red wine has some great health benefits when consumed in moderation, including improved memory, lower risk of heart disease, and even bone strengthening. Photo by Joe Shlabotnik

How To: Turn Your Old Satellite Dish into an Outdoor Solar Cooker

Harnessing the power of the sun is something that Captain Planet made cool before it was the go-to for renewable energy. Solar-powered energy is quick and cheap, and can make for some really cool DIY projects. And for those of you wondering what you should do with your old satellite, look no further. Aaron from Sharealikelicence offers up a way to create a DIY outdoor satellite cooker. He started with an old Ku Band dish and covered it with aluminum tape, for better reflection of the sunlight...

How To: Save Money on Your Home Theater with This Pro-Looking DIY Projector Screen

Projector screens can be pretty expensive, depending on the size and quality you're looking for. If you're thinking of installing one and want to save some money, you can build a pretty decent one yourself with just a few simple materials. Redditor dodgeboy made this 128" DIY projector screen for only $200, and I have to say it looks pretty impressive. Poplar 1x4s make up the frame, with pine 1x3s as supports. Once the frame was assembled and painted black, he installed mounting blocks on bot...

Winter Hack: How to Turn a Dead Battery into a Hand Warmer

My least favorite aspect of the winter season is how my fingers always turn into stiff, numb digits, unfeeling and seemingly incapable of making even the slightest movement. Yes, that might sound overdramatic, but if you hate wearing gloves like I do, you probably know exactly what I mean.

How To: 10 Life Hacks You Need to Know for a Better Summer

Are you a messy burger eater? Ants and fruit flies invading your home? Hate drinking warm drinks? Find out the quick and easy DIY solutions to these problems with these 10 amazing tips and tricks for the summer.

How To: Turn an Old Metal Slinky and Coat Hanger into a Bird Feeder

While the heyday of the Slinky may have been a few decades ago, I still think it's one of the coolest toys to ever go to market. Not to mention it probably has the best commercial ever created.

News: How to Turn an Old TV into a Sweet Fish Tank!

Check out this how to article that shows you how to turn that old TV sitting in your basement into an awesome custom fish tank! How to Convert an Old TV Into a Fish Tank: 13 steps.

How To: Build a Corn Dog Rig for Easy Deep Frying

Fairs and festivals are awesome, and one of the best parts about them is the food. Sure, it's all deep-fried and terrible for you, but it's so delicious. It's also always on a stick, which makes eating fried food even easier for us fat Americans.

Summer Cooling Tip: How to Upgrade a Handheld Fan into a Mister

If you're anything like me, the heat of the summer can often be unbearable. Where I live, it often gets as high as 108 degrees Fahrenheit, so anything that cools off is a welcome and amazing thing. Mister fans are especially amazing for cooling off, but they are usually very big and attached to buildings (which currently is way out of the picture for me.)

How To: Build a $20 Super Antenna for Better Signal Strength & More Free Broadcast TV Channels

If you've recently joined the ever-growing ranks of the cable cutters, you're far from alone. More and more people (myself included) are getting fed up with service providers' outdated subscription models and absurd pricing—and canceling their service.

How To: Make a MacGyver-Style Chess Set Using Just Nuts & Bolts

You know what ladies love? A man who can handle his tools. What do the ladies love even more? A man who can say checkmate. Well, except maybe this lady.

How To: Fix Crooked or Uneven Wall Shelves with a Piece of Paper

You can spend all day putting up shelves and still have them end up crooked. Even if you've got a stud finder or a level, it's still easy to make mistakes, and a few millimeters is all it takes to screw make a shelf noticeably uneven. If you find yourself in this predicament, the worst part is that correcting the problem usually means repeating the entire process from the beginning, though you'll be left with unwanted holes in the wall. But redditor Swedish__Chef__Bork__x3 found a way to fix ...

How To: Screw Staples—You Don't Need Any with This Stapleless Paper Trick

Staples may be an office staple when it comes to joining sheets of paper together, but they're a pain in the ass if you ask me. They're annoying to take out, you can't shred 'em, and they eventually loosen up. Plus, staplers tend to stop working right when you need them the most.

1 Buck Toothpaste Hack: Make This Tube Squeezer in Under 5 Minutes

Let's face it—if you care about anyone around you, then you brush your teeth. Brushing is an excellent way to not only prevent tooth decay, but to keep people from running away from you with their noses pinched.

How To: Slope Your Dish Rack Pan for Perfect Draining

Let's face it, pretty much everyone has an automatic dishwasher. They are super convenient and are becoming cheaper to allow the general public better access to them. With that being said, though, dishwashers are also becoming a lot smaller.

How To: 3 Easy In-Flight Hacks for Hands-Free Movie Watching on Your Smartphone or Tablet

The closest I've ever been to first class was when I was a young kid running up and down the aisles on a long international flight. I remember being in awe of how big the seats were and how much food was available. Ever since that moment, I've made it my life goal to earn enough money to make first-class flights a regular occasion.

How To: Replace Worn Off Lettering on Home Appliances with Sugru

Whether you've had them for years or bought them used off Craigslist, old appliances can always benefit from a facelift. One of the first things to go is usually the lettering on the knobs, buttons, and other surfaces that are frequently touched, leaving them faded and difficult to read.

How To: 8 Easy Ways to Remove Cigarette Smoke Smells from Your Car

The lingering smell of cigarette smoke can bother just about anyone, including smokers themselves. Unfortunately, it can be quite difficult to mask or completely get rid of the smell altogether. While you can go through extremes like washing and even repainting the walls in your home, those options don't exist when the odor is in your car.

How To: The Trick to Keeping Your Home Warm During Winter for Cheap

When temperatures drop and hit new lows during the cold, winter months, it's hard not to crank the heat up. That means increased energy bills each month, no matter if you rely on gas, electric, or another fuel for heating.