When I’m taking something apart, using a magnetic parts tray for the screws and other tiny metal bits is one of the best things I can do (together with taking pictures as I go) to make sure that it all goes back together again more or less as it’s supposed to.

So the last time I was disassembling an appliance for repair (a video projector, in this case), and I was carefully arranging the screws for each subassembly in a separate little pile in my parts tray, it occurred to me that it’d be nice to have a magnetic parts tray with compartments for this purpose. And when I was imagining what the dividers would look like, a shape like the blade of a fruit wedger occurred to me.

For some reason, I have two fruit wedgers. I never use a fruit wedger, but when and if I ever decide to start, I am confidant that my needs will be served by only one.

So I busted the plastic ring off one of them and, after breaking off some small bits to round the ends of the blades, discovered that the blade assembly fit pretty well into my 4? magnetic parts tray. And actually works pretty well as a divider, too. I knocked the sharp edges off with a file.