Basic Machines and How the Work covers many familiar machines and their components, including levers, block and tackle, and the inclined plane and wedge, in addition to hydrostatic and hydraulic machines, internal combustion engines, trains, and more. 204 black-and-white illustrations.
This book is a reference guide and instruction manual used to teach military personnel how machines work so that they can make repairs to unfamiliar equipment in the middle of the ocean.
Like the Navy Foundry manual, this book helps teach vital DIY concepts that are vital to repairing material in a long term “grid down” disaster.
In a apocalyptic “Postman” or “Mad Max” world – the ability to understand machinery would make a person a vital asset to a community. However, I don’t really believe in those scenarios, so I stick with the more realistic view that it is cheaper to know how to fix things than it is to pay someone to fix them.
I found the section on how differentials work to be fascinating, but the book’s descriptions on machines gives a great primer into how things work – by knowing this you can start to see principles and break things down into component parts. It is books like this that turn a person into a Macgyver.
I needed some large terminal lugs for my 
I am always in search of ways to make food storage easier, recently I shared a tip for making a mason jar lid from things in the kitchen. It was a good tip, but this one is a little better.
