A carpenter's square that can have the arms thereof separated for ease of storage and joined together during use includes a over-center latch arrangement designed to be no thicker than the thickness dimension of the arm members and which, when operated, tightly clamps the arms of the square at right angles to one another. A first arm of the square has an opening formed through the thickness dimension thereof along with alignment bores extending inwardly from a side edge thereof on either side of the opening. The second arm includes the over-center latch pivotally mounted in a slot or channel and includes a latch plate pivotally joined to a coupling member having a head thereon designed to fit within the opening on the first arm member. When the latch plate is manually actuated so as to reside within the slot of the second arm, the head on the coupling member cooperates with an edge defined by the opening in the first arm to tightly clamp the first and second arms one to the other.
An expandable tool for laying out and marking predetermined angular layout lines on a work surface. The tool is comprised of a first leg (202), second leg (204), and hypotenuse leg (206) which are assembled by the user such that the intersection of the first and second leg form the desired angle as defined by the hypotenuse (206). The general shape of the assembled tool will normally be a triangle. Each leg of the tool can consist of a single leg portion (or member), or alternatively, each leg can be made up of more than one leg portion. The ends of each leg are fitted with a fastening mechanism (214) for connecting the leg portions together. The tool can be made to various sizes by the addition and deletion of leg portions. Additionally, the tool can be disassembled to facilitate compact transport to subsequent work sites.
