Nagging question on Clamps

[Frodo]

Again, I appreciate your honesty. I wonder how many others reuse as well and haven't admitted to as much.

I have reused stuff before. We had the probably now-infamous thread on reusing crush washers on oil changes. Some folks got amazingly hot under the collar at the audacity of doing that, but I know I've had washers I probably reused half a dozen times, with zero problems. Ever.

For me, though, it's not really a matter of being cheap. It's wanting to get the job done in a reasonably expedited fashion. When I realize I don't have a new crush washer, well...here's one I can use, right here in my hand. It was working great before, I think it'll keep working great at least one more cycle.

No, it's not so much the cost, though when you spend $300+ on a replacement coolant tank you'd think the supplier could toss in a handful of clamps no charge, without even having to be asked. (My parts are ordered, who knows...maybe they will do that. I'll be pleasantly surprised if they do.) No, it's more the difficulty (for me, anyway) of anticipating exactly what I'm going to need before I even put the car into service position to start working. I read all the DIY descriptions, they're definitely helpful. But for me, I don't really have a feel for the details until I actually start to get my hands dirty. That's when you start to figure out which clamps need to be released and, by commonly given advice, replaced with new.