Hey, I’m Petter Cotton.
And here’s the Rabbit Hole.
Take a peek inside if you’d like. I keep RHO Tools (SHOP) in there where i built the HoldIt2, and that’s where I LOG quite a bit of my work too. Check either of them out.
If you’re not ready to dive into the hole head first, that’s fine. Let me tell you a little about myself.
I operate this hole thing.
I do a lot of different things in there, and I’ve always found myself needing a little more or something I just can’t find. So I started making that and those myself.
It’s funny, you would think inside the rabbit hole it’d be all downhill, but I’ll tell you, if I’ve climbed a molehill, I’ve climbed a mountain.
Since I’m always coming up with these one-off ideas, I figured maybe others could use ’em too. So, I’m making plans and putting them in my shop. If you’re interested, they’re there, or if you’d like to know more about my muse, I’d be happy to tell.
My muse is my work.
It’s uncomfortable, it’s dirty, often dark and cold; it reminds me of a rabbit hole.
I dig dirt, but that’s not all. Things need fix’n, so I do a little of that. And sometimes things need welding, and I’m already there, so… And then things need organizing, so I learned a little about that and picked up a computer along the way for a digital desk to organize my ideas. It’s just easier to carry along my travels.
I find the more I learn, the less I know, and the more curious I become.
I try not to rabbit-trail off, but it does get the best of me sometimes, as it is in my blood.
I’d say I have a passion for tools, but it’s more about a passion for ability. Heck, if I could turn a 1-inch nut torqued to 500 ft-lbs with my fingers, I wouldn’t need the tools, but here we are, and that’s where I’ll be: down in the rabbit hole. Just holler if you need me, and I’ll see what I can do.
By the way, I’ve hidden a carrot on my site. It looks like this ⪼⫸ First one to find it gets their own set of plans for the HoldIt2 completely FREE!
Til then, take a look around.
The Hole’s open.
Mission
1) Scope
The Rabbit Hole Operator
Committed to building high-value shop solutions and sharing the process.
The philosophy is doing more with less.
2)The Commitment
Core mission: Just Enough to Survive
Hopping on topics like welding, woodworking, mechanics, diagnostics, fabrication, and technology, and go anywhere else the rabbit hole takes us. Going deep enough to get a clear image without enrolling in schooling to learn it. We’ll do the best we can with what little we have, keeping good, honest quality at the top of our priority.
3)The Goal
To Build
An enterprise dedicated to learning and creating with what we have, with the aspiration to achieve greatness in the market and respect from our viewers by sharing our processes and tools so others like us can do the same.
THE INTERNAL WORKINGS OF A RABBIT
Peter Cotton again, follow me Down The Rabbit Hole, where I’ll keep you up to date on the Hole News. Bringing you tails from the RabbitHoleOperator.com about my adventures. We’ll leave the FLUFF behind and we’ll hop on topics like Welding, Technology, Heavy Equipment, 3D Printing, Wood Working, CNC, Automotive, Electronics, Fabrication and of course Tools.
We’ll go where the Rabbit Hole takes us. We’re always making discoveries inside our little hole in the ground. Keeping it relatable: Not every-bunny has the means but we make up for it with Ambition, Grit, and Tenacity. Don’t be deceived by our soft appearance. We’re on the run for our lives to escape the Hounds of Oblivion. So stay bright eyed and bushy tailed as we maneuver this hole thing we call RHO TOOLS.
The Foundation and the 3-4-5 Rule
12-25-25
In The Hole/RHO Shop
I know it’s obvious, but it makes a world of difference. Trying to build something on an unlevel, non-flat surface is begging for trouble. My recommendation: if you have a surface that isn’t, then grab a sheet of plate, shim it up if you have to, or start fresh. Off by the smallest amount down low is amplified up high.
This idea goes in all builds, from dirt work to carpentry and everything in between. If a dig out for a building (when the dirt is dug out making a level surface for the foundation) is off by just a couple tenths, it’s a disaster. Forms don’t line up, you may use extra gravel or worse, concrete. And that’s if the next guy does his due diligence and finds the error. It can also make it where they have to step the foundation, costing a lot more because of extra concrete. Everyone has their part in building the structure, and if it’s overlooked or we trust the man before us, then we are more than likely doomed to a structure that is not square. And if it is three tenths at the bottom, then it could be double that or more at the top.
So start fresh, with a solid, level, flat, and square structure if at all possible, or at least take the time to get what you have as close to that state as possible. If it’s solid, flat, level, and square and you know it is, then it does the measuring for you; it checks for square for you. Things built on a proper pad start and usually finish the way they’re intended.
I’m telling you this because the client doesn’t care about your efforts—he cares about the product. You can fight physics or take its advice: use a level, a square, or hell, even a stringline, but make the foundation right or you’ll fight it the whole way up. There’s not much worse than wasting your own efforts to later find nothing matches up and you can’t figure out why. Solid, level, flat, square.
.
Now, some of you are going to say you don’t have a giant precision square to check a foundation or a big welding table. You don’t need one. You have the 3-4-5 rule.
It’s the oldest trick in the book because it never lies. Measure three feet down one side, four feet down the other. If the diagonal between those two points is exactly five feet, you’re square. If it’s five feet and a quarter-inch, you’re building a trapezoid, not something you’ll be proud of.
Whether it’s 3-4-5 inches on a small bracket or 30-40-50 feet on a house pad, the math stays the same. Physics is giving you the answers—you just have to be disciplined enough to pull the tape and astute enough to read it correctly.
The Trilogy of Truth: Plumb, Square, and Level
1/9/2026
On the rabbit trail
I previously set the foundation block to give a proper starting point, but now we live and work in the real world… and most times we find that the foundation is not square, even if we bring it to the superintendent, nothing will happen. So what can we do but choose one of three options?1) Tear it down, investing our own resources just to get back to the phase where we were supposed to start.2) Walk away because it’s just not perfect.3) Learn to pull square out of the air and move forward.There is nearly always a way to make something work if we are dedicated enough… if we reach down and grab a handful of sand from within ourselves, we can press on and still get a darn fine result; and sometimes necessity demands it. But how do you find square in the air, flat in the wind, and level in chaos?Well, it depends. Are we on a solid-core planet like our very own Earth? Are we on Jupiter, the gas giant, or perhaps floating in space or at sea? Let’s discuss. We’ll start on Earths land because that’s the experience I have. I know, and you now know, we can take a few noodle-like tape measures and find square using the 3-4-5 rule. That’s a start.Let’s break this down to string. If 3 units, 4 units, and 5 units make a square, the unit doesn’t matter. But to find it with string, you need 12 equal units total. Take one long string and tie 12 knots at perfectly equal distances. Now, if you hold that string at the 3rd knot, the 7th knot, and the 12th knot, you are holding a perfect right-angle triangle. You can find square with only this.Then to find Level… you take another string and tie a weight to the bottom. Hold it up and you have Plumb. That is your “Vertical Truth”. Now, take your 3-4-5 string and pull that 90° square off of your plumb line. Where that line points is your horizon—that is Level.If your plumb string is true and there is no wind to blow it, then its profile is Straight.But how do we prove Flat? You build an A-Frame—three sticks tied into an ‘A’ with a plumb line hanging from the peak. You set the feet down and mark where the string hits the crossbar. Then you flip the ‘A’ 180 degrees, putting the feet in each other’s tracks. Mark the second spot. Exactly halfway between those two marks is your True Center. When the string hits that center mark, those two feet are sitting on a perfectly Flat horizon.Once you have found the Machine’s Heart on your A-Frame—that center mark you proved with the flip-test—you aren’t just holding a level anymore; you are holding a key to a flat and level foundation. You can now perform the walk with your “Spirit Level”.To “walk” the level, you keep one foot pinned to the ground as a pivot point and swing the other foot forward, like a pair of giant compasses. If the string hits your center mark, those two points are level. Now, keep that new foot pinned and swing the back one forward to a third spot.If the string hits the mark again, you have successfully “carried” the truth from the first point to the third. You can walk this tool across a crooked foundation or a mile of uneven dirt, leap-frogging the feet as you go. Each step proves the next. By the time you reach the end, you haven’t just checked a spot—you have mapped a perfectly flat horizon through the chaos.A spirit level in your pocket can tell you if a brick is straight, but “walking the pad” tells you if the site is ready for the foundation. It’s the difference between seeing a truth and building one.Millions of dollars are spent on tools that a piece of string can ascertain for you. Tools take the work out of refiguring these basic principles. A carpenter’s square is a lot easier than pulling square the long-hand way, and that’s why we use them. Yes, tools are nice and lovely to have around, but the reason I say this is to impart the knowledge that if you have a piece of string, you may be more equipped than you first realized.The power isn’t in the string, but in the knowledge you possess. Don’t sell yourself short and always be searching for that piece of foundational knowledge. You never know when you may find you need it.
If this isn’t the Rabbit you’re looking for maybe we can connect you to the right one