Anybody else here that loves tools...?

I can't see the advantage of the Koken socket either, other than it's thicker walled, but this is going to cause access problems surely?
 
Tools do nothing for me, they are things that other people use, I come from the Homer Simpson school of tool work. Simply tightening a screw will cause an explosion, hitting a nail will cause a huge explosion and power tools will usually end up in deaths or at least major power cuts across several square miles.
 
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Halfords Pro user here. Can't beat being able to wonder into any local Halfords if you break something. Lifetime guarantee and good quality for the money. In fact, anyone that says you need better quality I'd disagree with.
 
I have access to all my dads stash of tools., mainly kamasa,britool,facom stuff, Ive added to that with the Halfords pro stuff. Anoyingly now tho my dad only buys cheap crap, bloody old people:p

Ive seen the comment about 6 sided sockets before, and I dont really understand, Im fairly competant with a spanner, but im not a pro by any stretch of the imagination.

Why is 6 better than a 12 sided socket, I always (wrongly it seems) thought that 12 would give more grip?
 
Jonny69 said:
I can't see the advantage of the Koken socket either, other than it's thicker walled, but this is going to cause access problems surely?
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I don't think it really has thicker walls; if you look closely it's been sectioned through the "peaks" rather than the "troughs" of the drive points.
 
wohoo said:
I have access to all my dads stash of tools., mainly kamasa,britool,facom stuff, Ive added to that with the Halfords pro stuff. Anoyingly now tho my dad only buys cheap crap, bloody old people:p

Ive seen the comment about 6 sided sockets before, and I dont really understand, Im fairly competant with a spanner, but im not a pro by any stretch of the imagination.

Why is 6 better than a 12 sided socket, I always (wrongly it seems) thought that 12 would give more grip?
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Hard to explain without really experiencing it yourself. Essentially, pretend it was possible to have a "useable" socket with over 100 "sides" it would obviously be practically a circle internally. i.e. There are so many "sides" they are hard to even make out as sides and it seems internally almost like a smooth circular socket. This would obviously provide poor grip on the corner pieces or each side of the nut you were trying to grip (the bits it comes into contact with) as such a small area of the nut and socket are touching/gripping.
In such situations as this, even with a 12 sided socket, sometimes on stubborn nuts/bolts the socket can literally slip and keep turning past the edges/corners of the sides of the nut/bolt or whatever you are turning.

If you can imagine the other simple extreme. Say you had a 6 sided nut, and a 6 sided socket both 10mm. There is no better alternative. The socket perfectly aligns its sides to the sides of the nut and maximizes its contact/grip/friction on it as shape to shape, it aligns and is a very strong "bond" if you like.

Or another analogy. Imagine trying to undo a triangular shaped nut with a "normal" hexagonal socket. Would be pretty poor as would only grip at the 3 extreme corners of the triangle assuming you got the right sized socket. Best to get a proper triangular shaped socket.

Hope I explained that well. Not to say that those types of sockets ar ebad, they are convenient as they maximize the chance of finding a socket that fits odd sizes all be it not always perfectly.
 
Yup big tool fan here . Have a mixture of new Halfords Pro and Kamasa and old school Britool/snapon etc . Cant wait for xmas day as my dad has been tool hunting for the last year and i have about 12 heavy tool shaped things under the tree .

While rebuilding my lads Bike it was an exscuse to buy more tools . So new 6-40 torque wrench . Uni clutch tool . Tap and die set (metric) and other various bits and bobs . :)

Persil
 
jaybee said:
Halfords Pro user here. Can't beat being able to wonder into any local Halfords if you break something. Lifetime guarantee and good quality for the money. In fact, anyone that says you need better quality I'd disagree with.
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Breaking a tool midway through a job is a major inconvenience, having to stop what you're doing, clean up, go out to Halfords to get your broken tool replaced is a pain especially if your car is in pieces. I'd much rather it didn't break in the first place than have a free replacement when it does. Good quality tools used properly won't break.
 
kaiowas said:
Breaking a tool midway through a job is a major inconvenience, having to stop what you're doing, clean up, go out to Halfords to get your broken tool replaced is a pain especially if your car is in pieces. I'd much rather it didn't break in the first place than have a free replacement when it does. Good quality tools used properly won't break.
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To be honest, I've only ever had 2 Halfords things break and both were through misuse. A step down adapter where I was putting way too much torque through it using a big wrench. And a ratchet mechanism in one of my ratchets because I found out ofter a weekend of lending tools to a mate he was pulling the sockets off as hard as he could till they came off, rather than pressing the release button on top of the ratchet in and letting them fall off :eek:
 
jaybee said:
Hard to explain without really experiencing it yourself. Essentially, pretend it was possible to have a "useable" socket with over 100 "sides" it would obviously be practically a circle internally. i.e. There are so many "sides" they are hard to even make out as sides and it seems internally almost like a smooth circular socket. This would obviously provide poor grip on the corner pieces or each side of the nut you were trying to grip (the bits it comes into contact with) as such a small area of the nut and socket are touching/gripping.
In such situations as this, even with a 12 sided socket, sometimes on stubborn nuts/bolts the socket can literally slip and keep turning past the edges/corners of the sides of the nut/bolt or whatever you are turning.

If you can imagine the other simple extreme. Say you had a 6 sided nut, and a 6 sided socket both 10mm. There is no better alternative. The socket perfectly aligns its sides to the sides of the nut and maximizes its contact/grip/friction on it as shape to shape, it aligns and is a very strong "bond" if you like.

Or another analogy. Imagine trying to undo a triangular shaped nut with a "normal" hexagonal socket. Would be pretty poor as would only grip at the 3 extreme corners of the triangle assuming you got the right sized socket. Best to get a proper triangular shaped socket.

Hope I explained that well. Not to say that those types of sockets ar ebad, they are convenient as they maximize the chance of finding a socket that fits odd sizes all be it not always perfectly.
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That is literally the most complicated way of saying 12-sided sockets are prone to rounding off really stuck nuts and bolts :D

6-sided get a better grip and some of the good ones have the corners rounded out so they can even go over a very mangled nut and undo it with no problem.
 
Jonny69 said:
That is literally the most complicated way of saying 12-sided sockets are prone to rounding off really stuck nuts and bolts :D

6-sided get a better grip and some of the good ones have the corners rounded out so they can even go over a very mangled nut and undo it with no problem.
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I do try! ;)

Merry Xmas
 
I love to use my screwdriver sockets ratchet etc etc , therefore I HATE the tooless design cases , and I have eliminated already all the PCI and 5,25 Bay flimsy STUPID tooless design plastics and installed screws instead


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I got a bad obsession with buying tools.. Even worse is i buy Snap On.. So loads of money! Ill see if i got a pic of my toolbox
 
kaiowas said:
Breaking a tool midway through a job is a major inconvenience, having to stop what you're doing, clean up, go out to Halfords to get your broken tool replaced is a pain especially if your car is in pieces. I'd much rather it didn't break in the first place than have a free replacement when it does. Good quality tools used properly won't break.
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Whereas when you break a snapon tool you've got to wait 4 days for the bugger to show up with his van!
 
I don't have the need/space for a decent stash but got a halfords pro socket set and a toolbox filled with odds and sods I've collected over the last year or two.

Most recent addition was a set of screwdrivers. Needed 1 to crack open the chrsitmas tree light unit to replace a bulb and didn't have one that'd fit. So a trip to halfords, a single screwdriver was 3.49 or a set of 8 was 9 quid so went with the 8 :)
 
I love my Snap-on stuff, I like going on a tool binge, which is probably what will happen with my Christmas money. None of them are used on cars however.
 
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