Tool Time !!

[papabug71]

I love my old tools. Some of them are grandpaws & great grandpaws old tools. Grandpaw had a large collection of vintage "BE" Craftsman sockets, as well as a full set of Plomb sockets & ratchets. Great stuff. 90% of my sockets are from the early 40's. I have ratchets from 1932 all the way up to modern & a bunch in between.

I'll buy an old junk ratchet & track down parts to rebuild it rather than buy a new one. It's a hobby of mine & it's very rewarding. Been doing it for a while now. I wish I had before pics of the 1932 Duro ratchet. I found it laying in the scrap pile at the inlaws ranch. God only knows how long it had been there. It was so rusted up I had to give it a electrolysis bath. It works like a charm. Goes to show you how well stuff was built back then.

Im a big fan of Plomb tools. If you're not familiar with this brand, Plomb became Proto in 1949. Real Plomb tools make Snap-On of the same vintage look like Dollar Store tools!!

Here are a few I've collected & rebuilt:

1946 Plomb 1/2" drive. This is my go-to ratchet for anything requiring 1/2" drive.



1932 Duro 1/2" drive with provisions for both male and female drive. Only 18 teeth in this monster! CLICK-CLICK-CLICK



Go-to ratchet for 3/8's stuff: 1960's era S/K





Grandpaws Craftsman box. Plum full of vintage Craftsman, Plomb, Huskey, Duro, Snap-On, Proto, Indestro, S/K, JH Williams, New Britian & so many others:

[Bullitt390]

Nice!

I absolutely love SK. I definately got that from my dad seeing all the green SK tin cases in his collection growing up. I have a sizeable collection of ratchets and wrenches, but my go to 3/8 and 1/2 ratchets are John Deere flex handles. Love those ratchets.

Josh

[papabug71]

Yup, I have a load of old S/K stuff. Good thing about them is their ratches didn't change much from the 30's all the way up to today & you can still get rebuild kits for ratchets from the 30's !

I have a 1947 Snap-On F-70 ratchet & the only part I need is the one Snap-On no longer makes. (the backing plate). You don't have to worry about that with S/K.

[Bullitt390]

I have never been a fan of Snap-On. Probably has more to do with wanting to be different than follow the crowd. Of course the SO, MAC and Matco guys aren't too sure what to make of me when they make their rounds thru the shop. I have no problem with my Craftsman chests and SK tools.

Also it's fun laughing at the schmucks that come thru our shop having to lose half their paychecks to the Snap-On trucks for payments. Then their bitchin' they have to worl so hard and have so little money. Oh well.

Most of my SK is Facom era, followed by Dresser era. I have a few of the SK-Wayne wrenches. Very little Triangle SK stuff. I warrantied 3 40170 ratchets during the post Stanley/Facom era and a handfull of sockets. They look great and work fine.

Nothing from this new IDEAL era.

SK ratchets are hard to beat and still servicable, not many companies can claim that.

When you look for older stuff do you scrounge thru Flea Markets or eBay?

Josh

[papabug71]

Right on man! Most of my stuff is pre Facom. I have a little of everything, Diamond logo, Dresser era & Symington-Wayne era stuff. The S/K Wayne tools are kinda sought after by hard core S/K fans, as they were only branded "S/K Wayne" from 1962 to 1969.

I look all over for tools. Flea markets, garage sales, antique stores, ebay, you name it. But the best places i've hit for old tools has by far been the local mom & pop pawn shops. Most of them have bins & bins of old tools to go thru. Cheap too.

The antique stores on the other hand, not so cheap. They think just because a ratchet or wrench is rusted up beyond recognition, it's automatically worth $50 bucks. I've just started boycotting the antique stores. Everything they have is junk anyways, & if it's not rebuildable, I don't want it.

[Bullitt390]

Headed over to some flea markets Saturday and the SK Tool flu hit and I snagged some totally uneeded SK Wayne 5/8, 11/16, 3/4, 13/16 and a big 1 7/16" wrench.

After looking over most of my ratchets and sockets, I believe they are mostly the Dresser period, except some 1/2" ratchets that were warrantied around 2008. I thought Facom was around 1980, but it seems it began 1985. All my 1/2" sockets I aquired from my dad and he likely bought them between 1976-1982.

Between my garage tools and shop tools I have no Diamond SK branded stuff. Thought I did.

Josh

[crazyhorse]

This is very interesting.
Thanks for posting this.
Where do you get the rebuild kits?

[Bullitt390]

This is very interesting.
Thanks for posting this.
Where do you get the rebuild kits?

If you're referring to SK, either visit a store that carries SK or call SK directly and they will send out kits free of charge. The main store I use for SK (Big R in Greeley, Colorado) will usually just swap out the whole ratchet, but if it's Wayne or Triangle it's better tohang on to those.

Tri_State in Longmont just closed their doors. Almost 100% SK products, but with the jerking around they got they had to close.

Josh

[averagef250]

That's some pretty cool info!

I love nice old tools. I have 40+ 1/2" ratchets I've accumulated and quite a few are old Snap-on and Craftsman, a few SK and Armstrong. I have almost every size socket by 1/16's through 3.5", mostly old Armstrong and always keep an eye out for old Armstrong box/open wrenches larger than an inch and big hook spanners (they really come in handy when you need them).

One of my favorite tools, something I've used every day for 10+ years is a 30" Plomb crowbar I call the "Crocodile bar" It looks exactly like a crocodile on one end with an open mouth and the other has a serrated flat that comes to a fine point. That bar is always the right tool for giving something a little nudge or tweak and man is it tough. I had no idea Plumb was gone in 1949. That dashes all my hopes of buying another one of these bars if I ever wear it out.

Another cool old thing I picked up was a skilled tool and die makers Gerstner box originally from 1943 with a 1943 Machinist handbook in it. The box is kinda like an answer box for me. If I get stuck scratching my head about a setup or need a small tool or cutter to machine something out of the ordinary there's a good chance that box has the answer inside. It has countless custom cutters, hundreds of core pins, shims and misc. bits and pieces left over from a lifetime of precision work. I paid $75 for it. I didn't even look in it when I bought it, just new what it was and that it was full. After I had it for awhile I thought how sad it was that nobody cared about that box.

[papabug71]

crazyhorse, the info Bullitt390 posted for getting rebuild kits is spot on for S/K. You can get them off ebay every know & then also. As for the Plomb ratchets, Proto still makes the "pear head" ratchets & the rebuild kits will fit the 40's era rats with a little tweeking.


Dustin, I figured you had some of the Plomb 3/4" & 1" drive stuff. They called them "big bertha" drives. Plomb marketed them under this name. They're supposed to be in demand with heavy diesel mechanics. They fetch pretty good coin on ebay. Look thru the Proto Professional website for a replacement bar when the time comes. I bet they still make them, but they won't hold a candle to the old Plomb bar.

The Plomb name was gone in 1949, but the tools were still made under the PROTO brand. Proto was bought out by Ingersol Rand in the 60's, then in '84 Stanley accquired Proto & still market what's left of Plomb/Proto under the "Proto Professional" brand.

This is the best site on the net for hand tools. Have a look. Shows brand history, how to date code, lots & lots of pics:

http://home.comcast.net/~alloy-artifacts/

[Bullitt390]

Dustin, I figured you had some of the Plomb 3/4" & 1" drive stuff. They called them "big bertha" drives. Plomb marketed them under this name. They're supposed to be in demand with heavy diesel mechanics.

That was right up my alley. I was a heavy mechanic for several years, no way can one survive without 3/4 and 1 inch drives. I used 3/4 drive SK, Craftsman and even Harbor Freight ratchets. Sadly I have never broken the CM or HF, yet I broke the guts on the SK. Rebuild kit and the SK was all and good. The 1" ratchet is embarrasingly a Harbor Freight and I cannot break it.

I have used it to break loose excavator hydraulic cylinder piston nuts with a 10 foot breaker bar and two guys hanging on the end.

Although I would do that by myself with the 3/4 ratchets as well.

Now I just weld all day, inside a halfway warm shop, out of the elements.

Josh

[hdpusher]

I love to old stuff too. My wife and I hit the flea markets every weekend to do some "treasure hunting" There are a lot of good tools availiable if you know what to look for. Alloy Artifacts is an amazing site for information on tools. I have also rebuilt several old ratchets some with rebuild kits and some without. I ve made several parts over the years to keep those old tools going.

A little tip take a small fine file and clean up the teeth on the ratchets. It works like stoning a trigger on a hand gun. You can really smooth the action of the ratchet but keep in mind you can go to far.

[Bullitt390]

I figured with all my jawing, I better post some pics of my own.

My SK stable at home. 3/8 SK-Wayne, 1/2" Dresser period, 2- 1/2" Long handle Employee Owned Period ratchets, 1/2" Breaker Bar Dresser Period. I hardly have any 1/4 drive SK items... I better get working on that



My goto ratchet front and center. Deere 3/8" long handle flex head. It wouldn't be too hard to say it easily has 3000+ hours of use. It's "replacement" has hardly seen much use. 1/2" Deere ratchet has also been used and abused. Standard Deere 1/2" Teardrop in back. All made in USA before Deere cheaped out and moved some items to Taiwan.



Josh

[Bullitt390]

More SK porn...



I was actually a little surprised out of my plethora of 3/8 and 1/2 inch chrome ratchets, chrome sockets impact sockets, wrenches, SK Pro Gun impact wrench, plus screwdrivers etc... I hardly have any 1/4 inch SK stuff.

On a whim stopped by a pawn shop and badda bing picked up a 1/4 ratchet. surprised a little how much shorter it is compared to my Craftsman and other assorted ratchets.

Josh

[cowbay]

Very cool pics. I myself have been craftsman over the years. Never let me down, price not so bad, they always change out something with no problems when they break