Quick Craftsman tool set review... $185 309 pc. Mechanic's Tool Set

Here's my quick Craftsman tool set review:

I just received the Craftsman "309 pc. Mechanic's Tool Set". $199 sale price with an additional $15 coupon savings, $185 net. They claim this set has a "regular" price of $399, but the set is pretty much always on 'sale' for $249, dropping to $199 every once in a while.

I have primarily Snap-On tools in my main chest, but have plenty of older Craftsman stuff as backups. I wanted a pretty complete second set for our mountain cabin, and to fill in just a handful of sizes that have gone missing in my main box.

The Good:

• Country of Origin: With so much discussion lately about Sears moving manufacturing to China, I was pleased to see that every single tool in the collection was made in the USA, except for the ratcheting wrenches. Either stamped on the tool or in a bag that specified made in USA. Yes, the ratchets as well. Even the screwdriver bits, hex bits, and allen keys were marked USA. Definitely better than I expected.
• Wrench Upgrade: I'm not a big fan of the Craftsman raised panel wrenches... This set has Craftsman full polish ratcheting wrenches instead of the raised panels. I have a few sets of Gearwrench ratcheting wrenches as well, and these are very similar. Same tooth count on the ratchets, very similar finish quality, thickness, head shape, etc. The Craftsman's are a bit longer (probably out of the same factory). As listed in the 'bad' section, these are the only tools that do not say USA on the tool or the bag, and I'm assuming they are made in China. But honestly, I hate the Cman raised panel wrenches so much that I prefer (bite my tongue) these decent quality Chinese gear-wrench-like full wrenches to made in the USA raised panels...
• Hex Bits 3/8" drive: I use these quite a bit. Nice that they are included in the set, both metric and standard.
• Large socket assortment: 6 pt, 12 pt, deep, standard, metric, SAE. 201 sockets in all. As typical of Craftsman sets, they seem to randomly skip socket sizes. But there seems to be fewer missing sizes in this set than most others. It does **** that 'filling in' the missing sizes is difficult and somewhat expensive. Not a super big issue for me as this is a backup set anyway.
• Price: $185 is a pretty decent deal, especially for a (mostly) made in USA set. I don't think you could buy the same tools even in semi-decent Chinese quality (Husky, HF pro, Stanley, etc) for less.

The Bad:

• Not 100% made in the USA. The full polish ratcheting wrenches are not marked USA on the bag or on the tool, so I'm assuming they are Chinese. But as stated above, they seem to be the equal of gearwrench.
• Finish: These tools are definitely not works of art. Hard to tell how many of the chrome blemishes are due to manufacturing, or Sears just dumping everything into plastic bags. But I haven't spotted any functional defects, only cosmetic. I've seen so many people complain of deteriorating quality, so I pulled out a couple of my older craftsman sockets, many 8-10 years old. I didn't see any remarkable quality difference.
• Ratchets: Sears 'standard' raised panel ratchets were never all that great IMHO, even back in the days of the 'good ones'. Clunky shape, low tooth count, sharp edges. I pretty much despise them. I'll buy a set of HF composite ratchets to throw in with this set. I also ordered the gearwrench cushion handle teardrop 60 tooth ratchets that were on sale a few days ago. Clearly a Snap-on inspired design, no idea if they are any good.
• Some expected tools are not included: In a set with this many sockets, not having any universal joints, socket size adapters, or a few more sizes of extensions is unexpected. $34 to add a 4 socket size adapters and 3 universals??

The Stupid:

• Stupid 'set' offerings. I simply can not fathom why Sears offers 'sets' like they do. Craftsman has twenty different hand tool sets priced between $200 and $300, all with different crazy combinations of left-out and included tools. And the only way to really compare them is to pour over the .pdf tool sheets, which all seem to list the tools in a different order. Discounts and prices are all over the place. Wouldn't it be great if they had a tool set line like this:
  - Set A, includes all these great tools!
  - Set B, includes all of set A plus these!
  - Set C, includes all of set A & B, plus these!
  - Pro Set A. Includes all these tools, all wrenches and socket drivers full polish!
  - Pro Set B...
  - Pro Set C...
  - All metric set A...
  - All metric pro set A...
  You get the idea. I guess that would make too much sense. It seems like Sears takes their packaging/pricing queues from the cell phone and cable companies that offer constantly changing, nearly impossible to decipher, and erratically priced bundles.
• Stupid packaging. Sears really takes no pride whatsoever in how they deliver the tools to you. Jammed into plastic bags, often unmarked, rattling around against each other. No sort of organizational trays, even cheapo blow molded plastic ones.
• Stupid web site: The craftsman web site is terrible. You'd think a six billion dollar company could figure out how to create a decent on-line shopping site. It's not exactly like web shopping is cutting edge these days...

Were the ratchets US or China?

stricht8 said:

Were the ratchets US or China?

Click to expand...

Yes, the ratchets were marked USA. Every single item in the set, except for the 10 ratchet wrenches, was clearly marked on the tool or on the packaging 'Made in USA' or 'USA'.

I edited the original post to make this more clear.