3/8 or 1/2 drive

[AEAdam]

Awesome set up!

I agree with your thoughts regarding bit sockets.

You can currently get some, really quite acceptable, conventional sockets at reasonable cost. By “quite acceptable” I mean that they work reasonably well.

That just isn’t the case for bit sockets. The really cheap ones twist, deform, or simply break under quite moderate torque. They don’t fit well in the first place either!

I also agree with the general consensus advising Snap On, Hazet or KoKen. All are acceptable, though I would probably add Stahlwille to that list.

One other maker worthy of consideration is Wera. There are things I like and dislike about these, but interestingly, although Wera have the socket part of these tools made in Taiwan, the bit part is manufactured in the Czech republic.

I think I've watched all the socket and wrench comparison videos there are. One common trend I see is that the lower cost tools are typically not as HARD as the high end stuff. I can think of several reasons for this. But the bottom line is; precise heat treatment is more difficult and expensive than people think and you really do get what you pay for.

For some tools, impact sockets say, a softer socket will function fine and may even be beneficial. For 3/8" sockets, or larger sockets where contact patches are larger between the socket and the bolt head, a softer socket MAY perform acceptably, at least when it's new.

Bit sockets on the other hand....the business end needs to be harder than probably any other tool in your toolbox. These are really different animals from a strength of materials perspective.

My advice is that GJers should allow themselves to have a very different answers for bit sockets than chrome sockets, and impact sockets. I don't think a person is hypocritical for having, for example, Pittsburgh impacts, Tekton Chrome and Snap On bit sockets. That actually makes a lot of sense to me.

"Why should I buy fancy bit sockets, if all my other tools are value line Taiwan or China?" Hope I just explained why.

Just a logic extension, I think I'd say the exact same thing about combination wrenches. You can probably get away with inexpensive combos if you only use the box ends. It's the open end that separates combination wrenches. I suspect a lot of you never use your open ends. Until I upgraded, I never did either. There are only a few jobs that gave me trouble (tie-rods) and they ALWAYS gave me trouble.

 

[dchawk81]

I think I've watched all the socket and wrench comparison videos there are. One common trend I see is that the lower cost tools are typically not as HARD as the high end stuff. I can think of several reasons for this. But the bottom line is; precise heat treatment is more difficult and expensive than people think and you really do get what you pay for.

For some tools, impact sockets say, a softer socket will function fine and may even be beneficial. For 3/8" sockets, or larger sockets where contact patches are larger between the socket and the bolt head, a softer socket MAY perform acceptably, at least when it's new.

Bit sockets on the other hand....the business end needs to be harder than probably any other tool in your toolbox. These are really different animals from a strength of materials perspective.

My advice is that GJers should allow themselves to have a very different answers for bit sockets than chrome sockets, and impact sockets. I don't think a person is hypocritical for having, for example, Pittsburgh impacts, Tekton Chrome and Snap On bit sockets. That actually makes a lot of sense to me.

"Why should I buy fancy bit sockets, if all my other tools are value line Taiwan or China?" Hope I just explained why.

Just a logic extension, I think I'd say the exact same thing about combination wrenches. You can probably get away with inexpensive combos if you only use the box ends. It's the open end that separates combination wrenches. I suspect a lot of you never use your open ends. Until I upgraded, I never did either. There are only a few jobs that gave me trouble (tie-rods) and they ALWAYS gave me trouble.

I won't even argue against this. It makes perfect sense to me. Especially after cracking a cheap one off without much effort.

And I pretty much agree about the box vs open end on combo wrenches as well. I probably should have established that I'm almost exclusively a box end user. Even out of habit with the SO stuff. I actually had to buy SO in 15/16 for a particular application where only the open would work.

 

[AJHD]

The holder.

Mechanics Time Savers make plastic blocks with holes drilled or molded into them. Some of them aren't big enough to hold entire sets. So these would be ideal for a selection of most used sockets. I use them in this way sometimes.

You can buy these in different colors. For the scenario I suggested, you couldn't simply choose red for SAE and Black or gray for metric. Because in this case, you could have multiple metric sets, one for JIS cars, one for DIN, etc.

Got it? Its really not a great idea, as I said.



This might interest you:
When we moved to the UK, we had a house in the country with no garage. Just a damp gravel parking area. But that didn't stop me from working on my cars.

Lots of mechanics I knew there really liked the Blue Point blow molded socket cases. Like me, many didn't have nice garages to work in. Some would replace the BP tools with Snap On over time. They really liked the convenience of those cases.

So I bought heavy duty plastic boxes in the Container Store when I was home and took them over and fitted tools into them. I had multiple "kits". A 1/4" drive kit oriented toward interiors, a 3/8" drive kit with more engine bay tools, and a 1/2" kit with impacts and pry bars (but some stuff never fit and that was ok.).

I recently found these pics:


This is the 1/4" kit with metric shallows and semi deeps only. I had a couple BP bit sockets and some tiny ratchet wrenches which actually came in handy.



This is a little corner of the 3/8" kit. My torx sockets were out for some reason. The screwdrivers were just loose, I never created a fitted place for them, which was good enough. I was trying to color code the kits, red for 1/4" drive, yellow for 3/8" and orange for 1/2". That never really worked out exactly and I gave up on that.



These kits did come in handy. I didn't have to do tons to my cars there. But I was able to help my neighbors, which was nice. We didn't keep our house, but we still visit. I miss my friends in the UK.

I think you have shown that before. But I really like the setup. Keep it simple.