Ratchet.
Well-known member
Not sure whether this will be of interest to anyone, but as there is a thread on Britool, I though some might like to see some tools from one of the more obscure old British tool manufacturers, one which has been mostly forgotten these days.
Garringtons forging works, who were a large company manufacturing parts for the auto industry etc up until the 70s or 80's and made very nice hand tools, mainly wrenches and adjustables
Most of their tool lines were named after birds, Kestrel was their standard double box wrench, Wren used the same size ends but had a shortened shank, for use on cars etc, Merlin was their double open end wrench, and Jackdaw was an adjustable.
There are many other types including ratchets and socket sets (possibly made for them by another company), but the above are by far the most common, along with the tools they made for Jaguar car tool kits
As with most older UK made tools the vast majority seem to have been made for BSW/whitworth sizes, but they made SAE/AF, although they turn up far less often,
A few photos of some of my Garringtons tools, I have some others but didn't have them to hand.
Helpfully they put date stamps on most of their production, the kestrel wrench is marked with 8/50, august 1950 i guess, and the adjustable is later, being marked 8/55, the wren doesn't have any date marking, but seems to be far later judging by the polished chrome finish, and the refinements to the design.
They are very nicely made, sadly don't get used that often being whitworth, though the adjustable does, and is on par quality wise with my old Bahco wrenches
Bit of the history of the company here: http://www.historywebsite.co.uk/articles/Darlaston/Garringtons.htm
Anyone else got some garrington tools? I'm not sure if they made it across to the USA, or even Europe, other then in the toolkits of jaguars i guess
Garringtons forging works, who were a large company manufacturing parts for the auto industry etc up until the 70s or 80's and made very nice hand tools, mainly wrenches and adjustables
Most of their tool lines were named after birds, Kestrel was their standard double box wrench, Wren used the same size ends but had a shortened shank, for use on cars etc, Merlin was their double open end wrench, and Jackdaw was an adjustable.
There are many other types including ratchets and socket sets (possibly made for them by another company), but the above are by far the most common, along with the tools they made for Jaguar car tool kits
As with most older UK made tools the vast majority seem to have been made for BSW/whitworth sizes, but they made SAE/AF, although they turn up far less often,
A few photos of some of my Garringtons tools, I have some others but didn't have them to hand.
Helpfully they put date stamps on most of their production, the kestrel wrench is marked with 8/50, august 1950 i guess, and the adjustable is later, being marked 8/55, the wren doesn't have any date marking, but seems to be far later judging by the polished chrome finish, and the refinements to the design.
They are very nicely made, sadly don't get used that often being whitworth, though the adjustable does, and is on par quality wise with my old Bahco wrenches
Bit of the history of the company here: http://www.historywebsite.co.uk/articles/Darlaston/Garringtons.htm
Anyone else got some garrington tools? I'm not sure if they made it across to the USA, or even Europe, other then in the toolkits of jaguars i guess
