NateHiggins
Member
So I got this wrench at a shop in New Hampshire, and finally got around to doing some research on it. Its a Coes wrench, which is fairly common around here in New England, and generally marked as just "Coes Wrench Co" (I've got a few of em, mostly made, from what I gather, in the mid 30's-40's)
This humungous wrench, however, is marked "A.G. Coes & Co".
According to the Davidstown museum (the forum wont let me post links it seems), A.G. Coes & Co only made wrenches from 1869-1881. Unless they used an old stamp after the merger into the later Coes company, that'd mean this wrench was probably made in that time period, no?
My doubt about it actually being that old are mostly due to the lack of pitting on the metal and the condition of the wood. Unless it was re-handled or kept somewhere warm and dry for the past century or so, I would have expected it to be more than just dry and cracked. It could have easily been rehandled, however.
The only other markings are "Y. & D.M. SHOP, nicely stamped onto the lower jaw, and "DEC" crudely stamped with I assume a center punch on the upper jaw. I assume it was owned at some point by a shop somewhere in New England, and maybe owned by someone with the initials "D.E.C."
I usually rehandle the wrenches I restore, but I lack the tools required to make a new round handle like this, and I'm not entirely sure I'd even want to if its really that old.
Thoughts? I think its a neat wrench either way, but more insight on when exactly this thing was made would be interesting.
This humungous wrench, however, is marked "A.G. Coes & Co".
According to the Davidstown museum (the forum wont let me post links it seems), A.G. Coes & Co only made wrenches from 1869-1881. Unless they used an old stamp after the merger into the later Coes company, that'd mean this wrench was probably made in that time period, no?
My doubt about it actually being that old are mostly due to the lack of pitting on the metal and the condition of the wood. Unless it was re-handled or kept somewhere warm and dry for the past century or so, I would have expected it to be more than just dry and cracked. It could have easily been rehandled, however.
The only other markings are "Y. & D.M. SHOP, nicely stamped onto the lower jaw, and "DEC" crudely stamped with I assume a center punch on the upper jaw. I assume it was owned at some point by a shop somewhere in New England, and maybe owned by someone with the initials "D.E.C."
I usually rehandle the wrenches I restore, but I lack the tools required to make a new round handle like this, and I'm not entirely sure I'd even want to if its really that old.
Thoughts? I think its a neat wrench either way, but more insight on when exactly this thing was made would be interesting.
