KRSC46 Starter box mods

[bfediuk]

Hello!
My son and I are just having some fun, building a tool collection for him (for home and/or future work) and thought we'd try out a mid size box (or large cart... whatever you might call it). The goal will be to use it as his main box, maximize the amount of tools that go in it, but be efficient, easy to use and easy to access the mostly used tools.

He's a 2nd year HET apprentice who doesn't currently need his own tools for work, but we thought we'd build this box to be used if he did need them. So for now the box will sit as a second tool box in my home shop. It will never leave the concrete pad, but it will have to move around as we juggle projects (it's a small shop).

We're starting with a KRSC46 as it seemed pretty "standard" and decent enough. Quite a few of them around too (We're in Alberta). We bought it used and it was stock except for an added side shelf (and included a cover)

A couple of planned mods (parts in hand!) are:
- Add a power bar
- Replace the straight casters with rotating ones (so all 4 rotate) to more easily park it wherever in the shop
- Add some shallower drawers to "double" increase storage area (I'm old school and love more shallow drawers)... may even remove the 8" drawer.

 

[mhejl]

Two 2" drawers and one set of slides will run you $500 (or more now). I added the shallow drawers to my KRSC pre-pandemic. You'll have to scrub the part #s from one of the same width cabs; they arn't listed in the KRSC parts list. SO lost my pre-2019 order history or I'd list them...

I'm glad I did! one shallow drawer is full of 1/4 and 3/8 ratchets and the other extensions and my most used screwdrivers.

Power bar: magnatic HF USG for $30 or so.

Four swivel casters are a PITA (I tried it on another box), no thanks.

Edit: sorry, I missed the "parts in hand". How much are the drawers now?

 

[rsparks64]

My tool boxes are on all swivel casters, but I don’t move them much so I don’t know if they are a pain in the *** as Mhejl suggests. I do have mulitple shelving units that are on swivel casters and I move those a lot. I like the mobility and ease of movement.

By the way, I think you need more decals and stickers in your garage.

 

[Tchicken]

I have been considering going with all swivel casters, how is that a PITA? I need mine to be able to move into a small parking spot on the garage wall like parallel parking - which I haven't figured out with two wheels locked up. I don't need it to travel far but precisely?

 

[bfediuk]

I have been considering going with all swivel casters, how is that a PITA? I need mine to be able to move into a small parking spot on the garage wall like parallel parking - which I haven't figured out with two wheels locked up. I don't need it to travel far but precisely?

This is exactly why we need to 4 swivels while it's in my shop.... needs to be able to get into where I want to park it.... often needs to go straight in against the wall.

 

[bfediuk]

My tool boxes are on all swivel casters, but I don’t move them much so I don’t know if they are a pain in the *** as Mhejl suggests. I do have mulitple shelving units that are on swivel casters and I move those a lot. I like the mobility and ease of movement.

By the way, I think you need more decals and stickers in your garage.

My big box has swivels and stationary.... you need a lot of room to put it where you want. With this little box, I want mobility!... I'll keep the stationary wheels for when my kid gets his own space or the box needs to be moved in a work place

 

[bfediuk]

Two 2" drawers and one set of slides will run you $500 (or more now). I added the shallow drawers to my KRSC pre-pandemic. You'll have to scrub the part #s from one of the same width cabs; they arn't listed in the KRSC parts list. SO lost my pre-2019 order history or I'd list them...

I'm glad I did! one shallow drawer is full of 1/4 and 3/8 ratchets and the other extensions and my most used screwdrivers.

Power bar: magnatic HF USG for $30 or so.

Four swivel casters are a PITA (I tried it on another box), no thanks.

Edit: sorry, I missed the "parts in hand". How much are the drawers now?

Not cheap for sure.... $240/drawer, $55 for slides.... call it $300 per drawer (these are CAD $)

Oh... and another $10 for the slide latch lock thing.... The trim is included.

I did just like you said too.... had to find the part number from another box. However, I ended up calling snap-on to get the right part number for that paint/trim combo. They (Snap-on) were super helpful.

Not something everyone would want to spend money on. I covered it for my kid because I thought it would be fun to experiment with it.... I'll share some insight on it in case others are interested in the same... although it looks like a lot of people want the deeper drawers... IDK

 

[tool_scrounge]

My big box has swivels and stationary.... you need a lot of room to put it where you want. With this little box, I want mobility!... I'll keep the stationary wheels for when my kid gets his own space or the box needs to be moved in a work place

Get the best of both worlds with caster wheels with locking swivels

 

[bfediuk]

ya I hear there are snap on casters (maybe from the epiq series) that are lockable swivels... and would bolt right on. (would also give a 1-2" lift)...

we did purchase a matching pair of swivel casters to the ones that are on the box already... but I think I want to get some lockable ones

 

[bfediuk]

So we started on some work on the box.

First task was to replace the fixed casters with swivel casters. Used a jack to just lift the box up a bit... so we didn't have to lay the box down. This is a 15min job.

Interesting that the 2 casters I ordered from snap-on have the same part number, and both work, but look quite a bit different. One of them is VERY similar to the 2 on the box already.... big brake and big brake engagement "pedal", and the mounting flange has round corners. The other one has a smaller almost hidden brake (behind the frame of the caster) and the mounting plate has sharp corners (similar to the fixed casters we removed. This is annoying to me, but still perfectly useable.

 

[HolyMacaroni]

I'd get the SO power bar, and bolt a creeper hanger to the side opposite the handle.

 

[bfediuk]

Now on to the drawers.

For anyone who has modified the drawers OR added drawer slides in, they have found out that in order to put the drawer slides in EVERY slot, you actually need to start with the lowest set of slides first, then work your way up. You'll find you can't just add the new slides in between two existing ones (when they only have one spare slot between them... such as what we were starting with)

The one picture shows my son taking out the existing ones (which were installed in every second slot) and then the other picture shows a slide installed in every spot (installed from the bottom, up)

 

[bfediuk]

Prepping the drawers to put them in is a little harder, as the slider rails that go on the drawers are a tighter fit.... it just takes more force to snap them in. You'll know they're fully in when the hole in the slider (near the front of the drawer) lines up with the hole in the drawer.

We had 2 that we used a large flat screwdriver to help pry into the final position. The rest of them we could do by hand (again, with a lot of force for most of them)

 

[bfediuk]

I'd get the SO power bar, and bolt a creeper hanger to the side opposite the handle.

Ah yes... we did the SO power bar... more expensive than a generic thing, but like that it bolts in perfectly.

and as for a creeper hanger... we do like that idea, but the box has a fold out shelf on the other side, so we'll have to decide what we want to do with that. We like having the shelf.

 

[bfediuk]

My son decided he wanted one thin drawer on top (for miscellaneous, small things) of the socket drawer. My advice was put the socket drawer as high as you can because you have miscellaneous space in the box top (under the flip top)

But because we doubled up the slides on the socket drawer, and there are slides in every slot, it's very easy to swap the location of the socket drawer and all of the thin drawers....

Also swapped out the big (8") bottom drawer for 2, 4" drawers. We'll hang on to the big one in case he finds he needs something deeper

 

[HolyMacaroni]

One thing I will say is that I would only get generic tools as his needs will vary depending on what shop he is at.