Long C Craftsman Ratchets - Survey help needed:

[baldytooltime]

I feel Alloy Artifacts should present the Storms Drop Forge trademark with as thousands of their ratchets were produced and used during this World War 2 industrial period with the Serifs S vs the loopy Japanese S

 

[four.cycle]

distinctively different:


Showa Drop Forge (left)
Page Storms / Storms Drop Forge (right)

 

[Private Lugnutz]

@baldytooltime
Not sure what prompted you to do a chronological rundown of your Craftsman Costello patent era rats on an older, archived survey thread (note that the original survey was almost immediately suspended when Outlaw got the answer the survey was intended to help solve, and the second survey was a spawn looking just at variants with date codes), but, first of all, Nice collection!..., and secondly, I am happy to see that most of it jibes with the major variant sequence I summarized on page 1 of this thread...

For brevity, in sequence:
- long lever with "Frankenstein" buttons and a fully knurled handle
- long lever without "Frankenstein" buttons and a fully knurled handle
- short thumb lever with three-banded knurled handle.

Not sure what you mean by saying that the "Frankie" button mods were....

...relatively close to the patent...

...though.

If you mean "close" to the submission of the application, maybe. But note that ALL three (3) major variants of the Costello ratchet had to have happened in very short succession (in only two and a half production years!) from the time the patent was applied for (December 1937) to the time it was granted (in July 1940), because the October 1940 catalog - introducing the ratchet - shows the last variant, as I also noted on page 1!

We still don't know why NB never stamped a patent on any variants, to include all the ratchets they made during WWII and right up to the time they started using the Fors patent, which was right around the same time Sears, Roebuck & Co transitioned away from NB to MDF, but none of these ratchets ever bore the Costello patent number or date, as far as I have seen.

There were a few things that caught my eye.

This is one:

First New Britain had the contract for sockets and sub contracted VLCHEK to provide the ratchet.

Do you have any documentation for that?! While Vlchek was indeed making ratchets for Craftsman in the mid 1930's, with "BT" codes (like other Vlchek 3rd party Craftsman tools), they didn't look like that, I don't recall hearing or seeing anyone identify that ratchet as Vlchek, or state that NB was using Vlchek as a sub. That's not a challenge. Maybe everyone knows that and it's just a blind spot for me on the topic.

And this is another:

They didn’t want the same tool with someone else’s name on it.

I think uniqueness was definitely part of the decision-making equation. But I don't think it was the driving force.

My theory, and I have talked about before on other threads, including the "Long C" thread, can be summed up in three initials I use a lot as a wartime collector: WPB! It stands for War Production Board. The WPB was essentially FDR's governmental War Machine. All materials purchased for the war came through the WPB. Do you know who the chairman of the WPB was from 1942 to 1944, the most crucial years of the war, when the war was essentially won? Donald Marr Nelson (1888–1959). Prior to that position, from 1941 to 1942, he was the Director of Priorities of the United States Office of Production Management. The OPM was name of the WPB before we declared war. Prior to that he was... Executive Vice President of Sears, Roebuck, & Company! That's right, the man leading the agency most responsible for our victory in WWII, was the brains behind Sears in the 1930's up through 1941.

After dealing with all the many suppliers Craftsman used and then all the many suppliers the various services and technical branches used during the war, and the barely contained chaos that was, I believe he may have been convinced that a sole-source contract was more efficient.

Note the SDF logo on alloy artifact is a Japanese tool maker Showa Drop Forge trademark 1942.

I'm not sure why we're talking about this. As far as I know, AA never confuses the Showa Drop Forge logo with the monograph @baldytooltime is identifying as Storms Drop Forge. As far as I know, AA doesn't have any Storms Drop Forge monograph in their Page-Storms section or in their list of logos and TM's. Maybe I missed it.

Distinctively different:

Who says they're the same?

 

[baldytooltime]

The micro ball bearing selector definitely shows that the 1940 & on ratchets were derived off the Costello patent. If you look at the pictures all that was changed to go from the “franky” bolt version was remove the bolt and drop the sides for the thumb. I do believe they kept Pat. Pend. To keep the production running. And yes I think things were lax during once bombs dropped on US soil in 1941. I have several Sears ads with all kinds of bogus ratchets at the time. I honestly don’t think that they can be used as a credible timeline source. I thing my approach using engineering changes to the tool may not set a timeline but set a chronological order. The gist of my ratchets article was New Britain was using forges it didn’t own and they (Storms Drop Forge) did such a good job and Moore promised to continue using his forges and dedicate them to craftsman. No one has brought this up to my knowledge.

 

[Private Lugnutz]

The micro ball bearing selector definitely shows that the 1940 & on ratchets were derived off the Costello patent. If you look at the pictures all that was changed to go from the “franky” bolt version was remove the bolt and drop the sides for the thumb

? Are we misunderstanding each other? I agree. Again, all three of the major Costello variants I defined in chronological order in the summary I posted on page 1, which I just re-posted above, were made in 2-1/2 years, between 1938 and 1940, and then the third was made throughout the 40's. I'm agreeing w/ you, or you're agreeing w/ me, and helpfully showing very nice examples!

I do believe they kept Pat. Pend. To keep the production running

I agree. No re-tooling/re-dieing.

I thing my approach using engineering changes to the tool may not set a timeline but set a chronological order.

They clearly do, it's a chronology that agrees with mine, and provides more nuance than my summary.

The gist of my ratchets article was New Britain was using forges it didn’t own and they (Storms Drop Forge) did such a good job and Moore promised to continue using his forges and dedicate them to craftsman. No one has brought this up to my knowledge.

I'm no help to you on that. I don't pay too much deep attention to anything much past WWII. You could search the Long C thread on 'Moore' or 'MDF' or 'Storms' perhaps. I think it's common knowledge that mfgrs used foundries and forges. I'm not sure I knew that NB was using MDF. And I definitely don't remember seeing or hearing that the 'SDF' monograph on NB-made Craftsman ratchets signifies 'Storms Drop Forge.' Do you have something that shows that?

You didn't answer my question on Vlchek as a sub to NB for that early pre-Costell Crafty rat. If you have anything on that, I'd like to see it.

 

[baldytooltime]

No I don’t - just the design of the vertical selector is a VLCHECK design and the handle looks like the early new Husky factory female ratchet thick handle designs. So from a “speculative” viewpoint that ratchet was a vlchek design made in a New Britain owned Husky factory. There was a level of cooperation between the 2 until then then New Britain could finally design their own ratchet to go with their own sockets not use or subcontract someone else. Enter the Costello Franky ratchet. Only two frankys I can find Circle H and Husky. Both made at the Kenosha Wisconsin factory. They kept toying with design, then New Britain sub contracted with Moore (Moore Forges-Pun intended) so they continued this sub contracting policy to handle the tremendous forging required. It backfired on them as Moore took over the contract and had built up his capacity so he didn’t have to sub contract out. Single source but also single name and distinct.

 

[baldytooltime]

New Britain should have acquired Moore, but their pattern of operation was to sub contract and then acquire when subcontractor could not meet contract commitments or goes thru bankrupt.

 

[Private Lugnutz]

No I don’t - just the design of the vertical selector is a VLCHECK design and the handle looks like the early new Husky factory female ratchet thick handle designs.

Thanks.

 

[baldytooltime]

I think a lot of forgers sub contracted. Way more than we want to admit. I wish more would have put their forge mark regardless (Williams did a good job of this - others did not) so it’s hard to compartmentalize who made what. I think I’ve provided hard (tool) proof that the circle H and HUSKY ratchets were not made exclusively at the Husky factory and that New Britain sub contracted to Moore / Storms Drop Forge.