Vulcan tools

[ToyMeKaNeK]

As I remember from that area, the the Chevy forge plant was on Vulcan. The Tonawanda engine plant that is.

 

[Kev442]

Was whacking away today and noticed the hammer says "Vulcan Dynamic" on it. I am unsure it is the same Vulcan as these Williams tools, seems there was a Kelly manufacturing and they produced the same hammer for True Temper.
Pretty confusing!

 

[MikeTheGoalie]

My dad had a ton of Vulcan tools. I even have a tool box that I ended up painting. It was my dads for years and he gave it to me when I moved into my first house. Since he has passed and I'll pretty much give this to my son.

 

[t4runner]

We had a Cornwell dealer who sold Vulcan tools it was some time in the mid to late 70's. The only Vulcan tools I got from him was a set of torx drivers.

 

[chris fresh]

Just to add a little something to this thread,VULCAN TOOL related,here my new to me floor jack.Air over hydro,as of right now it's broken down and next in the line up for being completely restored back to brand new original condition.

I haven't found one picture of this jack,have no idea of capacity,have no idea what year.Yes i'm finding Vulcan anything is rare,pictures,info,everything.

I also have many more pictures of the break down and soon to have restored pics if anyone needs.

 

[Exceller8]

I just picked up a 1" Vulcan wrench that is really nice. I believe that mine is made by Cornwell. I would really like to complete a set because they're quality and they're unusual. Should I even bother? There seems to be little information on them and ebay only turns up the ones made by Williams. How rare are the Cornwell made Vulcan's?

 

[Exceller8]

I just picked up a 1" Vulcan wrench that is really nice. I believe that mine is made by Cornwell. I would really like to complete a set because they're quality and they're unusual. Should I even bother? There seems to be little information on them and ebay only turns up the ones made by Williams. How rare are the Cornwell made Vulcan's?

Anyone?

 

[jim keris]

I have some Vulcan flare nut wrenches. My brother in-law used to sell Vulcan pavement breaking tips for jackhammers

 

[rallenc]

Anyone?

Never realized that Vulcan was at one time made by Cornwell. I always thought they were a line of Williams.

I believe that the Williams address in Buffalo was on Vulcan Street, hence the name.

As to Vulcan, I've only seen a very few in my many years of flea marketing, and never sets.

 

[Exceller8]

Never realized that Vulcan was at one time made by Cornwell. I always thought they were a line of Williams.

I believe that the Williams address in Buffalo was on Vulcan Street, hence the name.

As to Vulcan, I've only seen a very few in my many years of flea marketing, and never sets.

I'll try and post a picture of my wrench tomorrow.

 

[Knucklebuster17]

Hi, I am new to this forum, but I saw this thread and decided to post. I have an 11 Drawer Vulcan tool chest full of about 95% Vulcan tools that I have been using for about 40 years now. Awesome tools I would match against any hand tool out there. 1/4" 3/8" 1/2" drive ratchets, sockets, extensions and breaker bars. Combination wrenches 3/8" to 15/16", angle wrenches 3/8" to 1 1/4". Some but not all have the Vulcan and Williams trademark on them. I have an 18" adjustable. 24" straight blade heavy duty screw driver. 12" & 18" 1/2" drive ratchets.

 

[Lookin4'67Galaxieconv]

Hi, I am new to this forum, but I saw this thread and decided to post. I have an 11 Drawer Vulcan tool chest full of about 95% Vulcan tools that I have been using for about 40 years now. Awesome tools I would match against any hand tool out there. 1/4" 3/8" 1/2" drive ratchets, sockets, extensions and breaker bars. Combination wrenches 3/8" to 15/16", angle wrenches 3/8" to 1 1/4". Some but not all have the Vulcan and Williams trademark on them. I have an 18" adjustable. 24" straight blade heavy duty screw driver. 12" & 18" 1/2" drive ratchets.

 

[3baygarage]

All Vulcan tools were made by Williams. They are all the same as Williams but a different stamp.

 

[stage20]

i see vulcan wrenches all the time at sales, never bothered with them.
bought a set of mac impact wobbles and the 9/16 is vulcan brand. tight as new. thick like the macs. seem to be good quality. i like reading about stuff like this.

 

[Tavko]

Hi Folks, just joined and wanted to share this info... back in 1969 I worked for PennCentral Railroad in Buffalo. We used to switch the Tonawanda NY, J.H. Williams plant. Frequently we would move rail gondola cars filled with scrap wrenches, sockets etc. These were mis- stamps and other rejected products - which were re-melted and re-forged into new tools. These rejects parts were mostly stamped "Willams" on one side and "Superwrench" on the opposite side. There were also a small amount of other "rejects" some of which were stamped "Vulcan". Note: these "rejects" were parts of the manufacturing process, and no way reflected the high quality of the tools Willams produced and sold. In fact, I started purchasing Vulcan tools from the local "truck guy" (His name: Gus Sorgi) around the time when metric tools were becoming popular. I just checked my collection, and found a set of metric combo wrenches with the stamp on one side "XOEMS-19 Williams USA" and on the other side of the SAME wrench "19MM Vulcan 19MM" Hope this helps to verify some Vulcan history.

J H Williams owned the trademark “Vulcan”, See: http://alloy-artifacts.org/williams-supercompany.html#patents

Trademarks
Williams registered a number of trademarks, including the W-Diamond logo, "Williams", "Agrippa", "Vulcan", "Superrench", and "Superratchet". Information on some of the more important trademarks is summarized in Table 2 below...

 

[Exceller8]

All Vulcan tools were made by Williams. They are all the same as Williams but a different stamp.

Are you 100% sure this wrench was made by Williams? It sure looks like a Cornwell to me?

 

[3baygarage]

That's a nice one.

Not sure where you get Cornwell from though. Cornwell wrenches are known for their v - notch shaped open end.

Also, XOE- is a Williams Superrench part number prefix.

 

[Exceller8]

That's a nice one.

Not sure where you get Cornwell from though. Cornwell wrenches are known for their v - notch shaped open end.

Also, XOE- is a Williams Superrench part number prefix.

Thanks! I guess I've never owned that style of Williams. The Vulcan looks just like one of the Cornwell wrenches that I own and there was another member who thought Cornwell had made them as well.

Thanks for the info...

 

[stage20]

that polished vulcan looks a lot like vintage jc penney era wrenches to me. (made by SK)

anyone have a polished williams wrench to snap a shot of?

 

[Exceller8]

that polished vulcan looks a lot like vintage jc penney era wrenches to me. (made by SK)

anyone have a polished williams wrench to snap a shot of?

I too would love to see the exact same Williams model.

 

[chaztuna]

I have some Vulcan flare nut wrenches. My brother in-law used to sell Vulcan pavement breaking tips for jackhammers

I have several Vulcan Flare [aka Tubing] Nut wrenches. Bought them in 1974 from my Vulcan Tool man. Yes, my Vulcan rep also went the extra mile on service. I want to thank Krusty for the history of Vulcan. Now I can fix the broken M-52A ratchet that's been sitting dead in my toolbox for the past 15 years. I bought it [in 1975] because of the fine tooth ratchet action. I'll be glad to get it working again. Repair kit is M-52ARK [Williams]
Back in the mid 80s, I worked for General Electro-Mechanical [plant 2] near the J.H. Williams factory. We got a discount on their tools. I bought quite a few & am very happy with them. J.H. Williams used to make Craftsman tools, before they shipped that contract to Mexico. That's when Craftsman was high quality stuff.
The first "Mexican" Craftsman replacement sockets I exchanged, developed peeling chrome plating within 3 years. Uggghhh!
What ever happened to Bonney Tools? Were they bought out? Or did they just go under? I have a set of their combination wrenches I bought back in the early 70s. Been using them every day for 40+ years! They are identical to the Matco wrenches.

Charlie

 

[stage20]

bonney made them for matco up until the mid 90's i want to say 93. all newer stock is armstrong, for the most part.

 

[stage20]

i dont know anything about mexican craftsman though?? USA....a short stint made in japan wrenches, now all china.

am i missing some of the history of craftsman?

 

[a52-830]

you will excuse me, and i am likely breaking some rule somewhere, but i just listed a bunch of vulcan sockets, and some other vulcan tools, in the Classified section of the Garage Sale area. since this is one of the few vulcan threads, i thought that one post pointing that out would not be a huge breach of protocol.

 

[stage20]

no direct link to sale ad, and thats ok by me. people that are interested can search through your name and find it. i myself would like to take a look.

some people just post to sell and thats not cool.

i appreciate the post.

 

[OmniGLH]

Interesting. Figured I might find a little something about Vulcan here. I've got a Vulcan top box - friend gave it to me for free. He'd had it in his shed for years, a former co-worker of his (auto tech) gave it to him when he retired. It was pretty beat up, like it'd been dropped so the drawers didn't open smoothly. Took a chance on dropping it on it's head (so upside down) and sure enough (LOL!) everything opens now!

No idea if it's actually WORTH anything - it's definitely old. Drawers are solid and slide nice. I sanded it and did a basic rustoleum rattlecan job on it to clean it up.

 

[Catfan17]

Vulcan tools was a division of the J.H Williams tool company in Buffalo New York. I lived about 10 minutes away from the plant. J. H. Williams opened its Buffalo plant in 1913 I believe. Not sure exactly when they started the Vulcan line of tools. I still have some Vulcan tools I purchased back in the late 70s. The plant did tremendous business in western New York because of all the heavy industry in the area. When the industry started to shutdown I think J H Williams and Vulcan were not able to survive because of the lack of business . It’s too bad because they were one of many industrial tool manufacturers based in Buffalo New York That had been around for almost 100 years . The old plants that empty for a while and then the property was purchased by Chevrolet and they used the property to expand their new engine lines. Hope this helps, it was cool to see your pictures, I haven’t seen walk into a boxes in a long time

 

[DonglordActual]

For some reason every Vulcan tool I have encountered has been damaged but not so for the Williams ones. I guess the end user does mean a lot.

I think I have a wrench with Williams markings on one and Vulcan on the other.

Cornwell is just slightly more common in my area than Vulcan. They just didn't have the distribution that the other 3 had.

The real interesting things were the SK tool trucks. Those were real and not just something I made up, right?

 

[WittHay]

i have a few 3/4 drive Vulcan sockets and this 1 1/4" combination wrench

 

[WNYflyer]

Well instead of starting a new thread I figured I would tag onto this thread. Basically unused Vulcan SAE combination wrench set that I obtained that it in no way shape or form resembles any William's wrenches that I have ever seen what with its highly polished chrome finish. I got to wonder if these are from one of the last years of the Vulcan tool truck line. The wrenches basically measure out in length the same as Snap-On long wrenches. Obtained from fleabay and I have never seen these combination wrenches in the wild and I live in prime Vulcan/Williams territory. Also picked up a Vulcan line wrench this weekend with the same polished chrome finish which is the first Vulcan tool I have seen in the wild with that finish. Anyways............

 

[KnurledNut]

@WNYflyer
Never seen full polished before. Thats a great find!

 

[Mgdoug3]

I have a Vulcan B-52 ratchet. Nifty little ratchet but I don't use it hardly at all. I thought I had a picture of of it but I don't.

 

[Bubba Fett]

A lot of the local hardware stores near me sell Vulcan brand hand tools, including screwdrivers, sockets and wrenches. Most of what I saw was made in China, but it seemed to be reasonable quality for the price.

I'm thinking this has nothing to do with the original company, but it is interesting nonetheless. I can't really say how good the tools are since I won't buy them if there is a better choice available.

 

[Al Borland]

I have a bucket of JH Williams and Vulcan industrial/impact sockets. Did decommissioning/demo work at some of the old plants in the Buffalo area. It seems that the workers took all the D-cell battery-sized sockets on their way out, then threw them thru the windows as they walked away.

 

[2ndGearRubber]

I found some Vulcan sockets, 1/2 drive 6 point chrome, at a flea market to round out my collection. I don't use SAE much, and when I do it's typically not 1/2 drive. So the bit of chrome missing and slightly shabby look after many years didn't bother me. They have worked well in my limited use, although I don't think they drive on the flats of the fastener, classic 6 point design.

 

[lardy1]

I was in an Amish general store in northern Michigan a couple weeks ago and they had a pretty wide selection of Vulcan Tools. I looked at them and handled some but that's no way to assess tool quality. They seemed bulky and unrefined though. No COO stamp on any of them I looked at. I didn't buy any of them.

 

[Sgtboz]

Weren't they affiliated with Williams? I remember seeing a Williams S-52 on Ebay once that was badged "Vulcan".

Your right. I have a set of Williams wrenches that say Vulcan on the opposite side of the wrench .

 

[3baygarage]

That is a really nice looking set. I don’t have much to add about the polished style other than I’ve seen polished Vulcan angle wrenches, like the Snappy above is. Someone on one of the forums had a whole set a while back.

 

[mritchie77]

Picked up this almost complete socket set this weekend at an estate sale. I think it’s missing an extension. Williams box, Williams B52 ratchet, but all the sockets are double marked Williams and Vulcan. Anyone have the missing extension?? LOL

 

[dnschmidt]

Vulcan = Williams

I used to buy Williams tools from Plant Service Company in Pittsburgh and many times the tools would come branded as Vulcan. Exactly the same so I didn't care. Very good tools.