Yet another Craftsman thread

[slackdaddy1]

As a teenager and early 20's I built/rebuilt plenty of Muscle cars, got married and took 10 years off, got back into it for a few years in the mid/late 90's.
In those years I had accumulated a mid size collection of made in USA craftsman tools. They served me well and did what I needed them to do.

Now I am getting back into working on Jeeps and rods, and need to "re-up" my tools, But my trusty Craftsmans are made in China

I started poking around and looked at Armstrong. I just can not pay that much for sockets and ratchets

Is there any alternative to the old USA Craftsman socket sets/tools ? Price and quality wise?

For mid priced tools it almost looks like I will have to give up on the idea of "Made in the USA" ???

I cant believe I am asking this, but --- are the Husky, Kobalt, Craftsman china sets "that" bad???

Thanks for any thoughts from serious weekend wrenchers.

Nick

 

[fasteddie313]

IMO if you are going to be buying something you aren't exactly going to be proud of you might as well buy used cheap and/or maybe look at Tekton stuff, my neighbor swears by it and it does look pretty good to my eye..

 

[Richard Cranium]

S&K tools, unless you want to go to ebay and try to get new old stock.

 

[WildwoodChuck]

If they are still in stock Menard's Masterforce are USA made. Post in the forum suggest that the stock is running low and being restocked with Gearwrench.

 

[FlushingDIYer]

Hey Nick, you sound exactly like me when I came upon GJ...

If you want USA and want to pay what we used to pay for old USA CM tools, your best bet is to go with SK-TOOLS and Wright Tools. Those are really the only "go-to" USA-made tools that are "relatively" affordable. Especially if you're willing to wait and look.

I had great success buying USA tools from Cripe Distributing. (You can buy from their website, via email, or through their eBay store.) They have a lot of USA tools and at good prices. All my combination wrenches (6mm-25mm) are USA (CM, Allen, Kobalt, KD) the latter three coming almost exclusively from Cripe.

Having gone through the process, it's best if you really weigh your options. For about $120, you can get full 1/4", 3/8" and 1/2" shallow and deep Toptul sockets on ebay from one of our members. Really great stuff for the price. But made in Taiwan. Also, if you live anywhere near an Advance Auto Parts, you can get a lot of GEARWRENCH sockets for a little more than $1 a socket using their coupons... (I am going to get 1/4" and 3/8" deeps for around $35...) Which is a great deal...but not USA...

Good luck figuring it all out. Fellas and gals on here are hella useful in figuring this stuff out.

 

[PFSard]

I started poking around and looked at Armstrong. I just can not pay that much for sockets and ratchets

Nick

Tool company laying off 170 at Midlands plant
http://www.thestate.com/news/business/article126068444.html

APEX Tool Group will cease production of its Armstrong and Allen lines of hand tools .....

------------------------------

You'll get a lot of suggestions here for specific brands. I would first make a list of what I need. Then, ask specific questions regarding the tools on your list.

 

[Jake40]

Gearwrench is a well made good quality brand with a reasonable price. They are lifetime garauntee and more and more places are starting to sell and warranty them.

 

[TNBurban]

IMO if you are going to be buying something you aren't exactly going to be proud of you might as well buy used cheap and/or maybe look at Tekton stuff, my neighbor swears by it and it does look pretty good to my eye..

I'd be proud about fixing my car right the first time with Tekton. I have zero Matco, Snap On, MAC or Cornwell in my box. Some HF, lots of Craftsman. Some Gearwrench, Channellock, Kobalt, Husky, Neiko and more I've left out.

At the end of the day, it ain't about the name on the tools unless you're worried more about polishing them to show them off than using them.

 

[Empty Pockets]

S&K tools, unless you want to go to ebay and try to get new old stock.

I have to agree with Richard, SK is good quality, Made in USA tools, and while not cheap, they are every bit as good as the current truck brands, at a fraction of the price.

I'm also a big fan of Wright, these are made in USA, and if the Wright tools I bought in the 1970s are and indication, they are quite rugged.

I have bought some additional Wright and SK, recently from HJE. They are good folks, fair prices, and they know their stuff. JMO

Hey Nick, you sound exactly like me when I came upon GJ...

If you want USA and want to pay what we used to pay for old USA CM tools, your best bet is to go with SK-TOOLS and Wright Tools. Those are really the only "go-to" USA-made tools that are "relatively" affordable. Especially if you're willing to wait and look.

I had great success buying USA tools from Cripe Distributing. (You can buy from their website, via email, or through their eBay store.) They have a lot of USA tools and at good prices. All my combination wrenches (6mm-25mm) are USA (CM, Allen, Kobalt, KD) the latter three coming almost exclusively from Cripe.

Having gone through the process, it's best if you really weigh your options. For about $120, you can get full 1/4", 3/8" and 1/2" shallow and deep Toptul sockets on ebay from one of our members. Really great stuff for the price. But made in Taiwan. Also, if you live anywhere near an Advance Auto Parts, you can get a lot of GEARWRENCH sockets for a little more than $1 a socket using their coupons... (I am going to get 1/4" and 3/8" deeps for around $35...) Which is a great deal...but not USA...

Good luck figuring it all out. Fellas and gals on here are hella useful in figuring this stuff out.

The FlushingDIYer brings up Cripe. Also good folks, of the few items I have bought through them, they have been fairly priced, and shipped quickly. What I have seen with Cripe is that they have a lot of buy-outs, buy backs and discontinued items. It's a good deal if you need their stuff. I've bought their stuff before and will likely do it again.

Good luck

 

[M6erfan]

I'll second Cripe, Harry Epstein, and even Bowers Tools for made in the USA stuff. All good people. GL

 

[pstemari]

Don't forget Proto when listing current US tool makers. SK, Proto, and Wright are all top-notch tools. Martin isn't bad, either.

Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk

 

[WildwoodChuck]

Gearwrench is a well made good quality brand with a reasonable price. They are lifetime garauntee and more and more places are starting to sell and warranty them.

I agree with the hard line stuff being quality, I still buy the wrenches an sockets. Today I had my first disappointing Gearwrench experience with a center punch and a chisel. They chipped and dulled after removing 2 1/4"-20 security torx screws.

 

[theoldwizard1]

Is there any alternative to the old USA Craftsman socket sets/tools ? Price and quality wise?

If you want Mad in USA, NO !

 

[CNGsaves]

Good advice above.

OP . . . also should consider part of your socket set to be IMPACT
. . . . recent bargains are the complete 3/8" or 1/2" sets from Sunex
About year ago they had $100 rebate (per set) which was a smokin' deal.
Another option for affordable impact sockets would be Gray Pneumatic.

You could plan your chrome sockets around what your impacts already cover . . .
. . ie if impacts are deep, then make your chrome sets to be short or medium depth.

 

[Teenager with old tools]

As a teenager and early 20's I built/rebuilt plenty of Muscle cars, got married and took 10 years off, got back into it for a few years in the mid/late 90's.

In those years I had accumulated a mid size collection of made in USA craftsman tools. They served me well and did what I needed them to do.



Now I am getting back into working on Jeeps and rods, and need to "re-up" my tools, But my trusty Craftsmans are made in China



I started poking around and looked at Armstrong. I just can not pay that much for sockets and ratchets



Is there any alternative to the old USA Craftsman socket sets/tools ? Price and quality wise?



For mid priced tools it almost looks like I will have to give up on the idea of "Made in the USA" ???



I cant believe I am asking this, but --- are the Husky, Kobalt, Craftsman china sets "that" bad???



Thanks for any thoughts from serious weekend wrenchers.



Nick

Tomorrow I'll get the standard 3/8 craftsman China ratchet put a deep well on it that fits my lug nut on my gmc jimmy and put a 3ft cheater pipe on it. Then I'll report back with how good or bad I feel it is.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[67King]

As mentioned, SK and Wright are good options. Mayhew is another good one for stuff like chisels, punches, picks, etc. I personally do not have any USA Williams stuff, but it gets very good reviews here.....I have some Taiwan WIlliams stuff (ratcheting wrenches) that are very good. I am personally not a big Gearwrench fan, but most folks here are happy wiht it (it is mostly Taiwan, but seemingly more and more China). I also have a few Sunex tools I'm very happy with.

Side note, I have a bunch of old Craftsman USA stuff from the early 90's. had had problems with it, and the brands I mentioned above have been superior to it from my experience.

 

[mudflap]

If you are really concerned about Made in USA..and are willing to pay for it..SK for sure.. TEKTON, and Carlyle are also very good for less....but imports.. Just means more money for jeep parts... The latest round of kids coming in from the Tech school all have TEKTON....The stuff is really good..and really easy to warranty.. I have to say tho... The last USA Craftsman 3/8 rat i had to warranty trade for the imported one,,,, it was better..nicer machine work..fit/finish, etc.. Than the USA ones toward the end.....Hate to say that... So maybe toke a look at the imported Craftsman stuff...? some of it is not so bad...especially some of their newer ratchets...low profile, fine tooth...

 

[Shark Pilot]

Welcome to the post-made in USA Craftsman world. I'm in the same boat - used to be CMAN was the no-brainer go-to tool brand. Last Summer I was in desperate need of an 8mm hex bit socket with as tight a fit as possible to remove a hex bolt which was beginning to strip. Bought a few including a Carlyle from NAPA. There was no comparison - the Carlyle fit perfectly compared to the few others I had including an older USA CMAN. So I have been slowly replacing some of my old CMAN with Carlyle sockets and ratchet handles. I am very impressed with the amount of grip the sockets have and honestly that's all I really care about. NAPA puts out a quarterly "Real Deals" tool sales flyer (also available online) with decent pricing on their Carlyle stuff so if you're not in a hurry that would be the way best to buy, otherwise can be a little pricey and different NAPA stores may charge higher prices as well. Made in Taiwan to high quality standards and available locally.

Gearwrench is usually available local and also seems to be well regarded though it looks like some of their stuff is moving from Taiwan to China. I don't have much firsthand experience although usually slightly less expensive than Carlyle.

SK made in USA but hard to buy locally for me at least. Not inexpensive.

Industrial brands you can track down from internet retailers including Wright, Williams, Proto, etc a lot of which has COO of USA - may not be local and takes a little research.

Japanese tool brands like Ko-Ken and KTC - looks like really nice quality stuff and prices aren't crazy, just tends to be harder to buy here in the US - check " the Tools of Japan" thread to get an idea.

Big Box house brands like Husky and Kobalt - could be made in Taiwan or China - I would tend to stick with Taiwan over China, plus Harbor Freight (same) and other tool companies like Crescent or DeWalt which can be OK from what I hear, but I wouldn't use most of this stuff to build a core tool set around.

I would go buy a socket from Gearwrench and Carlyle locally in a size which you might want to have as a duplicate and figure out which fits the best for your application and go with that. For me it was the Carlyle stuff, but after reading about Ko-Ken I might try out their Zeal low profile sockets as well. As for combination wrenches Wright Grip is on my list or possibly KTC or Stahlwhille but combos for me are a lower priority but definitely worth buying high quality.

Lots of options these days and you can mix brands between sockets and ratchet handles for example - you just have to do a little more legwork and research. Good luck and let us know what you decide on.

 

[amason3]

I haven't verified this, and maybe someone else can chime in, but with regard to the chinese craftsman vs USA crafstman and other USA brands, it seems the chinese tools material may be harder, where the USA brands are tougher. So, the chinese stuff may reach the same specs, but they are brittle beyond that point, where the USA brands are more likely to deform prior to failing. My assumption is strictly based on years of handling brittle steel opposed to more ductile steel. Old USA craftsman sockets and wrenches could be hammered on and simply deform (much like a cold chisel), but the new stuff feels like it would just fracture if hammered on. I realize the tools aren't meant to hammer on, but this also plays into their ability to handle repeated torque cycles.

 

[DFB]

Around here it's pretty easy to find USA craftsman socket sets at ace hardware. I just got a USA 1/4" metric deep set there.

If you want fractional inch USA sockets you can get them SUPER cheap new old stock on eBay. Generally $15-25 delivered depending on the style. Metric is harder to find those kind of deals on.

That ACE Hardware tip looks to pretty good I just went looking there and seen several things to be USA still.

There was this set on special price
But I'll consider it 132 pc really

http://www.acehardware.com/product/index.jsp?productId=37661126

And if you can believe the picture this set of metric combination wrenches are USA coo.

http://www.acehardware.com/product/index.jsp?productId=35555236

I guess if I was looking I would locate a store with stock and call to see if they could verify the product first so I don't waste time.

I wonder is there is way to discern COO just by set part#

IMO sad state of affairs with old Craftsman name these days. I recently got brought up up to up speed on all those lobster claw wrenches they have now.

My old stuff is all Craftsman USA dating back to 1980 for me. Sockets from 1/4 to 1/2, metric and deep, 12 point and 6 pt, And many different styles of their wrenches with duplicates of the most common ones