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I hear quite often not to skimp out on hand tools, and for me there’s not really any strict budget, but can certain things be bought in a cheaper name, say, socket sets?
I’m thinking what really matters in the case of ratchets are the ratchet itself, so if you buy a cheaper, say, Craftsman socket set, but use a Snap On ratchet with it, is there any reason people don’t do it like this?
On a related note, I’ve got plenty of tools to start off, Craftsman tools that have been collected over the years by me and my father, I’ll likely start off with that at a job while waiting on/ordering a second set so I can just leave them at the shop. While figuring out what to toss onto a list for a second set is there anything specific that saved anyone from trouble that should be picked up?
Also on a related note, do you normally just leave boxes unlocked sitting in the shop on days off? Even locking them, is that really a deterrent with how cheap and easy to break the locks are?
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Buy what you can afford, not what makes your tool box look better. There are no shortage of big brand name tool manufactures that sell good quality stuff with as good of a “no question asked” warranty as Snap On.
The money you save buying say Craftsman stuff at first can be put into buying a good quality impact gun, something you do not want to skimp on.
Just my 2cent.
Not trying to scare ya, but…
when I was in your shoes I discovered that I couldn’t get the carbruetor off certain vehicles with the Craftsman 1/4 set I had, so I ran to the Matco dealer. I had that set for over 20 years before I replaced it.
My point -don’t mistake big for beefy, and shop around.That is EXACTLY the way to do it. You can use cheaper, good quality sockets and more expensive ratchets. I know many professional mechanics that do just that. I know incredible, talented, genius mechanics that can rip a motor in and out in hours and diagnose a nightmare of a electrical problem that three other guys gave up on, that use Craftsman and Harbor Freight impact sockets. (If you don’t have those impact sockets, get them. Why spend $300 for the same exact metal?) Those same guys who have Craftsmans and HF impact sockets will have Snap On Ratchets (Though I disagree with buying Snap On ratchets because of price.) I use E-Z Red ratchets like these that cost me like $75 total and I’ve been using these everyday for a year. Wera ratchets are nice too and they cost like $60 each. Etc. etc., I could give you a ton of tool recommendations. I like Genius and Sunex and Harbor Freight and Gearwrench and so on, and if you want to spend more money for no reason for a good brand, you can buy Gearwrench sockets, but I think even Husky and Kobalt and Genius brand sockets are just as good.
Don’t get into debt with the tool man. That is rule #1. If you’re starting out, making nothing an hour, take it easy. My goodness, I wonder what these young bucks are thinking getting ten grand into debt with the tool man out of the gate when they make literally nothing an hour. I could go on and on and maybe I’ll come back some other time. These are very important financial decisions that you should not take lightly. Do you want to go into debt over a $50,000 BMW (Snap On)? Oh, you can’t use a Husky socket, you’ll get cancer and lose an eye! Oh come on now, don’t let the Marlboro man sell you on his brand of cigarettes. Be smart, do your research, and good luck. Or maybe you can come back in a few months ten grand in debt, I hope you don’t.
Yeah, I was a little surprized when I received advice similar to what Hitachi is giving (about mixing expensive with cheaper tools). When my boss said I would need a good impact he named Snap-on and MAC which I expected but then he said pairing the impact with Husky sockets(and he may have included Craftsman in that list of decent pair-ups)was fine. This threw me at first but was also a relief seeing that tool buying is going to be a life-long commitment.
The 1/2″ Harbor Freight Earthquake Impact is one of the best bangs for your buck out there, period. I know two mechanics that have it and love it, and it’s gotten great reviews. I knew someone who had a Mac Impact that couldn’t take a lugnut off that the Earthquake Impact could take off. But granted, it was an older Mac (but not that old), and probably needed a rebuild kit. It’s $70 with a coupon and you could buy an extended warranty (though I doubt you’ll need it) and that’s just too cheap to lose because even if you buy 4 of them you’d still be ahead. I don’t understand this myth that only Snap, Mac, and Matco make good tools, it’s insane. And if you want to spend $500 to have a lightweight impact because “your arm gets tired”, my goodness woman go work out, what are you a girl or something? (tee hee!) You can break my finger and I’ll use a 20lb impact gun before I spend $500 for a lightweight gun. I don’t use drugs but man, you could save that money and use it on drugs! I kid of course, but I’m making a point. Save your money people, don’t give 20 grand to the Snap On man for crying out loud, why go into debt slavery which is exactly what it is? Guys are just embarrassed to drive old Toyotas and Hondas and they’re embarrassed to use Harbor Freight Impact Guns and Husky sockets! Oh give me a break, you can laugh at me all you want; I I’ll actually have money for diapers and food on my table for my kids and things that actually matter, instead of some ten thousand dollar Snap On box to show off. Or take my wife out on a month-long vacation. You can keep your Snap On Box, my HF/Craftsman/Husky/Kobalt box will work just fine. “BUT HE STOOD IN THE DRAWER AND JUMPED UP AND DOWN!” What are you going to use your toolbox as a bomb shelter? Come on people.
master gearwrench metric set:
http://www.amazon.com/GearWrench-9416-Metric-Master-Ratcheting/dp/B0002NYD1W/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1403073004&sr=8-3&keywords=gear+wrench+mastermaster 1/2″ drive metric impact socket set:
http://www.amazon.com/Sunex-Master-Metric-Impact-Socket/dp/B00079LQL6/ref=sr_1_5?s=hi&ie=UTF8&qid=1403073150&sr=1-5&keywords=master+socket+set+metricingersoll-rand 1/2″ impact gun:
http://www.amazon.com/Ingersoll-Rand-231C-2-Inch-Super-Duty-Impact/dp/B0002SRM3I/ref=sr_1_8?s=hi&ie=UTF8&qid=1403073276&sr=1-8&keywords=1%2F2%22+impact+gun+pneumaticMechanic’s tool set:
http://www.harborfreight.com/professional-301-piece-mechanics-tool-kit-45951.htmlHammer:
http://www.harborfreight.com/4-lb-drilling-hammer-98258.htmlchannel lock set:
http://www.harborfreight.com/4-piece-tongue-and-groove-joint-pliers-set-43553.htmlRear disc brake tool:
http://www.harborfreight.com/four-wheel-disc-brake-piston-tool-68972.htmlTool cart:
http://www.harborfreight.com/26-in-4-drawer-580-lb-capacity-glossy-black-roller-cart-61634.htmlprobably around $700 or so. you’ll have pretty much everything a starting mechanic could ever need. The only additions I would recommend is a good multimeter and some impact universal joints. I’ve found it’s best to go with snap-on and whatnot for the universal joints.
Thanks for all the advice guys.
Now, possibly of note I don’t plan to take this on as a living, I’ll be working in a shop for probably about a year while I take some night courses, and plan to eventually switch to a full time student for electrical engineering, so I’m trying to keep tool investments down, trying not to consider buying things like, say, a backpressure gauge that I might not use in 5 years, when I might only work as a tech for a year or two.
As far as other tools such as crescent wrenches, is there a big difference from brand to brand? Screwdriver assortments?
Branching off a bit though, a question regarding multimeters. I’ve always preferred manual ranging, I’ve got a cheap B&K that I generally use, a 2704C I believe, I feel I might toss that in a tool box and buy myself a Fluke 425 for my bench at home. My thoughts are that you generally know the range you’ll need, or you won’t care if it’s off by a few units, say, a sensor is reading 73 ohms, you’re on a 200K scale, and spec is max of 68, would you condemn the sensor, or would you look for an open/short in there? How often do you find yourself wishing you had an auto ranging meter, as opposed to a manual?
Don’t drink the tool man kool-aid. Those guys who make fun of you for not spending $200 for twelve sockets, have drunk the kool-aid, and are in debt hook, line and sinker. And the funniest part? I bet some tool truck owners, if they were working in the industry, wouldn’t buy their very own tools they’re selling, and would be happy with HF/Craftsman/Husky/Kobalt/Gearwrench/Genius/Sunex/Tekton, etc.
Crescent/Adjustable Wrenches and Screwdrivers? Well first of all, if you can manage never using an adjustable wrench, that would be ideal, that would be great. Worst tool ever. Oh but that reminds me, this adjustable wrench is a new invention/spin on it, and it is amazing: Knipex Pliers Wrench. But if you’re just going to work for a year doing oil changes, you won’t need it. Screwdrivers? Any brand is fine. Harbor Freight has these new red grip screwdrivers that are good – stay away from their free screwdrivers, the ones with the black grips. I’ve misused and abused a few screwdrivers and have warrantied them without a receipt without a single problem whatsoever. They’re the best in customer service in that regard in my opinion, and that’s one of the biggest things I love about them.
Now if you say you’re just planning on working in the industry for a year, and you’ve got no experience, you’ll mostly be doing oil changes most likely and you won’t use a multi-meter too often. Get a free Harbor Freight one, seriously. But there are plenty of great meters in the $20-50 range as well.
That’s another hilarious thing. These guys have drunk the kool-aid, and whoever says you need a $500 Fluke to test a sensor and diagnose a car is either an idiot or has just simply drunk the kool-aid and believes it. If you can’t diagnose an electrical issue with a $40 meter, you can’t diagnose anything. Power Probe, period. That’s what Eric uses and endorses, that’s what every great diagnostic tech I know uses, and I knew a supposedly master mechanic that wasn’t interested in the Power Probe and advocated a $500 Fluke. And I don’t think he was that good at electrical diagnosing, judging from a few incidents. But you’re not going to need a Power Probe if you’re just going to be working in the industry for a year. You won’t need that many tools. Flukes are just a fluke.
But good on you for not choosing this career. It’s not for everybody. It’s not for most people. Good luck trying to not be sucked into it though, it’s how that happens sometimes. We swear we would only take a job temporarily, for a while, and maybe go back to school, but by the time you know it, twenty years pass by…
[quote=”Hitachi” post=101416]Now if you say you’re just planning on working in the industry for a year, and you’ve got no experience, you’ll mostly be doing oil changes most likely and you won’t use a multi-meter too often. Get a free Harbor Freight one, seriously. But there are plenty of great meters in the $20-50 range as well.[/quote]
I plan on working in the industry for a year to get some precalc and calc credits, but I’m not positive I’m sold on electrical engineering, it’s my plan, but if working in a shop ends up working out well for the year I’m in it I might choose to stay in the industry and get an actual education, not the program you do for 2 hours a day in high school like I’ve just been through.That’s another hilarious thing. These guys have drunk the kool-aid, and whoever says you need a $500 Fluke to test a sensor and diagnose a car is either an idiot or has just simply drunk the kool-aid and believes it. If you can’t diagnose an electrical issue with a $40 meter, you can’t diagnose anything. Power Probe, period. That’s what Eric uses and endorses, that’s what every great diagnostic tech I know uses, and I knew a supposedly master mechanic that wasn’t interested in the Power Probe and advocated a $500 Fluke. And I don’t think he was that good at electrical diagnosing, judging from a few incidents. But you’re not going to need a Power Probe if you’re just going to be working in the industry for a year. You won’t need that many tools. Flukes are just a fluke.
I disagree on that quite strongly, at least from a generalized “Fluke is just a fluke” standpoint. In the automotive industry, sure, you won’t ever need a logging meter with a couple microvolts resolution, but for my bench working on my various projects it can come in handy, and it’s a lot more useable than a benchtop meter, at least to me.
But good on you for not choosing this career. It’s not for everybody. It’s not for most people. Good luck trying to not be sucked into it though, it’s how that happens sometimes. We swear we would only take a job temporarily, for a while, and maybe go back to school, but by the time you know it, twenty years pass by…
Might not need the luck after all, might just go in head first and stay there.
I’m pretty much in the same boat as you, but I’ve been working as a mechanic/tech for years. I’m due to finish my associates in electrical engineering this year.
That said, if you’re getting an electrical engineering degree, chances are that you’ll put a top end multimeter to good use. I don’t use my $700 fluke for much that a $40 multimeter couldn’t do in the automotive field, but I also build computers on the side and I’m in the process of building an electric vehicle ATM as well. If you plan to see many electric/hybrid vehicles during your time as a technician/mechanic then you’ll definitely be glad you put out some extra dough for a top-line multimeter.
While it is fun to beat up on the chrome crooks, you’re deluding yourselves if you think their tools are a rip off. Point of fact: Snap-On. Mac & Matco tools do not have the same failure rate as the brand names y’all are ballyhooing about. Another fact -for every size Craftsman ratchet I own, I own three! Why? One works, one is in the “mail” and the other is fixing to let me down.
(Craftsman ratchets are the worst ratchets on earth for sure. Just terrible. I hate most Craftsman tools for various reasons and don’t own any but I’m sure their basic tools like sockets would be fine. Their quality has really gone down though I think. Then there’s Craftsman Professional but no one cares. Carlyle by Napa is another intermediately priced tool brand. Overpriced I think but if it makes you feel better than using Husky or Kobalt.)
Another reason some Snap On/Mac/Matco guys will really make fun of another tech who uses other brands is to make themselves feel better about being twenty grand in debt. It’s like the people who went to community college then transferred up and saved tens of thousands, but the people who went to a four-year will say, “Oh, well, the experience was worth going an extra twenty grand in debt! Community college is for losers!” Or the liberal arts majors who went to for profit design schools (like Wyotech and UTI, lol) in expensive cities and got fifty grand in debt, and graduate and end up working at Starbucks, or Jiffy Lube. “Oh well, I’m an artist, and my portfolio is online, and any day now I’ll get my big break.” “Well I work at Discount Tire and Jiffy Lube, I gotta have Snap On!” Shoes don’t make you play like Michael Jordan, Axe Body Spray doesn’t get you women, and Snap On doesn’t make you a good mechanic.
A lot of times those who protest the most are the most bothered by the truth deep down inside – the fact that they know that they got ‘tooken’. The Snap On Man took them for all that they have and they’ll be paying that man for a long, long time. I know new techs fresh out already deep in debt, and they make nothing an hour, and they’re living off ketchup and mustard cracker sandwiches, and I feel for them. I wish I could have shown them the light before they signed their souls over to the Snap On Man. Well at least they didn’t spend 50 grand on Wyotech to make 8 bucks an hour at Jiffy Lube. Oh wait 🙁 They drank the kool-aid and constantly spout how superior Snap On is and how other tools have some epidemic of failures and breakages, lol. Snap On might as well publish a propaganda paper publishing failure rates of Husky and Kobalt! BREAKING NEWS – TEN MORE MECHANICS DIE FROM USING HUSKY SOCKETS – KOBALT RATCHETING WRENCHES CAUSE IMPOTENCE – MORE AT 11! And all the while the Snap On man laughs all the way to the bank. Somebody call Liam Neeson because you just got taken. Taken for twenty thousand dollars, plus interest.
But when that Snap On victim works next to a master mechanic that’s got off-brand impact sockets and a Scan Tool that doesn’t cost a fortune to update and old SK wrenches, and he’s twice the mechanic he’ll ever be, he realizes deep down inside the cold hard truth, that tools don’t make the technician.
[quote=”Hitachi” post=101600]
A lot of times those who protest the most are the most bothered by the truth deep down inside – the fact that they know that they got ‘tooken’. [/quote]Most of “those” men bought their tools on credit, and the better tool salesman makes that possible. I’m not talking about the RA account one pays weekly, I’m talking about 10 & 20k accounts and new boxes. That is precisely why Snappy can sell a $7500 box! In a world where time is money and tool salesmen wait on you hand & foot, do you really think a tech is going to take a day off to wrangle a loan at the local bank?
By the way, the quality of Snap-On, Mac, and Matco are way, way overrated. They break too. I’ve seen it firsthand. Overall, it’s more about the handler, and not always the tool. Use the right tool and don’t misuse and abuse tools. The emperor wears no clothes but no one has the courage to say it.
Listen, in my AP Chemistry class in High School, our teacher had to the courage to say something that would have gotten her laughed at and even ridiculed. She went to a cheap state college. Worked in a laboratory after graduating and everything. She worked next to another technician making the exact same amount of money. And where did that other person graduate from? Harvard. And what was the difference? Oh I don’t know, a hundred thousand dollars in debt? You could hear a pin drop in that classroom from all the nonsense we’d been spoonfed since we were young. Now we’re seeing that we’ve been taken, we’ve been duped, and man our educational system is flawed and kids today should not be graduating college thirty grand in debt, and more and more of them are realizing it. Fifty years ago you could work a summer job and pay for all four years of college. What changed? Easy credit. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. But I won’t get into all that here. But think of the housing crisis. What led to houses spiraling out of control in price? Easy credit. Every Tom Dick and Harry on a McDonald’s salary could be approved for a half million dollar loan. Dry up the credit, the colleges will lose seats and lose money, and they’ll be forced to lower their prices.
Who has the courage to say, you don’t need to buy everything Snap-On. Heck, you don’t need to buy anything Snap-On. You could probably work your entire professional career and retire without ever paying a cent for a Snap-On, Mac, or Matco tool. Except for the odd special tool or so, and even so, try to buy them used on Ebay or Craigslist. At the very least if you’re so adamant, buy Blue-Point or Silver Eagle, I’m sure the tool man will warranty them. But still outrageously overpriced for the same metal you could buy at a fraction of the price at even possibly the same Chinese factories, except with a different brand! Lol! It’s like people who hate GM or Ford or Chrysler or Dodge or whatever – it’s all the exact same car, some of them literally the exact same car, hah! “Oh I hate that Korean Mazda crap, I’ll only drive my Ford Ranger.” Sir, your Ford Ranger is a Mazda. Cars nowadays are just getting more and more the same. Eric ought to make a video on that.
All I’m saying is, especially for new techs making nothing an hour, don’t get yourself twenty grand into debt. You might not last a year. You might run an engine dry and be out of a job tomorrow, and it’s back to flipping burgers. And that might be blessing in disguise. Honestly, some hobbies are better off hobbies, and maybe a lot of aspiring mechanics should have kept it in their home garage where they would have still enjoyed it.
But anyway, they’re overrated, like certain Hondas. Oh Hondas are so reliable! Horrible transmissions and every single piece of interior machinery might as well have been made out of Fisher Price plastic. Still better than American and European cars though, overall, in general.
Now does anyone know about Japanese and European tool makers? If the Japanese make tools like they make cars and swords and sushi knives, I bet they’d make some great tools. It’s all metal. I know Wera Tools is German. Oh I hate German car engineering but Wera tools are nice. Anyone know?
jeez man, that’s pretty deep. But by the same logic you could argue that the people who’ve always bought cheap tools are bitter to the people that buy snap-on/mac/matco/etc. tools for having better tools.
At the end of the day you ideally want the best tool you can find for whatever you’re looking for. Sometimes this is best found on a matco truck and sometimes this is best found on amazon or harbor freight. Source your stuff and buy the things that YOU NEED for the best deal you can get.
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