OK I got these cheap adjustable wrenches today. On the box is says. "Hardness and Torque meets or exceeds ANSI specs" Is there really an ANSI spec for this? I was thinking maybe its marketing hype. I have a couple SnapOn tools and they don't say that [;D]

American National Standards Institute?

Yep, there are strenght specs for hand tools. Don't worry about the Snap-on tools, they meet the specs. Of course so do the domestic Craftsman, SK Wayne, etc. But I would be careful about using the cheap tools made abroad for commercial purposes, such as a automotive repair. I think the cheap foriegn tools are made for occassional home use.

OK thanks. I don't plan to use these for any heavy duty purpose. Mainly my reloading benches. One of them I plan to use on those large jam-nuts on reloading dies, just to snug them. I used to simply use my fingers, then I switched to a pair of ChannelLocks, then I thought maybe adjustable wrenches would be better.

If Craftsman meets ANSI standards, Snap-On beats the $&*% out of 'em. Eddie

Story time! Just after Thanksgiving, I decided my Craftsman 1/2 inch torque wrench needed to be recalibrated. "What's wrong with it?" the service guy said. Looong coversation about what needed to be done. "That is not covered under the lifetime warranty" Duh... At any rate, they sent it North Carolina, who sent it to Texas. All that took 9 weeks, and then the wrench was stolen in transit back to me. Round and round we went trying to get the claim paid. During this time I ordered a new Snap On to replace it. The Snap On service center for recal work is in Norcross, GA, which I can drive to. Bye, bye Sears... I learned my lesson.

Snap on will also replace broken tools. I can't see why Sears wouldn't replace the wrench. I've seen many people bring in tools and they didn't even ask "what happened?" just gave them a new one right then and there. Steaking of which, I have a few screwdrivers that need replacing.

There's a store near my office called ReTool, which sells primarily used tools. I make a point of stopping in regularly and buying Craftsman and SnapOn hand tools, for about 30% of the cost of new ones. To see how far Sears would go in replacing the hand tools, I took them a socket which the previous owner must have hammered onto a slightly too large nut, and then cut the nut out of the socket; it was completely beat (I paid 25 cents for it, a 12-point 3/4" socket for 1/2 inch drive). The local Sears hardware store replaced it no questions asked.

next time just intentionally break the wrench. Then it's covered!

I do buy craftsman for their guarantee.. wont buy anything else at sears though

I like Craftsman. I've broken stuff and they've always replaced it no questions asked. I was gonna treat myself once and buy a set of Snap on wrenches, till I found oud the price. This may seem like a stupid question to you machanics but why does a Snap on wrench cost about $30 when at Sears you can get a set of 10 wrenches for that much ?

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Snap On torque wrenches have six month warranty. After that they do not cover repair work or calabration. They are very good about warranty on their other tools. Its too easy to screw up a torque wrench.

In my experience, cheap adjustable wrenches are knuckle busters. Klein adj. wrenches are my favorite, they stay set.

Snap-On tools are very good tools for the professional user such as an automotive mechanic etc. There tools are more heavily chrome plated. Notice the Snap-On hand wrenches are wider on the edge so that you can apply more pressure with your hand, compare that to the Craftsman. The Snap-On tools also has the patented "flank drive" broaching configuration on their box-end, sockets, and flare nut, where the wrench flats contacts the fastener away from the edge, thus prevent rounded fasteners.

I make my living with my tools and some of it is cheap stuff, Craftman or whatever. But for the ones that get used all day long, every day, I buy Snap-On. A life time warranty is great but I prefer my tools not break in the first place. [i]Don't ask to borrow my Snap-On tools and I won't ask to borrow your wife[/i][:D]

I make my living with my tools(airplane mech for usair) and I use a mix. for the most of my work I use a snap on set, but if I have to abuse a tool I use a craftsman. The craftsman is easier to get replaced... I dont have to run down some truck on the third saturday of every second month... I just go to sears and they replace it....pat

If I were making my living with my tools, such as a mechanic, I'd go with SnapOn. However, there's a Western Auto near me (nearest Sears is 25 miles, and good luck getting SnapOn to drop by at my convenience), and since Sears bought Western Auto, I can get replacements there. There is a noticeable difference in "feel" when you handle the SnapOn's, and for that matter, Matco, but for 1/4 the cost and the convenience factor, I bought all Craftsman hand tools. Air tools is a different matter - I like Ingersol Rand. And for precision tools, there is no substitute for Starrett.

Wow! I didn't know Western Auto was still in business. As a kid used to go into Western Autos all of the time. I think it has been 20 years since I last seen one of them in Calif. My cuz is a Snap-On truck owner, and his whole cost of a ratchet is more than the retail cost of a Craftsman.

I did. Craftsman tools are fine for the hobbist. I have a tool box full. I loan those out. My Snap-Ons don't leave my garage. Warranty doesn't mean much when you round the head on a converter bolt because the tool tolerances are a little sloppy. Snap-On will take abuse that would make Attilla The Hun weep. I've used chrome sockets on my air gun and have broken two, if my memory is correct. I've broken several Craftsman with a hand ratchet. Eddie

Snap-on doesn't cover torque wrench calibration under its lifetime warranty, either - my dealer wanted $90 to recalibrate my 1/2" drive BrutusR250, and it'd be gone for 3-4 weeks. I do like Snap-on tools better than Craftsman, mainly because a couple million other mechanics can't [b]all[/b] be wrong. I have about $1500 worth of Craftsman that I bought when the only things I worked on were my personal vehicles, and maybe $14,000 worth of Snap-on that I started buying when I began my current job (another $6K-$7K worth of Cornwell and Matco, too) and Snap-on beats all of them hands down. Well, Cornwell and Matco impact sockets are just as good, IMO, and one of my coworkers has Craftsman and Mac impacts that are so old the finish is worn off yet there's no rounding or peening in the drive tool opening - my Snap-ons already exhibit some of this. Anyway, I do like being able to run up to Sears after work to exchange a broken tool rather than having to wait till next week for Snappy to come back, although if I'd call him up and tell him he'd stop by when he had a chance. I've never broken a Craftsman socket or wrench, even when putting a lot more force into turning them than they're designed for. Their ratchets are OK, with the best feature being the quick-release that only a few Snap-on models have, but once you use both of them side by side you'll reach for the Snap-on every time.

I am here to help...Perhaps if you had wasted all the time I did explaining to the "expert" customer "service" rep what I wanted done to the wrench, ("Uh, that's not covered under the warranty", which I didn't ask for). Then spent all that time on the phone trying to learn what had happened to my wrench. Only after all my legwork did I discover my wrench was gone. Then they danced for a week not wanting to submit the claim to UPS and pay me for the loss. BTW, my older model wrench had a metal adjustment handle. The current Craftsman 1/2 inch model I looked at the store has a delightful PLASTIC adjustment knob. No thank you, "quality" like that I will do without.

My mistake, I thought you were complaining about it not being covered by warranty. I've never really noticed a problem with Sears' "customer service" people mainly because I don't really deal with them all that much except for exchanges. I don't really expect them to be experts in the tool field, anyway, and since quite a few people who buy torque wrenches probably don't know they have to be calibrated from time to time, I'm not surprised that the customer service guy didn't know it either. My big Snap-on torque wrench has a plastic handle/adjusting knob and it hasn't given me any trouble in the 2 years or so that I've owned it. I only wish they made a case for it!

I was a wrench/service manager from the age of eighteen to twenty seven. Before I started working in shops, I did all my own work and had a decent sized collection of Craftsman and Proto. When I started working in shops, I began my collection of Snap On and Mac tools. By the time I was twenty two, I had bought enough Snap On and Mac that I was able to move all of my Craftsman back into my garage at home. When I got out of the motorcycle industry in '92, I had two complete sets of tools, my Craftsman/Proto stuff I had at home, and all my Snap On/Mac stuff I kept at work. There was a kid at the last shop I worked at who had started out bustin' tires and doing pre. del. set ups and was on his way to becoming a pretty good wrench, so I sold him my entire Craftsman/Proto "home set" including my Craftsman Pro Series roll away for 1500 bucks. Craftsman/Proto/SK are all decent tools with great warranties and I only had a few pieces fail me, mainly because I misused them. The best thing about these is that there is a place where you can go to return them. Now that I don't work in shops anymore, I've got to go to my local service station when I know the Snap On truck will be there so that I can warranty out any broken tools. Then of course, the only item I've had to replace in the last ten years was a brke spring puller about two years ago, and that broke because I misused it.