Cool Tools: Ratchet Wrenches

I truly believe that every one of us (yes, that includes YOU!) has cool tools that we use on an everyday basis and stories about how we use these tools and how we came to find and use them. I'd like to hear about yours. Meanwhile, here's another one of mine:

Even if you are only a very occasional fixer upper or user of mechanical tools, I think every toolbox needs to have a set of these relatively new ratchet wrenches. These are very much in keeping with one of the dominant themes and requirements to be a Cool Tool: simplicity. In this case, it's a wrench with a built in ratchet mechanism. 

 

They also represent one of those ideas that makes you ask “Why didn’t I or someone else think of this sooner." Technically they did, since there have been ratchet wrenches for many years, BUT they have always been very large and quite “clunky” or impossible to use in most applications since the ends were so large you could not get them into most spaces where the heads of nuts and bolts are typically located. These newer versions fix all that and are sleek and small, even smaller externally than many plain or non-ratcheting wrench ends, which makes them VERY usable now.

In proper tool terminology, these wrenches (as shown on the left) are known as combination wrenches since they have an open end and a box end on each wrench. The new twist that makes them truly cool and indispensable for me is that they added a ratchet mechanism inside the box end. 

I find myself using these wrenches at least ten times more often than regular sockets for many reasons. The new ratchet wrenches take up MUCH less space, so you can get into much smaller and tighter spots, a situation that seems to be the norm most of the time for me. The ratchet mechanism is also designed with smaller increments, so you only need to swing or move the end of the wrench about 5º instead of the more typical 30º. This can make the difference between success or failure when it comes to removing a nut from an area that has immovable objects in the way of the handle, which again seems to be common in most situations. Being open on both sides also means that these wrenches can slide over any length of threaded bolt that is protruding from a nut, unlike sockets which are limited by their depth. This in no way eliminates the need for sockets though, since they are still very useful for reaching down into recessed holes for example, but since I’ve started adding these ratchet wrenches to my tool box, I find myself using my socket sets much less often.

 

 

One important note: if you are about to go out and purchase some of these, there are several important differences among the brands that you should be aware of. I’ve tried quite a few, and the most important of the differences for me has to do with whether the box end is offset at an angle or lies flat with the handle. This in turn determines how they reverse their action to switch between tightening and loosening.

Offset wrenches such as this on on the right, are bent where the box end attaches to the handle of the wrench so that the head is at a small angle of about 10º. Thus, when the wrench is put onto on a nut that is on a flat surface, the handle sits at an angle or is offset from the surface to provide enough space for your fingers to grip the other end and this prevents (OK reduces) scraped knuckles. These offset wrenches can therefore only be used “one way up” so that the offset raises the handle above the surface and therefore the offset ratchet wrenches have a small lever on the box end that you turn from to one side to the other in order to reverse them.

On non-offset wrenches such as this one, there is no need for this lever since you simply flip the whole wrench over. While you would think that you’d most often want to have the offset wrench type, I’ve found that the flat or non-offset wrenches are what I reach for more often since they are a bit smaller on the overall end and I never have to worry about accidentally bumping the lever and changing the ratchet direction when I don’t mean to. 

In practical terms then, you really want to have a set of both the offset and the flat or non-offset types. If you are still reading this, you probably a tool lover like me and so you know that tools are like disk space and memory on your computer—you never have enough!  However, if I were only able to have one type, I’d personally choose the flat non-offset ones first, since they are smaller on the ends and therefore more useful in more situations.

* Quick tip:  To know which way to use the flat or non-offset wrenches with no lever so the ratchet is going in the right direction, just look at the other open end of the wrench. The open end is always set at an angle relative to the handle, which is how you reverse an open end wrench to reduce the swing angle that is required (see photo of the  combination wrench at the top). I’ve noticed that when you are looking down on the wrench in position, whichever way the angle of the open end faces is the direction the box end works.

The other big difference I’ve noticed is that some makes, such as the popular Craftsman brand, have much thicker amounts of metal around the box end. This makes the end stronger I’m sure, but it also means that they often won’t fit into the spaces provided around a nut or bolt head. Therefore I strongly recommend the ones that are much thinner and sleeker on the ends, which get into all but the tightest areas.

If you’ve been reading Off Course – On Target for awhile, you’ve no doubt figured out that I graduated with honors from the school of by “Never a Sentence when a Paragraph Will Do” and I often find that the explanation of something very simple takes much more time and words and seems much more complex than the item itself.  Hopefully you can see how brilliantly simple this new style of ratchet wrenches is and why they easily make it into my Cool Tools category.  Hope you too find them useful or they might be a great gift idea for your favorite mechanically-inclined friend or family member.  You can usually spot them by their scraped knuckles and dirty fingernails! <g>

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Have  "Cool Tools" you use and want to share?  Send me your favorites with the following information:

• Name of the tool and source for getting one. 
• What does it do? 
• How did you come to discover this? 
• How do you use it? 
• Why is it on your top ten "Cool Tools I Use" list?

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