I miss Sears and U.S made hand tools.

[gnappi]

Looking into my tool box I have a large number of Craftsman and Xcelite hand tools and some I bought used in the 70's and aside from obvious wear on non critical handles the contact points of the tool are still as new. No chips, rust or rounded off corners.

My fave little screwdriver is a 1/8" type 41421 which I keep misplacing so I found them on Ebay and ordered four more which will last the rest of my life, AND my son's.

A very close second small screwdriver is my Xcelite R5324 which I have four of. Gads, I really miss the quality of Craftsman and Xcelite US made tools.

The foreign made cheap junk is at best good for a few uses then they're 86'd :-(

 

[bigbillyboy]

I have an abundance of craftsman , proto , New Britain etc. , never heard of Xcelite .......

 

[gnappi]

I have an abundance of craftsman , proto , New Britain etc. , never heard of Xcelite .......

Xcelite is / was a brand that targeted research and development labs.

 

[Paul B]

Xcelite is / was a brand that targeted research and development labs.

You left out people that delivered and set up TV sets back in the day. Remember who they had to open the back and fiddle around so that the tree colors were properly superimposed? It was called adjusting the convergence. Ask me how I know. LOL
Somehow I lost the handle to mine years ago and tried to get one from the company. No go, either buy a whole new set or do without. My jaws are still torqued very tight on that deal.
Paul B.

 

[JohnL]

I have mostly US made tools. Proto, Snap-On, and old Craftsman among others.

China usually comes up in these matters. I have a heavy axe I use for splitting firewood. Made in China. It is excellent. The flat side of the head was tempered right so I can strike it with a hammer and is does not chip fragments at me. I prefer this Chinese axe to a typical splitting maul or wedges. So, they got this one right, at least!

 

[contender]

Often,, you can scrounge good quality, older tools, for cheap in all sorts of places. Yard sales, estate sales, pawn shops, etc. I still smile at a set of the larger Klein side cutters with the pliers nose I got for $1.00 at a yard sale. Or the estate sale where I spent about $60 and got a HUGE amount of ridiculously low priced GOOD tools. Heck, in that estate sale,, I bought tools I already had just because they were selling them so cheaply!

 

[KIR]

My son and I were discussing tools this morning as well and how we each still have Craftsman tools from when we were younger. Didn't Sears have a replacement guarantee for them like Benchmade knives does now?

 

[gnappi]

My son and I were discussing tools this morning as well and how we each still have Craftsman tools from when we were younger. Didn't Sears have a replacement guarantee for them like Benchmade knives does now?

Yeah, but I don't think that the guarantee carried over with the acquisition of their name brands or assets. Lowes sells some Craftsman items under some sort of deal with whoever owns the brand.

Not that I'd need it anyway.

 

[Mobuck]

My fire insurance covers 'replacement cost' of the thousands of dollars of tools I lost in the 11/2/22 fire BUT most of those tools were 20-50 year old Craftsman quality that you can't buy now. What is available is pricey and the insurance is balking at the cost.
I've given up on replacing with Craftsman and going with what's available at prices I can justify. Harbor Freight ICON is pretty good and the local store warranty coverage has been top notch. Unfortunately, warranty of a spread or split wrench may be nothing compared to the extra time/labor involved in removing the fastener that was damaged when the wrench failed.

 

[redfernclan]

I have been a mechanic my whole life so yes, I appreciate good tools.
My great Uncle ended up with the farm that my great grandfather homesteaded. I was living out there when he was liquidating the tools in the shop. I ended up with many of them. Proto, Williams, P & C, SK Wayne, Industo-super and a few John deer, IBM and JC Penny if you can believe it. I think my two favorite ones are a "cat" bar made by "Kline" and he gave me a 3 foot prybar that he had received for payment for doing some work. Its made out of a 7/8 octagon stock or Titanium. THAT is me favorite.

 

[GasGuzzler]

Even Snap-On imports stuff now. Speaking of...I haven't bought anything from them in years because our local rep retired and the new guy stopped coming. The lifetime warranty is pretty useless now.

 

[peachhead]

At some point I learned about the Craftsman Club. I think every so often I got a discount on certain tools, and had special offers sent to me. I bought a lot of Craftsman tools. Back when Sears was at the mall, it was one of my favorite places to go
Ace carries them now too but I don't think they are considered to be as good as they used to be. I've started to like Kobalt and Ridgid, some of their stuff is made overseas.
I still have a couple of small excelite screwdrivers too.

 

[Johnnu2]

peachhead's post remided me of days gone by when Sears was 'at the mall'; that's where I would go while my wife was shopping in the mall; when she was done, she knew she could find me in Sears' tool section.... those were good days in many ways.... Thanks for reminding me peachhead.

J.

 

[DrHenley]

peachhead's post remided me of days gone by when Sears was 'at the mall'; that's where I would go while my wife was shopping in the mall; when she was done, she knew she could find me in Sears' tool section.... those were good days in many ways.... Thanks for reminding me peachhead.

J.

I would go to Sears just to window shop in the tool department. I was like a kid in a candy store.

 

[woodperson]

Lots of good tools for sale at better prices now than in the old days.

 

[weaselmeatgravy]

I worked at Sears for about 8 months in High School and recall learning that they didn't make anything. Everything was contracted out to the lowest bidder. I had Craftsman tools because my dad did, and we knew all about their lifetime guarantee. One time I broke a 12 point socket on a particularly tight head bolt on a big block Chevy engine and I took it back and got a free exchange a couple times only to break the new ones, then I suggested they give me a 6 point and maybe that would hold up to the torque, but again I broke that. Finally they gave me one for an air wrench and it held up and broke the bolt loose. I recall I was using a pipe extension on a breaker bar, so probably had about 4 feet of handle for torquing it. It was 15 years later that I finally got a compressor and some air tools. And longer yet before I got an air wrench. But the older I get, the more I appreciate my Ingersoll Rand impact wrench, especially when mounting or dismounting the snowplow on my old tractor.

 

[Cholo]

In the early 70's I worked for an excavator driving dump trucks. One day we had to break a rather large bolt loose and we couldn't do it with a 3/4" breaker bar with about a 4' cheater bar and both of us hanging on it.

Tommy had about zero minus patience so he brought up his backhoe and slammed that cheater bar as hard as he could. Well, he twisted the end of that 3/4" Craftsman breaker bar and told me to get a new one at the Sears store.

I brought it in and the salesman said: I don't even want to know how you did this! He went in the back and brought out a new one.

We got that bolt off, but I don't remember how we did it.

 

[needsmostuff]

Craftsman made some pretty good mechanic hand tools. I was raised with them and the lifetime guarantee.
Except the rotten , worthless, POS ratchets. I never had one that worked properly for over 6 months. I owned and exchanged a least a dozen of them. 1/4 inch, 3/8th and one half all junk that would reverse themselves every chance they got. Pure junk.
Nowadays they changed the look and the model number and Ace and Lowes will not exchange any more.
Good riddance and give me a Proto ratchet.

 

[Watertender]

Most Channellock tools are made in Meadville Pennsylvania except for the adjustable wrenches which are made in Spain and excellent quality.

I have some older Craftsman Pro tools but have given a lot of them to kids starting out in the skilled trades.

I have pipe wrenches to 4ft that I got from an oil field supply that was going out of business. They were brand new and I got a great deal on them.

Right now these are the handiest tools that I have because I work on a lot of valves that need to be opened and closed and adjusted. They are Petol Refinery Wrenches made in Texas. They ain't cheap but they are great! I gave the red one to an apprentice HVACR technician and I use the aluminum one almost daily.

I also have the world's only true left handed pipe wrench and I can prove it!

 

[Fox Mike]

Craftsman, MATCO, MAC, and Snap On. I have a garage full of them. Buy quality tools and you buy them once; buy junk and you will buy it again and again, along with the band-aids used when they break.