Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Building socket sets at the pawn shops?

Showoff ... Nice setup. One of these days I'll get my mess organized.

Ballz,

It's obvious you didn't pray for this find. It appears to be more of a deal with the devil.

I could spend a 100 in gas & never find a deal like that in the shops around here. Never seen a shop that didn't break down & separate stuff to nickle & dime it to death.

Good score !

Garage sales, esp those of recently divorced females. Their elated to get rid of the ex's crap that they will never use. Seems that the husband always takes his guns but forgets about a lot of the tools. Ran into one a few weeks back, she was moving and didn't want to move anything associated with him. Spent around $3,000. Best one I ever hit. GW

Ballz must have a mean head game.

That's how I feel about it. I catch a used deal here and there, but it can be a time sink. I have my father's old mechanic tool set which is mostly Craftsman with a smattering of JH Williams, Snap-On, etc. Good tools, but the socket and wrench sets had a lot of gaps, so rather than futz around, I bought the Craftsman 540 pc Mechanic's tool set at Sears while they were still made in USA. Several years later I added new SK 1/4, 3/8 and 1/2 socket sets and SK metric and SAE combo wrenches since Craftsman was starting to offshore their tools. There's enough redundancy that it's unlikely I have to run to the store in the middle of a job if something fails.

BIL works in the gravel business. He starts every day with a Snap-On screwdriver that has flathead on one side and phillips on the other and a Snap-On Adjustable wrench in his pocket. He's fixed hundreds of things over the years with just those 2 tools. That Snap-On "Flank Drive" adjustable wrench is one of the few things that its worth paying the money. Its 1000% tighter made than a cheapy.

I have been trying to build a open end wrench set from the late '40s. It's slow going in pawn shops. I've had better luck at the fleamarket when it was allowed. Sockets and wrenches from the better Taiwanese manufacturers are easily as good as Snap-On from the '60s.. The subtle design improvements are noticeable. Current Snap-On are still better. Having said that I use tools from the "60s '70s and the '80s . Knowing your brands is the secret . We all know Craftsman but there were better quality brands.