My bestest wrenches

ethicalpaul

Are those painted in "I dare you to steal this" purple?

B_Sloane

Flame Safeguard color

Don Brick

B_sloane I love your color choice I have used it for 20 years . Here are just some of my favorite wrenches. I have over 500 in my collection

BradHotNCold

Gordo said:

I am partial to the S-2 Ridgid compound wrench.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odLe_3fVpq0&t=

Gordo said:

I am partial to the S-2 Ridgid compound wrench.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odLe_3fVpq0&t=

Gordo said:

I am partial to the S-2 Ridgid compound wrench.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odLe_3fVpq0&t=

BradHotNCold

As Gordo’s video shows, the best one is the lever...
“ Archimedes — 'Give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world.”

BobC

I bet that purple paint discourages those wrenches from walking off.

I have a 50ft bright pink 14-3 extension cord that I still have for the same reason.

Bob

rick in Alaska

When I bought my first 24" aluminum pipe wrench, the first thing my boss told me to do was paint it ridgid red so it looks like a steel wrench. Otherwise it will be gone in a heartbeat.
Also, my wife painted all of her hand tools pink so I wouldn't take them. Didn't work. When you need a tool, it doesn't matter what color it is.
Rick

Alan (California Radiant) Forbes

@B_Sloane Nice Mulberry tree in the background!

mattmia2

I've seen the wrench with the drift on the end called an erection wrench because it is designed for erecting steel, the drift is for pulling the steel together while you get the other bolts in.

B_Sloane

BobC said:

I bet that purple paint discourages those wrenches from walking off.

Bob

Pawn Shops around here will not take painted Tools

KAB_2

Article a few weeks ago in Boston Globe on origin of Stillson Enjoy https://www.google.com/url?client=internal-element-cse&cx=006376928391721581342:dttdzxtrxse&q=https://www.bostonglobe.com/2019/12/06/magazine/forgotten-story-americas-most-famous-tool/&sa=U&ved=2ahUKEwi4y9rboovnAhVFbs0KHWDhB3IQFjAAegQIAhAC&usg=AOvVaw3Rn0if0lF344VrCDsElx1N

hot_rod

mattmia2 said:

I've seen the wrench with the drift on the end called an erection wrench because it is designed for erecting steel, the drift is for pulling the steel together while you get the other bolts in.

Erectors spud wrench is another common name.

mattmia2

The origin of that second line about spuds seems dubious. A million commercial and industrial things still have spuds...

Hap_Hazzard

If you don't know what to call something, call it a spud.

JUGHNE

I did see on the "Steve Lav" Utube a pretty good idea.
He has a small, maybe 10" pipe wrench that has thin jaws.
The handle is cut off, so if you needed a pipe wrench to work on an expansion tank, you fit the cut off wrench onto the flats of the tank nipple. Then take a 14-18" and open the jaws large enough to fit over the mini-wrench. I have watched him do this several times and works out well.

ethicalpaul

Hey wrench fans, here's a new TOH video about Stillson's invention: https://youtu.be/3RaUSUOvSlI

Jamie Hall

The one I can find when I'm looking for a wrench...

PMJ

Anymore it seems to take two men and a boy just to look at my Ridge Tool 60 inch.

retiredguy

I was in a supply store about 30 years ago and they had a 96" Ridgid pipe wrench. I thought it was a plastic display model until I tried to pick it up. So I had to ask the supply house "who was the customer" for such a huge wrench. I was told that it was going to a railroad yard to tighten nuts on parts of the old steam engines and drive train. I should have known it was for a steam customer.

I had the pleasure of using a 72" wrench to tighten a steam flange. I was much younger then.

I had a wrench with a drift on the end for aligning the bolts for flanges.

Intplm.

I frequently ask that I be talked out of using a pipe wrench that is bigger than three feet. Im beginning to listen👀👂

EBEBRATT-Ed

@rick in Alaska

very true. aluminum wrenches disappear. steel ones don't.

Same thing with box and open end wrenches. Chrome wrenches walk. Black steel wrenches stay

mattmia2

i have some harbor freight aluminum pipe wrenches and i notice that they veer to the side a bit when i use then up close to something. Is this just crappy machining somewhere? I just don't use pipe wrenches enough to have aluminum rigid wrenches.

BobC

Years ago I happened upon a collection of 6 pipe wrenches for $25 on ebay - shipping included. I bought them and a week later I heard a loud thump on my front porch.

The package had 8" to18" wrenches, all American made and all in good shape. The one i was looking for was a Ridgid offset wrench that didn't show much use at all. I gave three of them away and added the rest to my collection.

Some guy was spinning in his grave over this one. Years before this find a buddies wife sold her fathers toolbox at a yardsale for $10, her dad was a diesel mechanic and that box was full of tools. That thing weighed a ton but I'm sure the buyer ran out of there like it weighed 2 pounds.

rick in Alaska

JUGHNE said:

I did see on the "Steve Lav" Utube a pretty good idea.
He has a small, maybe 10" pipe wrench that has thin jaws.
The handle is cut off, so if you needed a pipe wrench to work on an expansion tank, you fit the cut off wrench onto the flats of the tank nipple. Then take a 14-18" and open the jaws large enough to fit over the mini-wrench. I have watched him do this several times and works out well.

When I was doing fire sprinkler work, we would take an 18" wrench and slide about a one foot piece of copper pipe over the handle and hammer it on to fit tight. That way, we had effectively an 18" wrench, but with a lighter wrench, and jaws that would fit in to tight areas. I still use that wrench almost daily, but the copper finally broke off and I haven't replaced it yet. 34 years of use will do that.
"Same thing with box and open end wrenches. Chrome wrenches walk. Black steel wrenches stay ."
Personally I don't like chrome wrenches as well as black ones. If you are a mechanic and are doing anything with oil, then it is very hard to hang on to the wrench.
Rick

mattmia2

Or get the socket off the extension or adapter.

Hap_Hazzard

Added a 15" Ford wrench to my collection. Jaw capacity is 3¾".

Mad Dog_2

Always read and was told about the Famous Parmalee Wrench, the best wrench for working on Chrome plated Brass. It grips like the human hand and leaves no
Marks on the Chrome plating. Priced one out about 10 yrs ago.   Almost 1000 bucks for 1/2" pipe size.  I had to fit out a very large commercial kitchen with 14 appliances all CP heavy brass. Stick w my old school tricks.  Rainbow rubber, sheet lead and rosin...Mad Dog
 

WMno57

I have several Parmalee wrenches that I have picked up at estate sales. Very few know what they are. They are also used to grip rollers in textile and paper mills.
https://parmeleewrench.com/

mattmia2

Seems like one little piece of debris and it's all scratched. Could do something with multi strand chain and a piece of rubber that works on more than one pipe size.

Hap_Hazzard

You can't exert quite as much torque with rubber strap wrenches, but it's enough to assemble steam piping with PTFE compound or tape. (Disassembly is another story, but you don't always need to save what you're taking apart.) There are good ones and bad ones, like anything else, but the ones pictured below, with the metal levers and the reinforced straps work very well as long as there's no grease on the strap or the work, and I have a pair I've been using for about 15 years now.

Chain wrenches usually have a serrated jaw that leaves bite marks, and padding it with rubber or leather reduces the torque you can apply to about what you get with the above strap wrenches.

guzzinerd

Mad Dog_2 said:

Always read and was told about the Famous Parmalee Wrench, the best wrench for working on Chrome plated Brass. It grips like the human hand and leaves no
Marks on the Chrome plating. Priced one out about 10 yrs ago.   Almost 1000 bucks for 1/2" pipe size.  I had to fit out a very large commercial kitchen with 14 appliances all CP heavy brass. Stick w my old school tricks.  Rainbow rubber, sheet lead and rosin...Mad Dog
 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/275688792613?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=J195ldk9SyW&sssrc=2349624&ssuid=FWKVlNuoS2u&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

$100 with shipping gets you the 1/2" plus 3/8" and 3/4"

Larry Weingarten

Hi, One good thing the Parmlee wrench does is to not make pipe go out of round when you need to use force, so it's good for any stubborn threaded pipe.

Yours, Larry

EBEBRATT-Ed

My absolute favorite wrench is a Ridgid 14" steel offset wrench. Used that more than anything.

I am retired and don't need it........but no one can have it!

When I die it's going in the box with me along with the head of my over 52 year old "Bendfield" 1/2" EMT bender.


So there.

JUGHNE

Ed, my Greenlee 1/2" CI head is 54 years.....so there!

Wife probably won't allow it in the box though.

EBEBRATT-Ed

@JUGHNE

My Benfield was at the oil co I started working for in 73' and I ended up with it. It looked 50 years old then so I don't know how old it really is. I have had several 3/4 benders over the years that got misplaced or stolen or someone borrowed it and I never got got them back.

But the old 1/2" I always managed to hang on to. I also have a 1" T & B (Thomas & Betts) and an 1 1/4" which I think is a Greenlee....that one has an aluminum head which are just as old. Used the 1 1/4" a few times but not often. Takes a lot to crank that one lol