I haven't yet run across an adjustable wrench that was worth a shit. Even old (notionally decent?) Crescent ones.<p>The jaws invariably splay when you apply force, even if you're using them correctly. I've come to the conclusion that it's just intrinsic to having a moving jaw that moves easily enough to be useful.<p>At this point, if I expect to need the wrench ever again (or need to reuse the fastener), I'll just buy a proper wrench for it. The couple of Crescent wrenches I keep are for emergencies and plumbing (because I don't have combo wrenches that big and do it infrequently), nothing more.<p>Vise-grips? Another tool that I find is more apt to round something than grip it properly. If I'm reaching for them, I figure I'm already so dicked that I'm unlikely to make it worse. Once in a while they get me out of an otherwise unavoidable trip to the hardware store.
The wrench in the article reminds me of that class of products engineered to maximize sales, not utility.<p>I teach my children that dollar store products are all junk. But I still let them shop there because it's an inexpensive way for them to learn the lesson that there are businesses that have no scruples about selling junk products.<p>I wonder how disheartening it is to be an engineer who designs these products. To be honest, they're probably just happy to be making a paycheck just like many of us. I've worked plenty of jobs that I didn't believe in.
This title was badly editorialized. Submitted title was "Beware of Bargin Bin Tools". You can see from the earlier comments here how badly that skewed the discussion in a generic direction that was dominated by the rewritten title. This is why HN has a rule excluding this type of title rewrite:<p>"<i>Please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize.</i>"<p>If you want to say what you think is important about an article, that's fine, but do it by adding a comment to the thread. Then your view will be on a level playing field with everyone else's: <a href="https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=%22level%20playing%20field%22%20by:dang" rel="nofollow">https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...</a><p>It's actually a good submission, but you need to use the original title so that can people can figure out for themselves how to assess the content and what they want to say about it.
The article is talking about a tool made by Crescent which was the original brand name making adjustable wrenches. In fact traditionally a few decades ago any of these adjustable wrenches were called a crescent wrench no matter who the manufacturer was. Like Craftsmen tools another example of the decline of tool brands from quality to junk.<p><a href="https://jamestowngazette.com/crescent-tool-company/" rel="nofollow">https://jamestowngazette.com/crescent-tool-company/</a>
<i>Looking more closely, the slider screw has a pitch of approximately 0.545"/rev and a diameter of 0.25", for a helix angle of 34°. This means that less than half of the slider force is actually used to turn the screw, undermining any force gain. That is, the jaw force is less than is applied to the slider due to the screw's inefficiency as over half of the applied force is lost pushing against the screw's supports.</i><p>Is that accurate that over half the force is lost? As the helix angle gets lower wouldn't more force be transferred to the screw instead of the supports? I'm no mechanical engineer but my gut says 45 degrees would be the point where forces are balanced between screw and support and as the helix angle decreased (to 34 degrees for example) more than half the force would be applied to the screw.
Here’s mine. It has a wheel on the side. So it needs two hands.<p><a href="https://www.bellota.com/es-es/para-el-taller/herramienta-universal/llaves/ajustable/llave-ajustable-de-moleta-lateral-forjada-en-acero-crv-6464/6464-8" rel="nofollow">https://www.bellota.com/es-es/para-el-taller/herramienta-uni...</a><p>It’s still as solid as the day I bought it. All others I have seen grow loose with use.
There was actually a revisiting of an earlier design in this space recently:<p><a href="https://www.metmo.co.uk/products/metmo-grip" rel="nofollow">https://www.metmo.co.uk/products/metmo-grip</a><p>I funded on Kickstarter (to get one for myself), and then again on Indiegogo (to get one as a graduation gift for my son) --- it's an amazingly nice tool, and once broken in, incredibly smooth.
I’d wager the reason the the screw mechanism wasn’t designed to give a mechanical advantage is that it’s a part from a standard crescent wrench. The idea here was not to design a sliding lock mechanism, but to make a slide that can spin a regular crescent wrench.<p>Note that The crescent wrench already closes up linearly, so we’re just changing direction 90 degrees. There’s better ways to do that.
Knippex "Pliers" are still far superior to this. They blew my mind when I first used them. I dont use normal wrenches at all anymore - the knippex just grip stuff so much more perfectly and with less chance of rounding and you can "ratchet" around the bolt even though they are open ended.
Wera is even selling self adjusting wrenches, which tighten themselves when you turn them. The big drawback is that the adjustment range is quite small.<p>All adjustable wrenches have the inevitable problem that they are easier to break then their solid counterparts and have some flex in their construction.
Don't beware of, just know your problem. You can and absolutely should buy bargain bin tools for emergency circumstances, or for rapid <i>disassembly</i> jobs, or in one-off situations, or simply as backups if your expensive tools are unavailable.
I've long subscribed to the philosophy that you should buy the cheapest tool you can find and use safely, use it until it wears out, breaks, or your skill surpasses the capability of the tool - and only then should you spend money on high quality tools. Too much money is thrown away in the name of "buy once, cry once" only to discover that you don't need the capabilities offered by the top of the line options.
Poorly designed, poorly manufactured, barely works in use <i>and</i> rounds the nuts you use it on so that subsequent attempts will be harder even with better tools.<p>It feels like there's been a strong Satanic / nihilistic philosophy at work among the hand tool industry for a while now. Started somewhere around the time period when the movie "Rambo" caused a fad for crappy "survival knives."
The bargain bin is fine, you just need to know what you're buying, and most people have no idea. For the engineering types here, you just need to remember one thing -- complexity scales fast. A bargain bin cast single piece wrench has no moving parts and only one failure point, the accuracy of that cast. If the price is low, its probably worth grabbing.<p>The bargain bin table saw on the other hand has multiple dimensions of accuracy, many joints that have to line up, many engineered materials with various degrees of quality (polycarbonate? ABS? cast aluminum?) along multiple interference angles. Not a good idea to throw that $129 special in your cart.<p>Remember that accuracy isn't cheap. Quality tool steel, dies, machining, QA -- it all costs money and is reflected in that price you're paying. Adjustable wrenches as show in the article are notorious for this problem. Backlash is one of those things that your average consumer doesn't think about. The engineer can do some quick thinking when shopping, "can I really manufacture XYZ part at scale and sell it (at retail!) for $1.00 and expect any degree of accuracy in that worm gear, on which this part relies on entirely for its usefulness?"
Not all bargain tools are bad. One of my favorite YouTube channels to find decent quality/affordable tools is Project Farm. Funnily enough he did recommend a Crescent brand wrench: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cyOd05PUix4">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cyOd05PUix4</a>
I noticed the bargain bin in the hardware store often just gives you the illusion of buying cheap. In reality you just get crap for a price that is higher then the branded tools
This goes for everything:<p>- Know someone who likes books? Buy them good books!<p>- Know someone who likes coffee? Buy them specialty coffee!<p>etc.. I never saw the point in "oh they love painting, I'll get them these super cheap paints" or whatever.