ChrisR

It will be interesting to see how the XR Flexvolt 54v (as it is known this side of the pond) will compete with the new Milwaukee OPE. I suspect that Milwaukee will come out on top. Why? 9ah battery Vs 2ah. Even when you factor in the higher voltage I suspect that the DeWalt will lag on run time.

C'Mon guys. This is the most innuendo I've seen in a thread. "How do you clean your tools?" "I like mine to be blown clean." "I like mine to be gently towelled." "I like to dip mine in peanut butter and let the dog lick it clean." LOL

I'm a big AvE fan. I don't do Patreon but I've subscribed to his pay per views. Because of what he does to the tools he is never going to get freebies from the tool companies and some of the industrial stuff he is buying to strip down is mega bucks. I also find the techy geeky side interesting too. Plus you won't find a more honest tool review on the internet. Who else has taken a $gazillion Festool saw, stripped it down and proven it to be pretty much junk? I also don't agree that he speaks the way he does to attract audiences. I have spent my career working with guys that speak like that. Canada has a more British outlook than the US and here in Britain we generally take the piss out of everything and everyone. In fact if a British guy isn't taking the piss out of you, your car, your job, your wife, your house then he probably doesn't like you very much. :-)

Copper theft is now a major issue in the UK. We even have people sneaking on to railways at night and stealing the signalling cables! Empty houses are often raided for the copper pipes and wiring. All metal theft is on the rise now sice we saw an influx of Roma Gypsies from Eastern Europe. These buggers are literally removing street furniture such as trash bins and benches to sell for scrap. Metal theft is now the number one crime that the British Transport Police (who deal with railways infrastructure) deal with. And it is very high on most other police priorities.

I ersonally think Wera are the best screwdrivers around. They come in insulated variety and are very reasonable price. For pliers and cutters Knipex are great as are NWS and CK. Btw Knipex do make for other brands and are often cheaper with the other name, ie Draper here in the UK. I can't speak for Klein as here in the UK they are ridiculously expensive. Due to a single importer who clearly consume a lot of narcotics before their pricing meetings at their office. I note your list does not include a meter but if you did need one I would recomend Fluke and also would consider a clamp version. I use a Fluke 325 as a marine engineer as I need the ability to measure volts, continuity and resistance but also the need to measure current without breaking the circuit. For crimpers I always go for ratchet type as these give a far superior crimp. Get a version with interchangeable jaws if you need to do insulated and non insulated. Or just a cheap pair of each. Cheap ratchet crimpers will all give a better crimp than expensive non ratchet crimpers. Strippers are a personal item. Some guys like auto, some traditional, some old boys just like using a knife. Find a version that feel comfortable in your hand and that you can use over and over with good results. For a bag, yes Veto pro pack are awseome but so is their price point. Many manufacturers offer good bags. Get one with a hard plastic base and comfortable carrying system.

I've just bought a Snap-On badged flashlight in Costco for £11 +Tax. For that price I don't care if its waterproof as if I drop it in the harbour I'm not going in after it.

They have been using it in Sweden for a while apparently so it's good for ice. The water is not trapped under the road it soaks away naturally as if there was no road there. Obviously it is for rain and snow not rivers of water. The idea is to prevent floods forming due to water being trapped on the surface.

Gardening. It's not that I can't do it but I hate it so much that I leave it until it's a jungle and then when I have to spend an entire weekend hacking it all back I promise myself that I'll keep on top of it, but I don't.

You can already get cordless pop rivet guns and cordless pipe benders. I put the links to a couple I found on the youtube comments section.

Yes. I use a £30 set for insulated crimps. That's about $45 in American money but here that is about the price for the wife and I to get lunch at the local pub so not expensive. The Knipex version here is about £100.

I'm not sure what brand my current boots are? I like to wear slip on dealer boot style. Here everything has to be British and Euro standard before you're allowed to wear them on industrial sites. I wore Jallatte rigger boots for a while offshore( issued to me) but I soon went back to dealer boot style.

£1.14 for Diesel and £1.10 for petrol (gasoline) here in Fife, UK. That would work out around £4.32 per US gallon or US$6.56/gallin for diesel and £4.17 or $6.33 /gallon for petrol( gasoline).

Nothing wrong with a lot of the Chinese ones. They're very often the same as the brand ones, made in the same factory by the same guy. The difference in crimp quality between ratchet and non ratchet is night and day. Ratchet are also more comfortable as you can stop half way if your hand hurts. Although that would likely be because you had the tension wheel adjusted wrong. Once you use a ratchet crimper, even a cheap one, you'll never go back as you just wont trust manual crimps.

No no no! I have spent my career both at sea in the UK Merchant Navy and offshore oil and gas industry before coming ashore and working for myself as a marine engineer servicing commercial vessels so a career pretty demanding of good tools. One employer I had in oil and gas used to supply us with entire tool sets from Snap On. Honestly I thought they were no better than any other and infact worse than many. We had a higher breakage rate on hand tools with Snap On than any other brand and offshore you can't just call the Snap On van to come and warranty them. Their spanners are very spindly and thin which I'm assured by auto mechanics (who owe Snap On more than their home mortgage company) that this is a beneficial trait in the auto world but honestly when working with big boy toys it's not. Are they decent tools? Yes, some of them are. Are they worth the cost? No, not inder any stretch of imagination! I tend to find that the only guys who really think they are that good are really just trying to convince themselves they haven't been robbed, but they have. Also: Snap On's biggest tool boxes are like £20,000?? I could literally employ someone to store my tools in a van and bring them to me on request for that money!

Wera are awesome screwdrivers. I'm ashamed to say I don't own any myself but before I was self employed my employers always supplied all tools and I always used to order Wera. As far as I'm concerned there are none better. I really must buy myself a set as they are quite reasonably priced here in the UK. BTW: Bosch Ribbed Tipped, lol sounds like a condom variety! lol. Ribbed for your extra pleasure!

Proper ratcheting crimpers are always far superior to normal types. You get a much better, even and more secure crimp. BUT you need to have the correct jaws. I have a set for insulated crimps that has the three colour dots. But you can get sets that have interchangeable jaws that do insulated and non insulated. No need to spend Knipex money (although they are great tools) You can pick up ratchet crimpers with interchangeable jaws for a very reasonable price.

I like AvE, His Canadian sense of humour is very close to my British sense of humour. Although he's quite secretive I get the impression he works in mineral extraction. I have worked in the offshore oil and gas industry as well as having worked in the commercial shipping world so our view of tools and how they should work is probably quite similar too. The bottom line is that the Festool saw he tore down was not a quality machine! Bushings instead of bearings and less than quality plastics could perhaps be explained away on a tool that was considerably cheaper but for me the real killer blow was the undipped motor windings. That there would have me returning a £10 special from the Ti Nee Cok manufacturing company as not fit for purpose. I'm actually surprised that would even get UL and CE approval for use in the US and Europe?

I think the worst I've done to myself was running an Oxy Acetylene cutting torch over my hand. I was bending and cutting steel brackets aboard a ship. The ship rolled and my right hand holding the torch moved across my left. It just felt dry at first then about 15 minutes later it was agony. Got a half day off duty for it though so not all bad. Also broke my foot in a storm off California once. We ran into San Diego a week later and I had the opportunity to go to docs but it was halloween and the gas light district was jumping so went to the pub with the lads instead. The worst I saw happening was whilst working on supply ships offshore India. Ourselves and another ship were under the rig back loading well casing pipe for the beach when on the other ship the deckhand on the cargo deck got himself between the pipe and the crash rail when the ship took a roll. He was squished from the stomach up. Their whole crew got flown out on leave as they were all pretty traumatised. Talking about shipyards above. I didn't witness it but a guy in Rosyth Royal Dockyard, whilst I was on the tugs there, was setting up a big mag drill on a plate with his mate as was a two man job. He was holding the bit with gloves when his mate hit the magnetise button. But his mate hit the wrong button and the drill switched on, grabbed his glove and ripped his middle finger right out. A good friend of mine was there and said when they picked the glove up the finger was inside and a tendon about a metre long was trailing out if it. Moral of that story is don't wear gloves when working with rotating machinery!!

Good to hear he is on the mend.

I'm a Marine Engineer. I have worked in a ship yard a few times throughout my career. Over here in the UK we have different, perhaps more archaic names for trades. A Shipwright is concerned with the fit out and construction of the ship. A plater will do the actual cutting and shaping of the hull plates before they get to the building slip/dock. Welders can work as both trades as well as pipe fitters and boiler makers. Boiler makers are particularly archaic as most shipyards no longer make their own engines and boilers. Naval Architects are the designers but in reality for the first decade of their career they do complicated maths workload for the senior guys actually doing the design work. Then there is us marine engineers. We take the vessels to sea and operate them. In a shipyard environment we also do the commissioning of the machinery and sea trials. I started off my career in the British Merchant Navy but now run a small sales and repair company mainly servicing commercial fishing boats. If you live near a shipyard then I doubt there could be a more interesting heavy industry to be in. Unlike a factory the job is never the same and the challenges are different every day as no two ships are ever identical and no sheet of steel ever bends in the same manner. However it is not an industry I would move location to join as it is a VERY volatile industry in the western hemisphere where work orders are increasingly harder to come by and competition from Asia and cheaper economies makes job security a rare thing, job losses are common.

I don't know if they do them in the US but Costco here in the UK offer a box by a company called Homak. I think they are a US manufacturer. The boxes offered here were not super wide but were a 16 drawer combo of roll cab and top chest. BUT they were only asking like £300! So you could have got two sets for under £1000. They were great quality too. Double slides on the big drawers. Good welds and drawer rims all doubled. Apart from the big Homak logo they were as good as a Snap On, the metal work anyway. Not sure if castors are as strong? Certainly better quality than the usual cheap stuff we get here which is all about the £1600-£2000 range from Machine Mart (our equivalent of Harbor Freight.) If they are available at Costco in the US I would have a look at them.

I'm pretty sure KIng Dick are still made in Birmingham, England. They are made by Abington King Dick company. Looking at some of their tool boxes etc that stuff might be offshored but afaik the spanners are still made onsite in the UK. I think it was K-D tools that were Apex owned not Abington King Dick?

I kind of feel that a lot of guys talk up SnapOn because they are trying to justify the cost to themselves? I have used them quite a bit in the past and I can't see the benefit of hem? They are a bit skinny for my industry where we often end up wailing on spanners (wrenches) with a hammers. My absolute favourite wrenches are (and you will love the name) King Dick. They are a UK classic and are as tough as they come. I have an inherited combination spanner from the 1950's which has spent it's entire life being abused in heavy industries like ship building. I put a vernier calliper across the open end which was all beat up and it was exactly 15/16th just as it was when it left the factory. They are not the sexiest wrenches around. No super slim grips or x-beam technology. If you order from the factory they will acid etch your name on them though!

Thanks guys! It's great to be here.

Hi, Chris here from Fife in Scotland. I'm a marine engineer who has spent most of my career working at sea as an officer on merchant ships and defence support ships. I now run my own small business mainly dealing with commercial fishing boats and smaller commercial craft. I love the TIA videos on Youtube and thought I would see what's happening on here. I love tools and can often be found flicking through tool catalogues when not working.