My son's taken up wrenching in earnest - he's in the City College auto repair program and started an apprenticeship at a shop nearby. I want to gift him the basic tool sets he needs. The usual stuff: drive sets in 1/4", 3/8", and 1/2" standard and metric.
Is Craftsman still the go-to brand? Snap-On? DeWalt?
I'm also thinking to get a corded, as opposed to cordless impact driver - yes, no? Looking at a DeWalt 7.5 amp corded driver, 345 foot lbs torque
Welcome all suggestions and input - thanks!
Now while I don’t buy the brand anymore, there is still quite a few Craftsman sockets in the $50k+ worth of tools I have at the shop. All leftover from my 19something piece “starter” set I got from my parents as a Christmas present 24 years ago. Over the years, when a socket broke, I didn’t waste my time going and finding a Sears. I simply replaced it with a Snap-On (or other tool truck brand) piece.
The point of all this is, you’re on the right track here. I don’t know how many pieces it’s up to these days, but the one that’s about 200 tools is a good set to start with. Your son will figure out and quickly upgrade the things that are huge improvements over box store tools, like the screwdriver set and ratchets. And if a socket breaks or whatever, at that point he’ll probably just replace it with a truck brand or get a new set in that line (such as 1/4” drive metric 6 point).
No corded impact driver. Absolutely not. The only people that use those are the guys at the Napa parts counter who zap off a pulley from your alternator to transfer it to the one they’re selling you. In a shop, the cordless stuff is everywhere now. Plus they’re actually stronger than the corded units now. I just bought the brand new 1/2” Ingersoll-Rand cordless impact...frigging thing has 1500 ft lbs breakaway power. If you want to get him an impact driver, IR of course is great, Milwaukee, Makita, and Dewalt would all be fine to use in a shop. Stuff from brands like Ryobi, Bosch, or any other brand that looks like a much better deal than the first group I mentioned? Fine for home use, bu not for a professional.
Since you asked about Snap-On...yes if you’ve got the kind of money where you bought your son a Range Rover for a graduation present? Then sure, you can buy a starter set, impact driver (air or cordless), or any other tool from Snap-On. They are all usually fantastic quality with an amazing support system (since you don’t even have to go to a store, they come to you every week). Buuuut, all the jokes about getting a second mortgage or selling your first born are not that far off. I have no clue what that 200 piece Craftsman set costs these days, but let’s just call it $200. You could get a similar set or just match it piece by piece with Snap-On, but it would cost close to $3k. The current 1/2” Snap-On cordless impact driver is somewhere around $850. If you’ve got the money, then great. Otherwise, it’s an awful expensive investment for something you (and your son) don’t know if it’s really going to be something he does for the long haul. I’ve met countless numbers of kids over the years who get in my line of work. They bury themselves buying a box and tools from one of the tool trucks, and a year later, they start getting kinda meh about doing this. Maybe they’ve gotten discouraged because it’s not as fun as they thought, or they don’t have the aptitude for it and they’ve messed up a bunch, or maybe they realize that the pay sucks for what it does to your body. Either way...whether you buy it or he buys it, go slow with the tools in the first year or two.
