Friday, February 8, 2019

Micro tool kit! Fits in an Altoid tin

So I have been working on collecting my own tool kit since I started riding back when dinosaurs roamed the world and all I had was a stick and rock and the wheel had yet to be invented. I started with a 1/4" hex drive breaker bar and some sockets from Craftsman and Snap-on (the Snap-on one's were allen hex heads and screw driver heads). Recently I was told by a mechanic friend about the Wera 1/4" ratchet and I added some extensions to run regular hex drill bits which are now a dime a dozen... well maybe a dollar each, but it's not hard to collect them. The Altoid tin works as a thing to hold all the bits and keep them from poking through the 1qt freezer bag, because I don't want to lose any of these while on the road. I stuck in all the weird allen keys that have come with various racks, water bottles bosses etc and you can see the heap I now have. But with these tools I can do a lot of on the road repairs. If you get a 1/4 to 3/8th converter you can add the breaker bar for bigger sockets like a 15mm, and disassemble almost any bike. But I've whittled my pile down to this.

The funny shaped tool is a Leatherman(tm) MAKO Shark Ti tool. I carry it because it has spoke wrench cutouts, the bottle opener, and it's another way to use the sockets.

The rubber "O" rings you see hold the extensions in the Shark tool and allow it to sort of "ratchet" if you slide the o-ring off, insert the extension in the hex hole, and put the o-ring back on. It keeps the extension in place.

The Wera ratchet is really nice, and has held up well. There may be a better quality one out there but so far I haven't seen it.

Anyway it fits in a nice tight package, and rides in my tool roll. Along with some latex gloves, a multi tool, etc.

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