I bought a pair after every reviewer seemed to love them and ended up absolutely hating them. They combine the worst aspects of adjustable wrenches and pliers. Unlike pliers you have to manually resize the opening for the bolt head before starting and unlike adjustable wrenches your torque depends on you keeping a vice-like grip the whole time you're turning it or they'll slip. Fuck those things, man.
I keep two (a 5" Knipex and an 8" Irwin) in my ~~tool~~ bags. (The small one in my everyday backpack and the bigger one in my toolbag.) They're much smaller and lighter than a set of wrenches.
They're also useful as parallel clamps/pinchers/vices. I've used them to (un)seat many press-fit parts like bike chain pins, small bearings, and shaft keys.
I’ve only ever used mine as portable vises, or to apply controlled pressure like snapping shut a press-fit watch case back. I always use sockets for actual nuts.
Like you, I find them much more useful as wrench-like pliers than as pliers-like wrenches.
Don't buy these if you think they'll replace your fixed size wrenches. Do buy these if you're often doing weird crap that you'd never even dream to use fixed wrenches for. And consider them if you hate your Channellocks but wish you didn't.
> your torque depends on you keeping a vice-like grip the whole time you're turning it or they'll slip
The post contradicts this. It shows the pliers gripping onto fasteners with only light finger pressure from one side. My own experience with these tools corroborates this -- as long as I'm pushing the moving handle towards the fixed one, the tool has a strong tendency to remain closed. I've only ever had to squeeze hard when trying to loosen well-rounded fasteners and when using them as a convenient parallel press.
A neat upside is that if pushing on the moving handle rotates the tool in the desired direction, then when you loosen your grip and twist the other direction, the tool will open wide, sort of ratcheting around the fastener to the next flat face. It's not as fast as a ratcheting wrench, but far faster than an adjustable wrench's procedure of place, tighten, rotate, loosen, remove, and repeat.
I love 'em but I don't usually use them on nuts, since there's better tools for the job. The fact that they're parallel makes them good for a lot of situations, like pushing something into another thing, or even just gripping onto things over a larger surface without marring them too much (e.g. I use them to get 3d prints off the print bed when they're really on there and refuse to give. Although I've also occasionally used the tiny version of them for e.g. installing a new faucet, when I couldn't get other things into the space.
It's a good tool but I wouldn't reach for it first in every situation. If you have a regular nut with plenty of space, there's better tools.
There is, for lack of a better term, "folk knowledge" and technique even for simple tools that someone has to explain or demonstrate. I've been lucky and had people in my family pass their experience on to me but I've also made a lot (a lot a lot) of mistakes ruining things and breaking tools.
Not just crescent wrenches, pretty much any tool with one fixed jaw and one moving jaw is directional. This applies to channel locks, vice grips, oil filter wrenches etc. It blew my mind how well these tools work if you rotate the right way.
Over in Australia they call them shifters. One of the many tiny culture shocks I had when I moved across the ditch was when I asked someone to hand my crescent and they passed my Crescent brand pliers instead.
It’s funny how these things are different throughout the Commonwealth. In Canada, if you asked someone for a Crescent Wrench they’d give you the adjustable wrench just fine, but if you asked them for a spanner of any kind they’d look at you like you had antennae sticking out of your head.
So much so that, while typing this, iOS autocorrect tried to change “spanner” into “scanner” for me.
From the description of "WP Content Copy Protection & No Right Click", which appears to be the most popular WordPress plugin tagged "prevent copy" (with 100,000+ active installations):
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From the reviews:
> hopeful ctrl U probelum will be resolved
> I work with website images all day long and this little nugget does a great job of protecting them.
> Well, it’s not perfect, if a Pirate wants your content he’ll find a way, but this great plugin will deter most people.
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In researching a few home improvement topics, I was amazed how often I found the exact same articles being posted in multiple places with different authorship asserted. It made me think that if I ever wrote anything original it would have the same end. Not to say that this technique prevents this or not, but I can understand the perception of the threat.
There is some risk of counterfeits when purchasing Knipex, Klein and other popular tools online. KC Tool and Zoro appear reliable. Other reputable online vendors for hand/power tools?
At a hardware store on Coldharbour Lane in London (at the Camberwell end) the guy behind the counter asked me if I wanted to buy the Rolls-Royce of adjustable spanners (wrenches to US folk) or a regular version. I purchased the Rolls-Royce version, the price difference was negligible, and walked out with a Knipex Adjustable Wrench. 15 Years later it still my favourite tool. Its weight, the quality of the metal and the fact that its jaws are always parallel make it a delight to use.
They're not even really the same tool but I don't care - the Irwin is just what I grab for just about everything and I only use these fancy Knipex when they are the only thing in the shop at the time ...
I have a set of these. They do work well, as the original post says, but I tend to use them more for holding flats or removing 8-sided plastic nuts and such.
One downside is they gunk up pretty quick if you're working with messy stuff. My 40 year old car has so much grit and grime underneath it (that I'm afraid to spray for fear of knocking something loose) that nearly every job is a dirty one. The teeth for the adjustable part are very fine unlike a typical channel lock, so they get packed with grime and hard to set sometimes until I clean them. I had the same problem with another push-button fine adjustable channel lock with a similar mechanism. The old C shaped channel with 5 positions never has this problem.
I have some of these, they are very expensive. Worth it to get the German made ones. Oddly, and I can not tell you why, when I want to remove/hold-fast nuts, I always end up grabbing my Mac tools wrenches and not these. Perhaps it is just because I can look at a nut and say "that's 14mm" and reach in my toolcart and grab the 14mm. Not sure.
I bought the little one, the cobra XS [0] for some absurd price (over $20) just for fun but it’s excellently made and I actually use it all the time! I’m waiting to upgrade the rest of my tools to knipex or the equivalently because I really appreciate the quality, even if I don’t really need it as I’m just a DIYer.
I bought them for my father and father in-law for fathers days a few years ago. Huge hit. Love mine but it probably slows me down, as I am always stop my project when I can only find a standard adjustable wrench, and go search for the knipex - it’s such a joy to use.
Most people seem to mention using them as an adjustable wrench, but they've been most useful to me as parallel jaw pliers. Unlike with traditional pliers, you can positively hold things with flat parallel sides while you do some work on it. Once I saw the pliers wrench it seemed so obvious, but I couldn't imagine pliers having parallel jaws. It was answering a question I didn't know that I had.
It was like at 23 years old when I saw my boss using vim for the first time. I thought notepad++ was the best I could get until I saw the speed of an experienced vim user. It didn't even occur to me that there could be a better text editor until then.
I grew up only knowing adjustable wrenches/parallel jaw pliers. I didn't even know there was a another kind. I can't stand using ordinary pliers for exactly this reason, thanks for articulating it
40 comments
[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 93.3 ms ] threadI guess they’re better than standard adjustable wrenches?
They're also useful as parallel clamps/pinchers/vices. I've used them to (un)seat many press-fit parts like bike chain pins, small bearings, and shaft keys.
Don't buy these if you think they'll replace your fixed size wrenches. Do buy these if you're often doing weird crap that you'd never even dream to use fixed wrenches for. And consider them if you hate your Channellocks but wish you didn't.
The post contradicts this. It shows the pliers gripping onto fasteners with only light finger pressure from one side. My own experience with these tools corroborates this -- as long as I'm pushing the moving handle towards the fixed one, the tool has a strong tendency to remain closed. I've only ever had to squeeze hard when trying to loosen well-rounded fasteners and when using them as a convenient parallel press.
A neat upside is that if pushing on the moving handle rotates the tool in the desired direction, then when you loosen your grip and twist the other direction, the tool will open wide, sort of ratcheting around the fastener to the next flat face. It's not as fast as a ratcheting wrench, but far faster than an adjustable wrench's procedure of place, tighten, rotate, loosen, remove, and repeat.
It's a good tool but I wouldn't reach for it first in every situation. If you have a regular nut with plenty of space, there's better tools.
Today is a good day then!
There is, for lack of a better term, "folk knowledge" and technique even for simple tools that someone has to explain or demonstrate. I've been lucky and had people in my family pass their experience on to me but I've also made a lot (a lot a lot) of mistakes ruining things and breaking tools.
I presume you're a Kiwi?
Over in Australia they call them shifters. One of the many tiny culture shocks I had when I moved across the ditch was when I asked someone to hand my crescent and they passed my Crescent brand pliers instead.
So much so that, while typing this, iOS autocorrect tried to change “spanner” into “scanner” for me.
> This wp plugin protect the posts content from being copied by any other web site author , you dont want your content to spread without your permission!!
> Protect your content from selection and copy. this plugin makes protecting your posts extremely simple without yelling at your readers
> its near impossible for expert users to steal your images !!
From the reviews:
> hopeful ctrl U probelum will be resolved
> I work with website images all day long and this little nugget does a great job of protecting them.
> Well, it’s not perfect, if a Pirate wants your content he’ll find a way, but this great plugin will deter most people.
> I started using this plugin when I got tired of having my content being used on the internet by people who thought that global distances would mean I would not find my content on their website!
https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-content-copy-protector/
What nonsense
I think similar things exist for Windows.
... but the only thing I ever grab are these:
IRWIN VISE-GRIP Locking Pliers, V-Jaw, 12-Inch (2078112)
They're not even really the same tool but I don't care - the Irwin is just what I grab for just about everything and I only use these fancy Knipex when they are the only thing in the shop at the time ...
One downside is they gunk up pretty quick if you're working with messy stuff. My 40 year old car has so much grit and grime underneath it (that I'm afraid to spray for fear of knocking something loose) that nearly every job is a dirty one. The teeth for the adjustable part are very fine unlike a typical channel lock, so they get packed with grime and hard to set sometimes until I clean them. I had the same problem with another push-button fine adjustable channel lock with a similar mechanism. The old C shaped channel with 5 positions never has this problem.
(Edit: IF it's a decent quality spanner and the correct size)
0. https://helpatmyhome.com/knipex-cobra-xs-pliers-review/
It was like at 23 years old when I saw my boss using vim for the first time. I thought notepad++ was the best I could get until I saw the speed of an experienced vim user. It didn't even occur to me that there could be a better text editor until then.