With their pivoting box ends, Craftsman’s ratcheting elbow wrenches are anything but ordinary. Possibly inspired by similarly styled indexable ratchets, these elbow wrenches are designed for use in tight spaces and situations where a fastener may be obstructed.
Curious about whether these new wrenches were innovative, gimmicky, or both, we set out to review them. In the end, we ended up liking the wrenches quite a bit!
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Elbow Wrench Features
The primary benefit of the elbow joint is its ability to reach around obstacles to access fasteners. With a 180° range of motion, the pivoting box end can also tighten or loosen engaged fasteners with an easy push-pull motion of the wrench.
Although push-pulling one of these wrenches is quite easy on the hands, it is not exactly efficient for high-torque situations. For these jobs, the wrenches’ elbow joints can be locked into one of 13 set positions every ~15° with the push of a button.
As Craftsman says, lock it for leverage and getting around obstructions, unlock it to speed fasteners on or off with a piston action.
Initial Impressions
To be honest, push-pulling these wrenches felt a bit unnatural at first. However, using the wrenches in such a manner was not too difficult to get a feel for. Before long, it felt natural to use the wrenches in their intended manner. To be fair, about half the time they were used, the wrenches’ box ends were locked in at 0°.
After toying with the unfamiliar ratcheting elbow joint for a bit, I examined the build and finish quality of the wrenches. To my surprise, I was quite impressed. The wrenches felt sturdy and comfortable to hold, and the chrome finish was nearly impeccable.
Performance
As mentioned, once I got passed the wrenches’ learning curve, I was using them as intended with relative ease. At first I was a bit hesitant to really torque the ratcheting mechanism, but it seemed to handle my superhuman strength without so much as a hiccup.
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Compared to similarly sized Craftsman and Gearwrench wrenches that were on hand, the ratcheting elbow wrenches were longest. This provided me with a bit of comfort – if the wrenches couldn’t handle some tough use, they would have been built a bit shorter. Right?
Speaking of wrench lengths, the set’s packaging claims “up to 30% longer for more leverage” and shows a ratcheting elbow wrench lined up next to a Craftsman raised panel wrench. Not a fair comparison at all.
The sides of the wrenches, somewhat square and rounded off, are comfortable to hold and really press one’s hand against. The box and open ends may look a bit bulky, but were found to be comparable in size to the ends of other ratcheting wrenches.
Just to sum it up, these wrenches feel strong, well designed, well built, and they function exactly as advertised.
We managed to find a few scenarios that made good use of the wrenches’ unique design. Some of those fastening jobs could have been accomplished differently, but it became clear that the wrenches’ elbow jointed box ends saved a bit of time and effort in the end.
Country of Origin
In contrast to Craftsman’s previous commitment, these wrenches are made in China.
Conclusion
These Craftsman ratcheting elbow wrenches are available in 7-piece SAE (5/16, 3/8, 7/16, 1/2, 9/16, 5/8, 11/16 inches) and metric (10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 17 mm) sets. Regularly priced at $100 per set, these are not starter wrenches, although performance-wise they’d probably be up to the challenge.
If you plan on encountering many fastener obstructions, then you’ll probably get a lot of use out of these wrenches. That’s not to say that they cannot serve as a general-purpose wrench set, but most users would benefit more from a larger assortment of non-ratcheting combination or reversible ratcheting wrench sets in that regard.
Aside from one wrench out of seven being a bit stiff at first, we couldn’t find any flaws with these wrenches. Given their respectable quality and innovative utility, we recommend ’em!
Craftsman Ratcheting Elbow SAE Wrench Set via Sears
Craftsman Ratcheting Elbow Metric Wrench Set via Sears
Craftsman provided the review sample unconditionally. Review samples are typically given away, donated to a local charity, or in certain cases retained for future review, benchmarking, or comparison purposes.
Check out our photo gallery on the next page!
IndyEngineer
I have read other reviews of these wrenches and they are pretty much aligned with ToolGuyds conclusion. However, maybe I’m too stubborn but I just can’t bring myself to buy a Craftsman wrench made in China.
Superautobacs
I’m still wishing Sears will sell these individually.
I’d like to have a single 14mm so that I can couple it with either a 3/8″ drive socket adaptor or an assortment of bolt-thru sockets.
That way, it’ll compliment the indexable ratchet that’s been around for much longer, only this one will access tighter/shallower areas.
uthscsaedu
The side view of the wrench looks like it’s bent, unless my eyes are playing tricks on me.
It would be cool if they put elbows on both ends, instead of yet another open end.
Stuart
I’m not sure why they’re only sold in sets for now. I’m sure that if they become popular, Sears might start carrying individual wrenches.
Also, your eyes aren’t playing tricks with you, and no that’s not a camera lens defect. Each wrench does appear to be slightly bent. I believe that this is intentional and have a theory as to why, but will check with Craftsman to see what’s up.
I mean… sorry about that, I told you I had superhuman strength!
kythri
Stuey – you’re on Craftsman’s Facebook!
http://www.facebook.com/craftsman
Stuart
Cool, thanks for bringing that to my attention!
uthscsaedu
The open-end does not appear to have any kind of anti-slip or “flank-drive” feature. Is that correct?
Stuart
That is correct.
kythri
Yeah, you don’t see that on any Craftsman wrench, do you?
I dunno if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. I tend to look at that as a gimmick, never having had an issue with open ends. A lot of people seem to think it’s fantastic, which is great.
KMR
I can see these being a labor-saver in a pro-shop environment. Any tool that allows me to possibly work around a part, rather than remove that obstructive part, can be a major benefit to getting a job done quicker…
So since Craftsman authorized you to give the set away… how do we get it? 🙂
Might as well try to win the set before I buy a set.
Stuart
Once it’s determined that the wrenches’ curvature is intentional and not a defect, there will be a formal giveaway where a winner will be selected at random.
You could try to bribe me, but it would probably be much cheaper for you to just buy a set on sale. =)
uthscsaedu
I think even if the curve is a defect, someone would be happy to use them.
kythri – I asked about the anti-slip design because I’ve seen it on other Danaher wrenches (Kobalt and Gearwrench). Gearwrench calls it “Surface Drive Plus”
I haven’t seen it on a Craftsman open end wrench, but since this is a newer design from China, I thought it might have it.
Steve
I like the idea. Some non-ratcheting elbow wrenches would be great too. I won’t be buying any until the USA made version hits the shelves.
Stuart
Unfortunately, I don’t think that we’ll be seeing these in USA-made versions anytime soon.
Danaher most likely applied for a patent for the elbow wrench design. It will likely be cheaper for other brands to license this design from Danaher or rebrand the wrenches than to develop their own variation.
sherman brown
what i dont understand is why they dont come in full sets. the 7 piece sae set is one wrench short. i believe the set i bought is missing the 5/16, which is a size i use very often. and the metric set is missing 5 sizes of the wrenches. it should come in the 12 piece set. i have also noticed that the locking flex head wrench set now only comes in the 7 piece sets, missing the 11/16 wrench. i dont use this size very often but it is a real pain when i run across this size bolt or nut. why has sears made the decision to go with the 7 piece sets??
sherman brown
i have been trying to find the 5/16 elbow wrench. the only place i have found one is on ebay for 13.50 and it may be damaged.