We recently posted our suggested Holiday Gift Guide, and before that we predicted which tools will sell very well during this holiday shopping season. Today, we’ll tell you about three of the tools that we are gifting to friends and family this year.
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1. Gorillatorch Flexible Tripod Flashlight – We picked up one of these for ourselves a few weeks ago, and then another one for a close colleague. The Gorillatorch is a rather versatile flexible-tripod flashlight, and if its $30 price were $5-10 cheaper, we would buy quite a few more as gifts.
2. Streamlight Stylus Pro Flashlight – Time and time again, when we are at a loss of what to give, we fall back to the Streamlight Stylus Pro. Everyone NEEDS a reliable flashlight that can be carried in a purse, briefcase, backpack, or pants pocket. Emphasis on the reliable part, which some people tend to forsake. Hi Dad, yes, I’m talking about you!
3. Kershaw Ken Onion Leek Pocket Knife – As with flashlights, we feel that everyone should have at least one quality pocket knife. Usually we opt for giving Leatherman or Victorinox mutlitools due to their greater utility, but this year one of our close friends is getting a Kershaw Onion with a plain blade and unadorned stainless steel handle.
By no means is this all that we’re gifting, but just those that have already been received or anticipated by the respective recipients. Please feel free to share with us any tool gifts that you plan on giving this year.
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Mike Shoaf
My wife gave me one of these last year, and we’re now giving some to others: Rockler sells a ratcheting hex key set that’s super-handy. It folds up to be about the size of a regular “pen-knife” style hex key set, but this one has a pop-out handle that allows for ratcheting. The ratchet action could stand to be a little finer, but it’s certainly better than many other name-brand tools I’ve used. For the price (only one digit before the decimal as of this writing!), it can’t be beat.
I haven’t had any particularly stubborn fasteners to use this on, so I can’t vouch for durability under high-stress. But it does seem like it would certainly be tough enough to handle anything I’d want it to do (automotive, bicycle and furniture applications).
http://www.rockler.com/product.cfm?page=19910
(I’m not affiliated with Rockler or the manufacturer of this tool in any way other than being a pleased customer.)
uthscsaedu
Hey Mike I’ve seen those ratcheting hex keys that you’re referring to, but not the Rockwell brand. The ones I’ve seen (which are imported, of course), have some statement on the packaging, which says something like “these are precision instruments, not to be used for high torque applications.”
Not exactly like that, but something like that.
uthscsaedu
Hey Stuart – nice touch with the gorilla tripod flashlight and the screw.
Is that the same “story of a screw” screw?
Stuart
I believe that there is only one brand of ratcheting hex key, and that other brands licensed the design.
As for the Gorillatorch, that’s a stock product photo. That, and the Story of a Screw screw was #2-56 machine screw.
uthscsaedu
well, it’s still cool. It reminds me of Wall-E for some reason