Lowe’s launched a new Kobalt mechanics tool set that looks to copy – sorry, be closely inspired by – Wera’s hugely popular Tool Check portable tool kit format.
The new Kobalt tool kit features 41 pieces including screwdriver bits, sockets, a driver handle, and adapters.
Lowe’s doesn’t show much in the product photos, but it looks like there could also be a bit ratchet here. If you look at the top, there’s what looks like a direction selection lever poking out from the same spot where Wera places the bit ratchet in their own portable tool kits.
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Bicycle tire levers? That’s an unexpected surprise.
This is multi-functional mechanics tool set with some robust-looking Kobalt tire levers for bike repair tasks.
Price: $30
Discussion
The price seems great.
From what I can see, Lowe’s did pretty good with this kit. Don’t feel bad that it looks a lot like Wera’s unique styling, as they’ve also been… heavily inspired by others’ innovations, as Allwrencher can likely attest to about Wera’s Joker adjustable wrenches.
My Wera bit ratchet and screwdriver bit Tool Check tool sets are among my favorite, most reliable, and highly convenient portable tools. This new Kobalt offering is just $30, compared to $90 for the Wera metric set.
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You do get more pieces and I’m sure a quality difference with the Wera, but not everyone can justify spending 3X the money.
I might pick up a tool set for review consideration, but it’s got to be at least 1/3 as nice as the Wera tools, right?
I started off with a small Wera bit ratchet set, then went with a Tool Check, and then their upgraded Tool Check Plus. $90 for all that can be hard to justify right out of the gate. $30 for the Kobalt? Pretty smart move by Lowe’s.
I’m not sure this set needs the bike tire levers. Maybe they can serve some kind of double purpose.
Reflector
The bicycle tire levers probably came out of whatever Lowes employee (or OEM…) realizing that the Wera kits with the Tool Checks are popular within the bicycling community. Rare case of seeing the niche hobbyist market I think.
Blocky
I do like the inclusion of stubby tire levers, but it feels slapped on. For bike applications, these sockets are dead weight. Unless there’s a 15mm socket, and even then with poor leverage, this set is not going to take the wheel off my road bike. 19mm for my e-bike. The Wera is 5.5-13mm and that’s probably what this is, though it should be in the listing.
My daily bag has a lobtex adjustable wrench, bondhus 4,5,6mm dedicated L keys and pedros tire levers, which is about as light as I can go and address most things in town.
As far as mini tool kits for cycling, the pbswiss bike set has always looked like the winner to me – compact and functional— just add the wrench of your choice.
https://www.amazon.com/PB-pi-bi-Pair-Green-470greencn/dp/B00IG7NQZA/
I’ve also used the crank bros m19 for almost 2 decades. It was in my bag for most of that time but as others have mentioned, it is poor for access and turning, especially on e bikes.
Blocky
On the bike stand at home, I think this icon set is going to find more use:
https://www.harborfreight.com/locking-flex-head-ratchet-and-bit-set-35-piece-58074.html
Mini ratchets from Anex to Wera to Vim and Icon have saved me hours working on bikes. I’m sure the unpictured Kobalt ratchet would also serve.
William Adams
Probably my most favourite tool is intended/marketed for bikes:
https://silca.cc/products/t-ratchet-ti-torque-kit-2nd-generation
(though I will admit, I’ve been tempted to swap out the bits in it for a matching set of PB Swiss)
will
I paid $35 for my wera on sale so I wouldnt go near this copy for $5 less,but with that said its a solid price and in a year they’ll have these for $10-15 during sales. For that price I’d buy the metric to go with my SAE wera.
John
This looks very nice for a portable bike kit, actually. It’s not much bigger than the ‘swiss army knife’ style bike multi-tools but looks way nicer to use compared to trying to screw something in while rotating a whole tool.
MattW.
This just opens the flood gates for inferior tool checks. Toolant made one touting it was better or as good as its German counterpart. Now with a mainstream store version more people will do the same. This reminds me of icon vs snapon not much to stop it. The worst part we get to fake listing’s with wrong pictures on azon people getting scammed thinking there getting a deal. Just concerned.
ITCD
Icon v Snap-on isn’t the same, because the folks behind the Icon brand are deliberately making the choice to make their items look as much like Snap-on as they can reasonably get away with, and blasting direct comparisons to Snap-on in the marketing materials on top of that.
This here is just someone going “huh, seems like a good idea and they do seem popular. We’ll hop in on that.” Which is literally the way it always goes. One company was the first to make an adjustable wrench, now there’s adjustables from tons of companies. One company was the first to make modern ratchet wrenches, now there’s a bunch (including Wera jumping in on that). One company was the first to put 2 and 2 together in regards to electric tools and a battery to get rid of the cord, now there’s a bunch of options there as well.
The Wera self-setting spanners goes back even further than the Allwrencher pointed out in the article, I’ll have to dig it up again but an extremely similar design was already around a century ago, they just had the spring on the outside but the concept was literally identical otherwise. Where’s the pitchforks over the Jokers?
MM
Speaking of the Joker self-adjusting wrenches: I have the complete set. I bought them because of the realization that they were like the infomercial-tier self adjusting wrenches my father once owned, except the Jokers are well made and came in a wider variety of sizes. I bought them specifically because “hey, someone finally made a version of this old tool which is actually pretty nice”. I think that’s why nobody complains about them; the idea wasn’t new, but they made a quality product. This Kobalt tool kit isn’t an improvement on anything, it’s a cheaper knockoff.
Mini tool kits are nothing new; what I like about the Wera tool checks is that they are nice quality. Most mini tool kits are full of poor quality bits whereas Wera are top tier.
ITCD
And the folks who want good quality are quite welcome to spend the money on a Tool Check. Or to swap out the bits in some other set to something of better quality. I just don’t see a reason, personally, to get all up in a huff about a company seeing a good idea and going “we’ll try our hand at it, too.” For better or worse. That’s just the nature of competition, and so long as there’s no IP protection on it anyone is free to make their own version of it whether that version is the crappy inexpensive version or an absolute top-notch version.
Sky
Junk knockoffs in the spotlight; great…
Witness
Wera bits are diamond dusted to improve their grip. Apparently these aren’t?
Eric
As far as I know it’s only the gold colored bits that are diamond coated, so you only get a few with the tool check plus. The rest are just their standard bits.
Eric
The Lowes page does mention a ratcheting bit driver, and the screwdriver handle doesn’t appear to be ratcheting so it’s probably just Lowe’s terrible photos and listing hiding it. They also really need to list the bits and sockets included. Especially since you can’t even see what must be a 2nd row of bits.
I’m guessing tariffs played a part in the huge price increase from Wera, it’s been around $66 for a long time. Looks like the price jumped up in January. And it’s still around that same price on amazon.de.
Stuart
The price has been at the $90 level for a while.
For example:
https://14cyiuhvcgv.com/16-top-amazon-holiday-tool-deals-still-available-2022/%3C/a%3E%3Cbr /> https://14cyiuhvcgv.com/amazon-wera-screwdriver-tool-set-deal-103023/%3C/a%3E%3Cbr /> https://14cyiuhvcgv.com/fathers-day-tool-gift-guide-2017/%3C/a%3E%3C/p%3E
In 2017, the price was $85.
Amazon sometimes has sales pricing ranging from okay to deep discounts, such as for Black Friday, Prime Day, and similar. $66 is an extremely rare and very atypical deal price.
Amazon DE and others do tend to have lower pricing than USA. https://www.amazon.de/Wera-056490-Tool-Check-Ratchet-Sockets/dp/B00I8MYMT2/?tag=toolguyd-de-21
will
I got my wera for around $35 but this was over a decade ago. If I’d known the price would increase so much id have bought the metric kit as well. Such a useful tool for small projects,I might have to buy this in metric until I can find a crazy good wera deal,so it might be awhile huh.
David
The average price for metric version on Amazon has been just under $90 since 2016.
[ccc link removed]
Archer
The tire levers won’t help much, but this seems like it could be a pretty good thing to have on a motorcycle too. Might grab one to keep on my KLX300.
David
Typo: Bike levels => bike levers.
Stuart
Thank you! *fixed*
Steven B
Why no 15mm socket? The most common thing I have to do is remove or tune the wheel…which is always a 15mm socket. I avoid quick release because I live in the city and don’t want to make it too easy to steal my bike wheel (happened to me a few times living in Chicago).
I desperately want a tiny, well organized tool kit…like this or the tiny craftsman/dewalt, but the lack of 15mm means I am stuck using my current system of old tools in a small canvas roll…that weighs more and takes up more space than I’d like.
PW
Lowe’s is something else. Here’s a product that I’m interested in, but I cannot tell if it’s a worthwhile purchase from their comically bad listing. IS there a bit ratchet? I see no details in the listing (it says 1/4 ratchet somewhere but details). What size sockets are included? What are the sizes of all the bits?
Honestly I routinely see fake BRAXERN and DLIFLY brands on Amazon with more information than this.
will
It has the locking lever on top and I can see the back of a ratchet. I dont know what else it could be,but yeah talk about bad photos. Just pop it open and take an off angle photo and they could’ve fit everything in one Pic. I guess part of the budget was cheap photography,the ceo must’ve gotten his 6th grader to take the photo,and paid him in shiny pennies since they’ll be dead soon,so may be worth something in a few hundred years.
will
I wonder if it has the extension on the top. The only way to get it out is to slide it to the right. So you’d have to remove the shims to get it out every time. Theres a slot for it so maybe there is another way to remove it or its just a blank spot and the ratchet is just longer?
will
Nope ,to answer my own question each slot on top has its own lock,so it must be removed by pulling up on the extension.
camt
I bought this today. Can confirm there is a small ratchet wrench on the top for the included bits, as well as a quick connect extension. The screwdriver is not ratcheting but that is fine. There is an awesome selection of included bits. I was surprised to see ball end hexes, and just about every torx size you’d want. The included sockets are the same included in the wera kit; missing the 9mm which is kind of common on classic and cheaper bikes. The only issue with this kit is that the tire levers are cheesy looking and just don’t work well. I don’t see myself using this often, but it’ll be nice having so many essentials in one little kit.
camt
Picture of the included tools:
https://imgur.com/a/x3wkRSJ
The full list from the back of the package:
https://imgur.com/a/RS6cGCv
Stuart
Awesome, thank you!!
PW
Thanks so much! Your pictures are so much more informative than the Lowe’s website.
blocky
Very cool. Looks like the assortment matches Wera’s bike kit down to the bit selection:
https://www.amazon.com/Bicycle-Check-Special-Content-Bit-Socket/dp/B07X4HRP3X/
DH
Cute, too bad pretty much every Kobalt Tool Ive ever come in contact with has been “harbor Freight” quality at best. I have ZERO confidence in this brand
Sam
Morgan’s Maintenance YouTube channel has a comparison review to the Wera ToolCheck. Biggest downside is the Lowe’s set has a solid back, so you have to use the sockets to expose the bits. I fear over time if not built sturdy, the parts holding the sockets might break off. Positive side – the bits are labeled in their holders. And the tire levers detach and can be stored separately.
Cody
I guess Lowe’s realizes there’s money to be had in copying the German tool brands, and bringing them at pretty cheap prices. Thus, I’m getting one here pretty soon, as my Lowe’s has them in stock.
While far from Knipex quality, I was impressed by the $15 two-pack featuring a 125mm Cobra clone and 160mm Pliers Wrench clone they had last Christmas season. Surprised they didn’t do another run for Father’s Day, as they sold well.