Why oh why didn't they make all the small wrenches just a bit smaller? Like maybe exactly one millimeter smaller. 99 times out of a 100 when I need a wrench smaller than 10mm the first one grab is always too big. If they'd just made all the little ones 1mm smaller I wouldn't have that problem.

Whenever there is a 50/50 chance of something going wrong, 9 times out of 10 it will.

Have tyou ever heard of an Adjustable wrench?

I get it. In my case, they need to make them all 1mm larger.

We should swap wrenches.

Of course. But when I pick it I guess wrong 100% of the time about whether to push or pull the little adjuster.

I have three big and one little adjustable wrenches. One is a real Crescent wrench. But I can't use it on my French bikes. For that I need a croissant wrench.

Know the feeling Jim. Just this past week, I was tempted to put different colored bands of electrical tape on my 8,9 and 10 mm wrenches. Then I thought "this is silly!" Then I picked up the wrong one again.

I once wanted a Whitworth wrench set, but have noticed I already HAVE one whenever the job calls for a common metric size.

I have all my wrenches color coded to make it easy. Now if only I could remember what each color meant?!?!

I know where all my metric wrenches are...right next to the pile of rounded off standard bolts.

After 30+ years of wrenching for a living, it is pretty easy for me to tell the size of the bolt/nut just by looking at, but then I started to work on bicycles more and more and it is the only place I think I have ever used a 9mm wrench everything else metric is either 10 or 8mm in the real world so this one still gets me. 99.9 % of what I work on is metric. When it comes to the old British sized ( Whitworth SP?) nut & bolts all bets are off.

Glenn

Bolt size = the size wrench I can't find.

Scott

I usually get the right wrench on the third try... It varies evenly between:

Too big, too small, just right

and

Too small, too big, just right

This really ticks me off, especially when it ends up being a wrench that I just used.

I've been wrenching fast little furrin' cars for fun for 30+ years. Some sizes are (or at least were) never used, 6mm, 14mm, 16mm, 18mm. I find them all over the place on bikes. Bikes keep those wrenches from feeling unloved.

It's right there in the toolbox. That's another truth I've learned from all that car wrenching.

Japanese cars have used 14mm heads on their 10mm bolts for decades. What used to be 17mm (10mm thread) and 19mm (12mm threads) on BMW, VW/Audi & Mercedes are now 16mm & 18mm. 6mm is rare on a car, since 4mm thread (7mm head) is about the smallest machine-thread fastener you'll find. some old instrument clusters used sheet metal threaded screws with 5.5mm heads.

Bored yet?

Bikes are way simpler, though it is getting hard to find allen wrench kits with the 7mm that you need for early alloy Cinelli stems.

yeah, I never came across a 9mm needed on a bike. std, old, sizes, 8mm, 10mm, 14mm, 15mm, sometimes even a 17mm. All the others adorned the shop peg board.

Paging Goldielocks, this wrench is too big and that wrench is too small...

I've heard tell there are numbers stamped on wrenches -why don't they stamp them on the fasteners???

LOL

Most older and the cheaper derailleurs used a 9mm sized nut on the cable clamp, I have used it a lot lately.


And yes I have the 5.5mm sockets for strange fasteners, that is another one I hate running in to because that's about the time my socket isn't where it is supposed to be.
Glenn

I pretty much buy any tool I can find. I have all the wrench sets as well as all the taps and dies for metric, US, Whitworth, straight and taper pipe and a few odd gas fittings. I have the 5/16-32 that is on the outside of a schrader valve. I have many of them in left hand threads also. I don't have French and Italian BB taps though..

Me too! Wouldn't you think it is a design flaw? Couldn't there be a simple addition that could be sensed without having to turn it two ways first? I have been having that problem for years.

Every trip to the tool box now, I pick up 3. One will be too small, one too big, and one Goldilocks.

Works about 10% of the time.