Welcome to the Craftsman Professional Combination Wrench Study. While the Professional Wrench has not been around nearly as long as the Raised Panel Wrench or the Teardrop Ratchet, there is still a bit of confusion that needs to be cleared up.
Here’s a “Quick Find" index to help you find what your looking for in this thread
Reply 5 page 1 The Stainless Steel Set (1972)
Reply 16 page 2 Brief history (very brief) of Moore Drop Forge / Easco Corporation / Danaher Corporation
Reply 22 page 2 The “Craftsman Motorsport” wrenches (1991-1993)
Reply 24 page 2 The Gen 1 Professional Wrench (1994-1997)
Reply 26 page 2 Angled Open Back wrench – France (1994-1996)
Reply 31 page 3 Gen 1.1 or Gen 1 short/standard length (1995-1996)
Reply 37 page 3 The HUGE Gen 1 wrenches (1997-
Reply 41 Page 2 The Stubbies (1997-2010)
Reply 49 Page 4 The Gen 2 Professional Wrench (1998-1999)
Reply 54 Page 4 The Gen 3 Professional Wrench (2000-2013)
Reply 57 Page 4 Craftsman Industrial Wrench (2014-2015?)
Reply 62 Page 5 The Crab Claw (2015-present?
Reply 66 Page 5 45-degree Deep Offset Box-End Wrench (2002-2012)
Reply 68 Page 5 Quick Wrench (1998-2003)
Reply 77 Page 6 Flare Nut Wrench (1999-?)
Let me start with a little history of how I became interested in this subject. A few decades ago I was an A&P Mechanic working at the local airport and had purchased a set of the Standard Craftsman Raised Panel combination wrenches for my meager, 3-drawer, rollaway toolbox. I bought the Craftsman wrenches because there was no way I could afford Snap-On wrenches. The Snap-On truck would stop buy the hangar once a week and all I could do was go in and drool over the shiny tools until the boss would tell me to get back to work.
Fast forward about 20 years, after a stint of flying Army helicopters, I was a Civil Service missile tech working at an airfield in Germany. Part of my job was to drive around the flight line in my VW bus and test the Hellfire Missile systems on the parked Apache helicopters. I had purchased one of those grey plastic tool cases that had all the little pockets to keep your tools organized. I filled them with the Craftsman wrenches from my rollaway toolbox. The problem was, every time I needed to use a wrench at home, I had to go out to my bus to grab one. I promised myself I would buy another set of wrenches next time I went back stateside. So, there I was cruising through the local Sears when low and behold there was a set of shiny, Snap-On look-a-likes stamped “Professional”. Well, I was a professional so I bought them.
Fast forward another 20 years, newly retired, puttering around in my garage when I looked in my toolbox at the still shiny wrenches while next to them was my old Raised Panel Metric Wrench set. Off to Sears again and there they were, a shiny set of metric wrenches. Good price too. I was putting them away in my toolbox and noticed, hey, one-of-these-things-is-not-like-the-other. Where’s the “Professional” stamp? Where’s the “USA” stamp? And the open ends were thick, fat, massive chunks of steel. It took just a few seconds of internet searching to figure out these were forged in China. I’d been duped. So off to eBay I go, only to discover that everything marked “professional” is not the same either.
So here we go. After my postal carrier started using a dolly to bring my eBay purchases to the door, I think I have it all sorted out and decided this information needed to be shared.
We will be covering the wrenches pictured below and maybe a few more that are part of the story leading up to introduction of the “Craftsman Professional” line of tools. There were really only three main “generations” of the professional wrench series with a few offshoots. To simplify things, I have decided to label them Gen 1, Gen 2 and Gen 3. (See, I told you it was not as complicated as the Teardrop Ratchet). Also, during this study I will refer to the left or right end of the wrench. These references are with the word “Craftsman” right side up and facing you.
And remember, this study is about the Professional wrench series. PLEASE do not start posting pictures of your Grandpa’s Raised Panel Craftsman wrenches from 1933. That’s not what this is about.
Thanks for reading this far. We’ll start getting into the meat of the subject in the next post.
Todd F.
From top to bottom:
Raised Panel wrench (for comparison)
Stainless Steel
Pre-Professional (Craftsman Motorsport)
Gen 1
Gen 1 standard length
Gen 2
Gen 3
Craftsman Industrial
Chinese “Crab Claw” (for comparison)
