I decided it would be good to add a pair of basic slip-joint pliers to the toolbox in the RV. It's already stocked with Channellock-type pliers (two sizes, regular and big), needle-nose, duckbill, side- and end-cutters. But there are times when yer basic, all-purpose slip joint pliers are just the ticket. So I went looking. Normally, it's not hard to find a pair, but this is winter, when the sales are down. So the first two pair of decent pliers I found weren't quite your basic pliers:
I've been intrigued by thin-jaw slip-joint pliers since I found them in a Craftsman tool catalog back in, oh, maybe 1968; I couldn't quite figure out what problems they solved that regular pliers could. So, of course, that (bottom pliers, a pair of Challenger #3246 pliers) was what I found first. Then I found, at a different sale, the Craftsman (no model #) pliers at the top, above; at $2.00, hard to resist.
The Challenger pliers are in the small, but still normal, end of the size range; but the jaws are sure thinner. Here they are with my pair of Snap-On slip-joint pliers (thank you, Uncle Charlie! Part of my inheritance from him):
The Craftsman pliers are odd ducks. They're arc-joint/Channellock-type pliers,
but the angle between the jaws and the handles is closer to the inline configuration of slip-joint pliers (Uncle Charlie's Snap-On pliers again, top in photo)
than the close-to-or-at-45 degree angle you find on Channellocks (Channellock pliers from a yard sale a while back, and boy are they handy!).
I think the Craftsman pliers have won a berth in the RV toolbox. The thin-jaw Challengers will go into the shop toolbox, where they can teach me what good things they can do.
