[OT - Crescent Wrench] - Re: 8.10b - first impression and questions

[Gene Heskett]

On Friday 10 October 2008, Thorny wrote:
>On Thu, 09 Oct 2008 21:02:44 -0300, Derek Broughton wrote:
>> David McGlone wrote:
>>> On Thursday 09 October 2008 11:13:35 am Art Alexion wrote:
>>>> On Thursday 09 October 2008 11:01:20 am Nigel Ridley wrote:
>>>> > You know how hard it is to find an adjustable metric wrench in the
>>>> > USA.......!
>>>>
>>>> Yep... *I've* never seen one...
>>>
>>> It's called a Crescent wrench.
>>
>> Not in my neck of the woods.  A crescent wrench is a _fixed_ size open
>> wrench.

My $0.02 (adjust for inflation)

"Crescent" does indeed make fixed sized wrenches and has for 70 years or more, 
but a 'crescent wrench' has always referred to the adjustable wrench they 
have made for even longer.

>Since I'm reading this OT thread I might as well put in my $.02.
>
>Not sure where your neck of the woods is but I can certainly understand
>that there could be regional or local names for some tools. I've even been
>in workplaces where there were localised, internal, names used for
>specific tools. Sometimes they were names that I won't include in a post
>and really had nothing to do with the tool or its use other than perhaps
>the way the tool looked physically.
>
>My understanding is that the name Crescent Wrench became a popular name
>for an adjustable open end wrench (the generic name) presumably because
>the name of the Crescent Tool Company was so prominently displayed on the
>handle and most humans like to deal with simple nicknames rather than a
>generic name which takes longer to say.

This is correct.

>I think it possible and likely that the Crescent Tool Company was the
>first to produce an adjustable open end wrench. When I was in high school
>shop class we were forced to use generic names for tools, thus a
>"Phillips" screwdriver had to be referred to as a crosspoint or crosshead
>screwdriver.

And that miss guided generalization can lead to all sorts of problems.  A 
cross point cavity in a screw head can be made in at least 2 patterns that I 
know of, and the two are most assuredly incompatible with each other even in 
similar sizes.  So please refer to the screwdriver both by the pattern used 
(Phillips/Reed&Prince or whatever name your vendor is using cuz he's too 
cheap to pay the Phillips royalty), and its size since there are Phillips 
screwdrivers sized from .5 to #5, although most folks have never seen one 
bigger than a #4 (and you normally drive that bit with at least a 3/8" square 
drive ratchet handle, the #5 usually has either a 1/2" drive, or a 3/4" drive 
socket on the rear of it).

The Reed and Prince cross-point pattern has been a PIMA for 60+ years.  For 
starters, that is the actual pattern on most el-cheapo cross-point 
screwdrivers, and when you stick it into a Phillips patterned screw, it 
doesn't fit well because its extended tip prevents full depth insertion, and 
then proceeds to tear up the screw and the screwdriver.  Conversely, the only 
way you'll get a Reed and Prince screw to take a Phillips bit is to set it 
into the screw with a _good_ hammer blow.  Most won't, so again you wind up 
fubaring the screw.  That can often be repaired with the hammer to set the 
bit into the screw correctly.  All this is assuming you are using the correct 
size in the first place.  If you aren't, well...

So please go back to that teacher and explain the real world facts of life to 
him, he is doing his students a huge miss-service by refusing to use the 
names correctly.  Take a 30" 2x2 or a Louisville Slugger along just in case 
you need a educational persuader.

>Another example which you will probably recognise (since your 
>email address ends with .ca) is the "Robertson" screw which is a square
>socket screw (to differentiate from hex socket screws which use an "Allen
>key", hex key). I'm guessing most names derived from the inventor's
>surname. Similar in the world of over-the-counter drugs is the common name
>"Aspirin" which is a copyrighted name for a product of the Bayer Company.
>(I think they were the first to produce ASA).

-- 
Cheers, Gene
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
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