Tool collectors

[john.k]

Been trying to put together a set of Whitworth spanners for a buke restorer just starting out ...............and can you believe it ,Whitworth spanners are now premium priced as collectable tools ...........everyone selling single items  at exorbitant prices ...well $20-$30 each for Sidchrome rings ,anyway .........About 20 years ago ,someone gave me NOS boxes of Whit  sockets with the ratchet drives and bars gone from them ,as there was zero call for Whitworth at that time.

[cardan]

Yes I've seen this too, but I've also seen reasonably priced Whitworth spanners at swap meets and so on, even Sidchrome. I guess it's worth looking around. Luckily I still have the Sidchrome spanners and sockets I bought at McKewan's (?) in Bourke Street, Melbourne in the 1970s, plus the product of a lifetime gathering odds and sods. Tools are nice.

Leon

[R]

Yes, swap meets seem to be the best sources for reasonable prices.
Hyperinflation seems to have struck anything listed online !

If you can get the fleabay sellers in the UK to post with Royal Mail economy international, then there are some reasonably priced sets to be had there.
Not Sidchromes though, obviously.
Delivery does take a few weeks, not next day or 2 like some of the sellers want to send !!  Boy that costs ...
They seem to be experts at gathering up whole sets.

If you watch the local fleabay long enough, someone will break ranks and offer a set or 3 at reasonable prices.
Ya gotta be quick though ...

You can still buy new Sidchrome sets, at lower $$ than some of the used sets are asking.
Dunno if they are any good ?
And some sellers ask top $$ for the same thing, dunno what is going on there. !

[john.k]

Yes I see you can buy new Whit stuff for not much more than the second hand stuff ........The kid wants antique stuff ,and he wants Sidchrome ......yeah right ,make it easy.............I do have a full  set of Sidchrome Whit stuff ,and no way is he getting that..............Funny thing is that eons ago ,Sidchrome tools were dismissed as clumsy and second rate ...but thats the 60s for you .........nothing made in Oz was any good,now its all collectable............Suppose it could be worse ,he might want all Dufor or Dowidat tools .

[Rex]

Maybe people would have more luck finding stuff if they used the correct terminology, ie "Imperial" rather than "Whitworth".
Whitworth, as any fule no, is a threadform not a type of spanner.
These Imperial spanners are sold at UK swapmeets/autojumbles for a quid a time as there's no call for them. It's worth rooting through the boxes of tools just to get a range of spanners to keep with each bike.

[john.k]

There is a great surplus of AF tools here (think US /SAE fasteners) ,and if you say Imperial the cunning sellers immediately think 'Aha ...Ill unload this rube with a lot of SAE tools ,when I know he wants Whitworth."..............and much Whitworth tools are marked with a dual Whit/BS marking in two different sizes .....which further confuses those who know only metric ...............Sooo.If you want British Standard tools ,say Whitworth and everyone understands .

[john.k]

Germany made Dowidat tools also have a big collector following here .......seems there is a worldwide interst in this obscure brand..........My first bike was a BSA A7 found leaning up against a tree where it was abandoned ..........and my first 'proper' spanner was a Dowidat Flexi -Flat  in 5/16 & 3/8 that was sufficient to pull that whole motor apart with  just one spanner.

[R]

Dowidats were made in australia at some point.
Strong dependable tools.

If you watch the local fleabay long enough, someone will break ranks and offer a set or 3 at reasonable prices.

I picked these up for a travelling toolkit for a bike, not so long ago.
As you can see, not really a 'set'.
These didn't break the bank, by any means.
And if the plating is not perfect, many sellers will take an offer.
(and some silver paint will hide many sins - not when you are buying though !!)
Red in my workshop means W-BS.

[john.k]

The combination sets are definitely the most desirable ,and Ive seen setd like that at swaps asking $100..........Ive not got the 1/8 size combi,Id assume being small and easily lost .

[R]

Had to hunt down the 1/8 W one.
A recent addition - hence the missing red stripe.

The rockers in old Enfields use reduced 1/8W nuts to hold them down.
So essential for a complete set.

Be making a profit at $100
Bloomin inflation ...

[Rex]

Don't know about the collectability of Sidchrome stuff, but when I started out as an apprentice about 100 years ago the older fitters would take the piss mercilessly for anyone turning up with combo spanners.
"Where you been shopping the weekend boy, B&Q?" and other similar references to DiYers for combos being for weekend mechanics.
To this day I prefer a range of O/E's and a similar range of deep off-set rings to be able to do most jobs.

[john.k]

I never had any combi spanners either ...just rings and open ends and sockets   ........As you needed twice as many combis as DE rings to cover the same range ,that Id think is the reason.............its probably the reason they are rarer nowdays ...less of them sold.

[R]

"Where you been shopping the weekend boy, B&Q?"

One of these is marked with the D^D arrow, so the military have been to B&Q also ...

I will confess to also buying a sturdy set of double ended ring spanners - for workshop use.
Too big to carry on a bike though.
And, I don't plan any full rebuilds beside the road !!?

[cardan]

The rockers in old Enfields use reduced 1/8W nuts to hold them down.

I've found that many makers (Douglas comes to mind) avoided the 1/8W hexagon, and instead used 3/8AF. Who knows what that was all about.

I have a Lennox motorcycle made in Lennox St, Richmond, Melbourne, c1915. The engine was made on site, and I reckon they also made most of the nuts and bolts: the hexagons are all "AF" (I was going to say "Imperial" - certainly not Whitworth) but most of the threads are BSW!!! I suppose they were turned from "AF" (1/2, 9/16,...) hex bar, but again who knows. I certainly need the full range of spanners in my shed.

As an aside, when I was doing a deep clean on the Lennox I took most of it apart, cleaned and reassembled. I had problems finding a spanner to fit some of the smaller nuts on the mudguards. On closer inspection, I found that the nuts had 8 sides! The last owner of the bike was a plumber, who used the bike and sidecar for his work during WW2. He used gutter bolts where appropriate, but was clearly offended by the square nuts so cut the corners off to make octagons. I've had people tell me I should get rid of the gutter bolts, but I love that part of the bike's story.

Leon

[cardan]

Completely random! Today I was scanning 'Beneath the Bonnet' by JR Beruldsen about automotive parts manufacture in Australia, and in one part it mentioned that AG Healing (well known for their motorcycles from the early days into the early 1920s, and later for radios, washing machines, TVs,...) made Austalloy spanners. They sold this bit of their business to Siddons (seems in the 1920s), and the tools later became Sidchrome. So the origin of Sidchome is with Healing in Melbourne. I have a couple of Healing-built motorcycles, and a pile of Sidchrome spanners!

Leon
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