I have my dad's Craftsman radial arm saw. The thing is built like a tank, and the owner's manual is an absolute hoot.
It's 60 years old, and works great. Nothing like stuff made by those WWII guys.
I grew up with my dad's Craftsman tools as well. But the vintage is important. His old table saw, joiner, hand tools, etc were great and I wish I had been able to hold on to more of them. Bought a bunch of them myself but much of the stuff I got in the 80s and 90s is crap. I have a craftsman band saw I wouldn't give away to my worse enemy and a table top sander where the 'safety' switch failed to always-on!
The very best thing I inherited from my Dad was a lowly Phillips screwdriver. Specifically a long shaft driver manufactured by Enderes, vintage unknown.
How can one Phillips screw driver be significantly better than another? I still don't know but I found out that there can be a difference when I was working on the screws that fasten my gas tanks to the RV10 wing.
I was having a great deal of trouble removing the factory driven screws from the quick build wing kit. There are scores of #8 screws involved. I went thru every driver I had short of an impact wrench, to loosen the screws. My machinist neighbor built some custom versions that worked well. But then I tried this rusty Enderes driver that has been in the bottom of my tool box for a decade or more. And it worked better than any other tool I had.
Hmmm, despite the rust this was clearly a superior driver! I did some research and learned that there are a couple of variations on Phillips head fasteners and such but none of that applied here. Then I ran across an article in the archives of an early internet forum called The Well. A posting there described my driver and went on about how this computer technician loved this tool and how he might do physical damage to any of his mates that might take it from him. And it was the same, long hex shaft driver made by Enderes.
As a followup, I bought new drivers from Enderes but found they were just good tools, no better and no worse. I even talked to the company but gave up when they clearly thought I was some kind of nut. Oh well.
It's my magic driver. It works on the correct size screws but works equally as well on the smaller ones. I can apply as much force as possible and rest assured that the screw head won't strip. I've examined and compared the driver head to other drivers and can't find any magic stuff but it's still my magic driver and I protect it with some vigor... no loans, no travel but otherwise it just lays in the bottom of my box waiting for the next challenge.
All Phillips head drivers are not the same but I still can't make sense out of it. Perhaps just a good batch on some well set up tool making equipment.
And I can no longer find The Well piece - if anyone knows where their archives can be accessed, please share.
Fun thread, Thanks.
