Yeah, haven’t posted anything in a while, as usual.
And I’ve been thinking of diversifying my post content for at least 3 years.
So, I’ll write about cheap shit I buy.
Recently on one of the many Chinese online shops I peruse they had a sale for ratchet wrenches 1/4″, 3/8″ and 1/2″ drive, less than USD$2 (1.99) each.
Considering the local prices are, at the very least, three times that for one, the price is tempting.
Well, I have like 3 or 4 3/8″ ones, but the only 1/4″ ratchet I ever had has been M.I.A. since…the year 2000?
Never really replaced it, just use a 3/8″ with an adapter.
And I never really owned a 1/2″ ratchet, don’t have sockets that require that size. (but I will…one of these days, probably by buying a set that includes the ratchet too)
So, I added one 1/4″ and one 1/2″ to the cart and bought them.
USD$3.98 (3.48€), free shipping.
Yeah, sometimes I end up feeling like I’m taking advantage of our slit eyed merchant friends. (a.k.a.: chinese fuckers peddling every kind of cheap shit around the web)
But I never am. They always win, somehow.
How would they win this time?
I know the ratchets are cheap and I’ve used cheap ratchets since I was 9-10 years old. There’s no way I can lose!
Oh…life and sly merchants from the East always find a way to make me lose. Or at least not win all that much.
First, the 1/2″ ratchet.
The switch is even made of metal, kinda rare thing on these extremely cheap ones, but exactly like they showed on the photos.
A thing of beauty, at least for a 2 dollar ratchet.
Then I moved on to unpack the little 1/4″ one…
No photo because I didn’t take one when I opened it and now…you’ll see.
First, it was smaller than advertised, exactly 1 centimetre shorter.
And, unlike the 1/2″ one and the photo on the site, it had a plastic switch. I could deal with that, one or two of the 3/8″ I have also have a plastic switch and they still work decently after years lying there on some toolbox. (point being I don’t really use them much, so the plastic switch is good enough)
A plastic switch that was broken and didn’t let me change ratcheting direction.
Now that makes it hard to work with.
So, I gently opened it up and, I believe, broke the switch even more!
Now I have to, somehow, come up with a new switch for the thing.
Without any machining knowledge or tools.
I’m thinking perhaps repurpose a bolt, a partial thread one, you know with a smooth part before the thread, cutting it to size and drill a small hole for the spring.
And I have to find a new cap for the spring as I lost the one that came with it. (a little hollow metal thingie goes over the spring so it slides on the pawl, was doing the part that typically would be a metal ball)
Until I come up with a solution, it’ll stay there, unassembled.
Yeah, sure, in an economic point of view, it makes no sense to spend hours trying to fix a USD$2 ratchet.
But while money is extremely important, it’s not everything. And my free time is not paid. So it’s not like I’m losing some amazing earning opportunity to fuck around with a broken tool.
I’ll probably just buy a new one before I fix this one…then again, I haven’t had a 1/4″ ratchet for some 20 years…
Decisions, decisions…
Well, long story short it seems I got a working 1/2″ drive ratchet for 4 dollars, shipped. Can’t complain too much.
That’s all for today.