OutdoorKing Repair Forum Forums Collectors Corner Collectables Vintage Hercules SAE socket set

All right, someone's to blame for this. Go to the Sunday flea markets they said. Might find Whitworth spanners they said. (slashnburn it was you! )

Now you see what you started...the following were $5 each. But no Whitworths!

A curio for the shelf: Hercules SAE 1/2" - 7/8" socket set. Still works and complete, one ball-lock jammed with dust and the 5/8" pretty chewed up. Little of the original red paint left.


Also the obligatory Victa spanner/tool (which I need) , good condition too.


Cheers,

Those sockets sets were around in the fifties and sixties

Glad to be of service
Have you tried the Victa spanner yet? I have two different sized Victa plug spanners around here somewhere.

G'day Patrick, Norm & Slash

A cursory glance confirms that the Hercules was Australian-made, but
is a little bit earlier than expected, with adverts dating from the
early-thirties, but they did sell for decades (as Norm says).

As a side-note, Turner, Pope, and Wiltshire (Boundy) were tool makers.



The Victa spanner has a modern logo, so I guess it is from the
later 20th century.

Socket to me.
-----------------------
Jack

Yes Jack my school still uses Turner wood planes!

That is brilliant Kye,

... and it shows how accomplished you have become in observation.
Many lawnmower companies have a pre-history that goes un-recognised.

Rene Turner is an un-sung hero of Australian manufacturing.
Their tools were of the highest quality, and it may surprise you
to find what his earliest products were... Their slogan,
"Is there a Turner in your home?" is so poignant.

In any case, I still don't know who made Hercules tools!

--------------------------------
Jack

Thanks Jack, I had to look twice when I saw it. The Turner logo sticks out to be more then any other mower logo for some reason, more then Pace, Rover, Pope, Victa or any of the smaller brands! But ever since I got into mowers the word Automatic sticks out like crazy! It starts to bug me sometimes haha!

No worries mate! Actually had been to those markets a few years before but not looking for this type of stuff. Of course now mower-spotting (nothing good this time) but may have to get up early next time...


I was afraid you'd say that! No I haven't tried it yet.

Hercules socket set
Jack,

I was looking for Hercules tool info myself, the closest I could come up with was the Hercules Pneumatic Tools made by "The Buckeye Portable Tool Company" out of Dayton, Ohio. One of their paper brochures (on ebay) shows a similar branding stamp on their tools. The ad for the tools had changed by 17 Sep 1933 to...
...so either they wished to downplay the Oz manufacture or they were from overseas. "Hercules" with its implication of strength would have been a commonly sought name for tools of course. I suppose this is all plausible, but not at all conclusive. Actually, more like sheer speculation!

I must say if it really does go back to the 1930's I'm impressed as I hoped it would go back to ~WWII.

What attracted me was the excellence of design and build to meet a function and last so long.What I love about the set is that, given a clean up, it would do exactly the same job and be no less efficient than a modern unit. The design is pretty well optimised- you can't really imagine six sockets and a lever in a smaller, self-contained, self-storing package. And it's no taller, no wider and only 1" longer than the Victa spanner.

What I find poignant is the item forms a bridge back to the past that says "your stuff is a relevant today as it was back then", to persons who probably are no longer are with us.

I hope the same can (and will) be said of my stuff & work in the future once I'm gone, if only just once by one person, somewhere, sometime!

Hi Patrick

That was very nicely said there.
I think I have a similar view of living history.

One of the real problems I have found in researching are the products
named because of their commercially successful track record.

For example, when I was researching Australian-made 'Champion' mowers
I had to filter the myriad of other products so-named.

The other annoyance is the Australian-made claim. It is unlikely that the
Americans would sell AUS socket sets at all at this time. I would speculate
that "The Buckeye Portable Tool Company" out of Dayton, Ohio [home of the
Wright brothers] may well have been the actual manufacturer. Otherwise,
perhaps they were locally-made licenced copies.

In any case, it's a nice piece of industrial kit that craves immortality.

Cheers
--------------
Jack

Well, the HTPAA website says that the Australian manufacturer who used the 'Hercules' brand was WH Wylie & Co of Adelaide - they show a pair of locking pliers so marked. http://www.htpaa.org.au/ozwrenches.php

Wylie were better known later on for making car shock absorbers and jacks, until US firm Monroe bought them out in 1985.
http://www.ozwrenches.com/jacks.htm They don't appear to have trademarked 'Hercules' though.

However, it's no surprise that several US tool firms also used that brand - some examples are found at http://www.toolexchange.com.au - also a good source for Whitworth stuff.

My old man has an old compact hex drive socket set - must check the make, next time I visit.

What I find poignant is the item forms a bridge back to the past that says "your stuff is a relevant today as it was back then", to persons who probably are no longer are with us.

I hope the same can (and will) be said of my stuff & work in the future once I'm gone, if only just once by one person, somewhere, sometime!



I still have quite a few of my Pas old tools. Even the toolbox dad says Pa made and used when working in Tassie. Pa was a carpenter ( built his own house even made his own concrete stumps) so whenever I need to do any woodwork I break out his old tools, including his electric planer (from the 80's I suppose) but I always spare a thought for him and wonder if it ever passed his mind that one day his grandson would be using his tools.

Actually, he used to have a few sets the same as the Hercules pictured above but from memory they were unmarked the tools were zinc coated and the tin case was red.

Slash those ones in the red case were for sale at any tool place in the sixties, I think they were a cheap copy possibly Jappanese because in those days any tools were expensive. I remember buying a Minimax socket set in the mid sixties and it was half the price of any other set on the market at the time. It was when Japanese products started to improve in quality, before that Japanese stuff was rubbish and a bit of a joke

Yep, there were 13/16" AF for the earlier models, and 3/4" AF for the later models that used the short CJ-8 type plug.

Hi Gadge, Norm, Slash, Jack, et al,

Thanks for all the comments. A few followup thoughts:

Hercules
Like Jack I was also thinking they may have been of USA manufacture or licence-made in Oz, probably didn't make that clear in my post. But I think Gadge probably has it closer. I too had found an image of that pair of pliers.

Slash's Pa's tools (I really hope those apostrophes are correct...)
Yes Slash, my Dad and I are happy for me to inherit his tools too, in fact he's already encouraged me to take some away! I must pull his plane out and see who made it, I suspect it's from Sheffield, England, probably his chisels too. I still remembering him using them.

Victa spanner
This actually has several sizes, with the main spanner hole being a stepped-double-size- see photo below. The two sizes are 13/16" stepping down to 3/4". The other apertures are 1/2" on the back side and (strangely) 9/16" grading to another 1/2" on the back side.

In between the Victa spanner, 5/8" and 13/16" Sidchrome socket set spark plug sockets, long reach impact sockets and a 21mm old spark plug wrench (with elbows) I have most bases covered.

3/8" fits the old Victa/Pace Premier.

The Victa spanner 3/8" would also fit my Rover's B&S except the head is too thick. I have carefully used an angled ring spanner until now BUT with my long impact sockets I should have the right socket too. Haven't tested Eric's Lauson motor as no spark plug was present.


Japanese/Chinese/et al made
Bit of a topic here. Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Korea have all been through the developmental phase from cheap, often shoddy progressing up the quality scale. Now all are accepted high-quality areas and cheaper production has moved elsewhere. China has been in the game for a while, there is a lot of dross out there however selectivity results in cheap, good quality purchases. I have bought a digital vernier (pic below), real Fluke multimeter and plenty of printer toner cartridges from China with no issues (plus a variety of other cheap items of varying success). The main investment/cost may be your time taken to be selective.

The Fluke is a real Fluke, from a Fluke factory but a Chinese model for the Chinese market. So I lose any local service agent support. Others have actually opened them up and posted they are the 'real deal'. At the price I could buy 3 for the cost of 1 comparable Oz (but made in China) model.

The printer cartridges came from a relatively new Ebay store. The owner was proud enough to post photos of his (purported) facility and list details of his experience. His communication was good and is claims had more the air of an engineer's factual statements that the standard Chinese it-will-do-everything-including-warm-fuzzy-feeling-and-good-health-etc.-now-give-me-your-money line. Again, approx 25% the cost of OEM ones. When I ordered the cartridges, they were packaged well, delivered (comparatively) quickly from China and the item packaging and quality appeared frankly to be OEM. So good they also passed M-I-L Spec: Military nothing, that's Mother-In-Law Spec! If it keeps the M-I-L happy (more than once too) they must be good.

The digital vernier is a fraction (~10-20%) the cost of a comparable Mitutoyo yet it came with a good instruction leaflet, a small calibration certificate and even a spare battery. The only flaw was a broken hinge on the plastic case. I'm happy with the performance.


Cheers,