By Dean Bielanowski
Every home should have at least one socket set. And every workshop or mechanic should have a good deep socket set, not to mention engineers, construction workers or anyone else who regularly comes across larger size bolt heads or hex shaped nuts. Sometimes the handy adjustable wrench just doesn’t cut the mustard when trying to apply sufficient torque to a heavy nut or bolt head without it slipping and causing you, or the nut or bolt head some serious injury or damage.
There are eight sockets in this set and these include the following sizes: 1”, 1-1/6”, 1-1/8”, 1-1/4”, 1-5/16”, 1-3/8”, 1-7/16”, and 1-1/2”. The sockets are made from Chrome Molybdenum and come with a smooth black-grey colored finish. Each socket has a retaining ring groove and a ¾” square drive connection to fit ¾” socket bars or torque wrenches. There is a fair amount of material surrounding the hex socket to help protect from minor bumps, drops and unintentional abuse! The deep throat design allows access to nuts that may be held further down the shaft of long bolts, or for bolt heads sunk into surrounding material or obstructed by other objects.
The eight-socket set ships in a basic but sturdy metal case. The weight of the sockets alone is enough to lug around and it is good to see the metal case itself is not excessively heavy to make carting the kit around a heavy weightlifting competition.
Given that the size of the sockets themselves are not suited to the size of most common bolts and nuts you might find around the home, except perhaps for certain vehicle lug nuts or retainer bolts, the set is best suited to light-medium industrial and construction use where larger bolts and nuts are more frequently found.
I tend to use only two or three of the sockets from the set as these are the ones most required in my travels, but it is good to have a wide range of sizes on hand, and this set certainly offers the quality that Hitachi tools are known for. Check it out if you are looking for a decent set of larger sockets at a reasonable price.
