Dad bought a new Toyota Corona Mk II wagon in 1972. He also bought a metric socket set. As a teen, I used it to work on my motorcycles (mostly changing spark plugs in those two-stroke engines). I don’t know when I, erm… ‘appropriated’ it; but dad died in 1998. I’ve had it at least a couple/few years before that. It’s been my go-to socket set since the mid-'70s. I have no idea what the brand is. Dad usually bought Craftsman tools, but this set isn’t that. The only markings other than the sizes are the JAPAN stamps.
The paint was wearing off, and there was a little bit of surface rust on the box; so I found as near to the original colour I could find in the hardware store’s limited selection of Rust-Oleum spray paint. It’s very, very close.
I thought about 'shopping the 10 mm out.
Still wondering where dad got this one. Could he have bought it from Toyota? You’d think it would be branded. Maybe it had a Toyota sleeve? Or, he shopped a bit at Western Auto. That seems a likely candidate.
I already commented but once again it was deleted. I had that set. It was cheap (made in Japan back then was the made in China of today (well the made in China of 20 years ago), but a serviceable set. Better not to pound on it, I broke the ratchet though I broke more expensive ratchets over they years as well. I replaced it when I could with a more name brand - Craftsman. In short it is not a great tool set.
I can’t post a picture at the moment, but that looks identical to a socket set that I think belonged to my maternal grandfather. (I don’t recall seeing it in our garage until we cleaned out his house after he passed away.) He never owned any foreign cars, but he also wasn’t very picky about the brands of tools he purchased, so that’s probably how it showed up in his tool collection.
I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the same manufacturer. The contour on the ratchet handle looks the same. Is the ‘switch’ (whatever you call the thing that changes directions on the ratchet) a single ‘bar’ down the middle, and do you have to align it with a ‘slot’ in the vacuum-formed base so you can close the lid?
Your box looks like it has more of a metallic finish than mine did. The paint I chose was very close. With a bit of steel wool and a browse down the paint aisle, you can refinish that nicely. (Oh, is yours metric, or SAE?)
Mine is a light green box, both SAE and metric and made in Taiwan. But the exact same looking pieces. And the nut driver broke 30 years ago. I think it was my first set of sockets, which means I acquired them in 1972 or thereabouts.
I had the same set and another equally cheap-but-serviceable set for metrics. Almost everything I did was SAE; almost. But it wasn’t until the mid-80s to late 80s that I finally broke down and got Craftsman metrics (with a few Snap-on for some specialized stuff).
Now my prized possession is two very old Craftsman sets - 1/4 and 3/8 drive - with 8-point sockets for the old 4-point/square nuts used in furniture. From back when they made some really good cabinet tools. Those, like my double-deep sockets for doing the tension adjustments on car trunks, stay in the safe and not in the toolbox.
My dad and I went together and bought a couple shipping containers full of tools, this was in the early 80’s. It contained a couple hundred socket sets just like that. We set up a space at my dad’s used car lot and sold the tools. We sold out of the socket sets like that pretty quick, I think we were asking $5 each for them. I still have a few items that load of tools, a bench grinder, a couple impact wrenches and 3/8 inch flex head ratchet with a 20 inch handle. All still work great.
