Professional Tool Reviews for Pros

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Hand Tool Reviews & Buying Guides

Hand tools make up a large portion of the equipment we carry every day. Pro Tool reviews pays close attention to recent innovations. Our hand tool reviews include knives & cutting tools, wrenches, chisels, fastening tools, hammers, and more. These hand tools covers the gamut from one end of the industry to another. Possibly our favorite series is our best framing hammer review. In that head-to-head review we compared nine popular models. This type of comparison isn’t always possible, but we do test out these tools on the jobsite. Hand Tool Reviews for the Pro Tradesman This is also where you’ll find popular lighting products and even folding knives from Kershaw, CRKT, and Zero Tolerance. We try to review as many of these types of tools as possible. This helps us remain a leader in reporting industry trends. This is particularly important when manufacturers add new features or make tweaks to their products. Sometimes they revamp an entire line. Other times they include something that only slightly improves a hand tool over a previous model. It all adds up.

GyrosGuard Rotary Tool Safety Shield installed
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GyrosGuard Rotary Tool Safety Shield Review

by Thomas Gaige

If you have ever used a mini cutoff wheel with a high speed rotary tool, you just might know what it’s like to have tiny pieces of a cutoff disk thrown at you when it breaks. To ensure a safer user experience with just about any rotary tool on the market, the GyrosGuard Rotary Tool Safety Shield offers protection, visibility and performance for rotary tool users. This unique blade guard does not impede visibility, yet offers complete coverage of the cutting wheel or blade. Thanks to an ingenious spring loaded design, and an easy to operate thumb stud that makes opening the guard easy, you can access and cut the material that you are working on. Along with the GyrosGuard Rotary Tool Safety Shield, Gyros Precision Tools offers a complete line of rotary tool accessories and miniature tools.

Swanson TOSB01 7" Speed Bevel Review
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7-inch Swanson TOSB01 Speed Bevel Review

by Clint DeBoer

When Swanson sent us their newest 7″ Speed Bevel, we didn’t realize the new inexpensive orange ABS plastic composite square would quickly become our all-around go-to tool for odd jobs and miscellaneous angle measurements. Swanson, who brought us the original Speed Square, built some new innovation into the Speed Bevel. While it doesn’t excel in build quality, it does have a really good function as a low-cost multi-purpose solution for finding angles, making quick cut measurements, and serving as a stop-gap protractor.

Dow Great Stuff PRO 15 Gun Review
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Dow Great Stuff PRO 15 Gun Review

by Clint DeBoer

The Pro 15 is Dow’s answer to dispensing its Great Stuff Pro expanding foam consistently and easily. It’s a one-handed tool that allows the PRO cans to fasten securely to the top and dispense a bead of expanding foam anywhere from 1/8″ to 3″ in thickness. If you do a lot of construction work, or you are in the specialty trades like plumbing, electrical or weatherization, you’re going to want a tool like this to simplify what can be a very tedious and time-intensive task. Once you use a dispensing gun, you won’t want to go back to manual cans. Add to that the fact that Dow’s Great Stuff Gun can help you to use your cans longer and reduce waste and it just might save you money over the long haul.

Kershaw Blur Folding Knife 1670BLKST Features
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Kershaw Blur Folding Knife 1670BLKST Review

by Thomas Gaige

The Kershaw Blur Folding Knife 1670BLKST comes in black with a partially serrated modified drop point blade, super grip handles and the proven SpeedSafe assisted-opening system. With the knife in hand, one of the first things that will jump out at you is how much grip that the handle materials offer. The sides of the aluminum handles have textured rubber inserts that make it virtually slip-resistant, even with greasy or wet hands. With just a little bit of thumb pressure against the thumb studs located towards the back of the blade, the blade swings and locks open with an authoritative thwack sound. The liner lock keeps the blade securely open until you press it sideways to release the blade. All in all this knife is packed with practical features that make it great for every day carry.

CAMO Marksman Pro Hidden Deck Fastener System Review
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CAMO Marksman Pro Hidden Deck Fastener System Review

by Clint DeBoer

We’re not easily impressed with hidden decking systems. While they offer a really excellent finished product, many of the systems require clips and extra work that causes the job to take longer, involve more training and generally increase your costs to deliver the finished product. With the CAMO Hidden Deck Fastening System, however, our concept of what was possible with hidden deck fastening systems was redefined. The CAMO system, which uses a Marksman or Marksman Pro installation tool, eliminates the need for clips and routing or cutting the edges of the board, and simplifies the method of deck board installation. In a nutshell, they devised a method to fasten the boards by driving screws at an angle along the board’s edge – directly into the joist. In this way, the boards are secured and the entire process is simplified. In short – it’s fast, and it’s impressive.

Bosch Thin Wall Metal Hole Saws
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Bosch Thin-Wall Metal Hole Saws Review

by Thomas Gaige

Using products like the Bosch Thin Wall Metal Hole Saw are probably the easiest way to make clean holes in sheet metal. We recently tried the Bosch HTW1 1″ Thin Metal Hole Saw on an aluminum gutter project and found it made our task of installing the down spout connection to the gutter almost effortless. Now this is not just a regular hole saw but one that is optimized to cut metal. It has a built-in spring ejector for the plug and has a 1/4″ hex shank that will fit into your impact driver. Probably the handiest feature is the shoulder that is built into the top of the bit that acts as a stop to keep the hole saw from going completely though your workpiece. The logic for this is that if you have to add a hole to an electrical panel, you can drill into the side of it without fear of the hole saw blasting though the steel wall and into the wires inside.

Johnson 25' PlanReader Architect Series Power Tape Review
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Johnson 25′ PlanReader Architect Series Power Tape Review

by Thomas Gaige

Oftentimes, when out in the field, it can be difficult to measure plans to verify dimensions. With the new Johnson 1819-0025 25′ PlanReader Architect Series Power Tape, you have both 1/8″ and 1/4″ architectural scales built right into the bottom of the tape. With larger, easy to see numbers on the top side of the tape, you can do your regular measuring and layout work. When you need to go back to the drawing board to check some dimensions or verify the size of something on the plans, just flip the tape over and you have the two most common architectural scales at your fingertips.

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