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  • Author Author: e14mindi
  • Date Created: 10 Mar 2020 5:51 PM Date Created
  • Last Updated Last Updated: 6 Oct 2021 10:18 PM
  • Views 10501 views
  • Likes 20 likes
  • Comments 164 comments
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Cool Tools Kit Awards 2020

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Hello Community, and happy March to all of you!

 

Some of you might be thinking to yourselves - what is Cool Tools? Isn't that a bit familiar? And indeed it is. We ran a fun campaign nearly two years ago to talk about awesome tools as a sneaky way to get you all to show us your work benches (check out the original post here: Cool Tools Bench Awards 2018.) We originally thought about doing this annually, but last year we got caught up in an endless winter here in the Chicago offices that left us wanting anything but to think about the cold. However, now that we have experienced our first actual spring day, we have de-thawed, and we're excited to bring you the Cool Tools Kit Awards 2020!

 

What is the Kit Awards?

 

Previously, we asked the Community to share their work benches but now we're curious - if you could only have one kit for the rest of your life - let's call it your desert island kit - what would be in it? Is there a particular tool that has outlasted all others? Is there some indispensable piece of equipment that, if you were to lose it, would be cause for tearing out your hair (as if sorrow would be made less by baldness?)

 

In the comments below, we want you to tell us about your desert island kit - show us in pictures or video, go into as much detail as you want to tell us what would be in it and why. If you don't want to talk about an entire kit, pick out one of your Cool Tools and describe it under categories such as:

 

  • Oldest Friend (tool that you've had the longest)
  • The Most Reliable (the tool you use most often)
  • Weapons Rack (the tool that you'd proudly put on display if you had to)
  • Dream Tool (a tool that either you don't believe exists, or for whatever reason you've never purchased)
  • Or, make up your own category to talk about a tool that you think everyone should have in their kit!

 

What's in it for me?

 

We're giving everyone on the Community through the end of March to leave comments on this post for a chance to win some great tools from our revamped Multicomp Pro line (like the ones below) as well as from others by some of our great partners like Flir, Fluke, Knipex, Klein and others.

 

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Buy Now

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Buy Now

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Buy Now

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Buy Now

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Buy Now

 

 

Then, every Friday in April we'll be picking some winners from the comments below to win prizes. All you need to do is tell us about your desert island kit or one of your favorite tools. To make it even more fun, our Multicomp Pro team has agreed to put together a great prize pack to whoever comes up with what they think is the coolest of the Cool Tools Desert Island Kits! So have some fun with this and leave your comments below. You have all of March to get in your comments, so no need to beware the Ides.

 

We're so excited to see what you all come up with!

 

Want another way to get your hands on some of these Cool Tools? Check out out the RoadTests & Reviews space where rscasny will be launching RoadTests for some of these items. Apply for the first one here: Cool Tools 2020: USB Soldering Iron

Attachments:
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Top Comments

  • dougw
    dougw over 6 years ago +17
    It is surprisingly hard to pick a favorite tool, but it is a lot of fun recalling all the great tools and trying to compare them. I am first going to narrow it down to just 3 candidates and even that was…
  • genebren
    genebren over 6 years ago +13
    Tool Kit Over the past two years, I have built well over 250 boards from within my Office/shop. The vast majority of these boards were built for clients, but a fair number have been for my own projects…
  • colporteur
    colporteur over 6 years ago +12
    On reading the post, I looked over at my tool box and immediately thought, I can't live without my Romex Wire Stripper. That is what it was called some 30 years ago when I bought it. An Google search returns…
  • robogary
    robogary over 5 years ago in reply to kmikemoo

    Your Hallicrafters is a treasure. At least I understand what the knobs say  :-)  Do you use it on air ?   I do use my Kenwood TS820, its fun, but cant use 30M 17m, etc.

    Probably like your Hallicrafters, I keep the tuning instructions taped to the desktop, along with the antenna tuner adjustment settings.

     

     

    .

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  • kmikemoo
    kmikemoo over 5 years ago in reply to robogary

    That is AWESOME!  Can you imagine being the guy that had to lug that around the battlefield?  Ug!

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  • robogary
    robogary over 5 years ago in reply to kmikemoo

    I have a CW transmitter with no meters, no manuals, no idea of manufacturer, given to me in 1975.

    It actually worked in 1975. I havent powered it in years, suspect its a WWII model, pretty heavy. Wish I knew more about it.

    Even the old guys in our local radio club cant ID it.

    image

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  • kmikemoo
    kmikemoo over 5 years ago in reply to robogary

    robogary Yeah old radios!!!  Thankfully I was able to find a manual for mine otherwise... I'd be lost.

    image

    The HT-44 transmitter has just as many switches and knobs but I haven't really looked at that.  Three challenges at a time.  Four would just be too many. image

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  • robogary
    robogary over 5 years ago

    OK, everyone loves their analog voltmeters - off on a tangent of the analog meter

    my ham radio equipment , my newer digital transceiver is fabulous with switching and tuning to new bands in seconds,

    but my old analog Kenwood TS820 transceiver is true love with analog meters and knobs to twist - it takes minutes to change frequency and/or bands and retune , but the trusty old horse is always ready and has great audio reports

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  • shabaz
    shabaz over 5 years ago in reply to balearicdynamics

    Hi Enrico,

     

    Very nice! You've already got an awesome meter dial there.

    But, you've given me ideas on how to incorporate multiple dials onto a display, for different measurements!

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  • shabaz
    shabaz over 5 years ago in reply to Jan Cumps

    A place where I worked used a lot of rotary switches for portable gear, they were rugged and easy to set using gloved hands.

    I'm working on a project with a meter and rotary switch currently ! : )

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  • redcharly
    redcharly over 5 years ago in reply to Jan Cumps

    For me it's a beautiful sensation to turn a knob and hearthe switch clicks...

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  • Jan Cumps
    Jan Cumps over 5 years ago in reply to dougw

    dougw  wrote:

     

    Cool. Now we know where all these new meters got the idea to use a rotary selector switch.

    before PCBs were around, a multi-wafer rotary switch was the weapon of choice to make and break complex circuit connections.

    They lasted the longest in oscilloscopes, hifi receivers and meters.

    Hand-held Multimeters seem to be one of the instances where the concept survived when switching to PCB, until now.

    Maybe because it's an excellent user interface for this application? Or because experiments with other form factors didn't sell as good?

     

    bench meters have largely switched (sic) over to other interfaces.

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  • weiwei2
    weiwei2 over 5 years ago in reply to balearicdynamics

    this is cool. i can use it for home cycling ....now with MCO, stuck at home cycling

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