Has anyone noticed tubular box wrench sets available anywhere in Chiang Mai?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/6PC-TUBULAR-BOX-WRENCH-SET/dp/B00CMU0KHE

Grin

Global carries a decent selection of socket/ring/open spanners as well as monkey wrenches and stilsons.

They definately have them as when I saw them I thought it unusual to have what I refer to as a car wheel nut spanner.

Go to the very right hand side where the tools are and you will find 2 or 3 aisles from the end.(towards the back)

I should have mentioned that I already tried the obvious places like Global House and Home Pro. These tubular box wrenches are hard to find anywhere let alone Thailand. So I am assuming the only place to find them would be some type of specialty shop.

Essentially they are hollow tubes about 10 cm long with an open hex socket of different sizes on each end. They also have a pair of holes on each end so you can poke something like a screwdriver through the holes to turn the wrench.

In the US this type of wrench was at one time common as a spark plug wrench. In general they are used to get into recessed places where you can't get any other type of wrench on the nut.

My particular need is to get to the nuts on the mounting plate on the underside of a cartridge type faucet. These nuts attach to mounting bolts that protrude about 5 cm so the tubular wrench has to be longer than that to fit over the length of the bolt to reach the nut.

Grin

grin , try a plumbers merchant , ask / have a look for an "obstruction spanner". Its a bar with a lobster type gripper claw at the end of a 30CM bar , turned one way it opens up , other way it grips to tighten nuts and bolts that only need to be hand tight. Hope this helps.

grin , try a plumbers merchant , ask / have a look for an "obstruction spanner". Its a bar with a lobster type gripper claw at the end of a 30CM bar , turned one way it opens up , other way it grips to tighten nuts and bolts that only need to be hand tight. Hope this helps.

Thanks, I have what I call a basin wrench which is what you described but there is not enough space to even get the gripper up to the nuts. My son who has skinny fingers can only get one finger on the nuts so they are not even hand tight. We are working through a hole in the concrete slab under the counter top and a piece of rebar is obstructing the hole as well. Do you know of any plumbing merchants where I might go look for any special plumbing tools?

Grin

As far as I was able to search these are not available in Chiang Mai. eBay was my friend. Postage was more than the set of spanners but worth it.

They are here. A couple have been added to my tool box since I arrived and I have seen them in numerous Thai worker's boxes. Try Lana Screw, take a picture and if they do not have, ask where you might find them. Sets might be hard to find but you need only one.

If 5 cm is all you need then you might find a deep socket that would do it.

If none of that works and you can not make the hole bigger, Cut the bolts shorter and carefully file the threads on the new cut so the nuts start easily. Or on second thought, just cut them and save a lot of running around and confusion because of Thai language.

Yes they also have them in Nana Screw, thats the original shop which is just around the North East corner of the moat heading towards JJ market. Its a very good tool shop.

If it were me, and I couldn't find the right one, I'd make it.

As long as you don't need to really reef on the nut, ordinary thin-walled pipe would work as a 'use once or twice' tool.

Hammer down the flats and you're good to go.

Yeh Nana Screw I mistakenly called Lana Screw. Thanks Mr. Kiwi and Happy New Year.

Common problem, holes too small. I just took the bolts to Nana Screw and bought a stack of nuts the right height for 18 baht. Threaded them on the bolts and had a welder weld them together so they threaded on and off together as one. The welder would not accept payment because he thought it was funny (he had the wrench in his tool box and loaned to me when I did a friend's sink a year later.)

Yeh Nana Screw I mistakenly called Lana Screw. Thanks Mr. Kiwi and Happy New Year.

No worries. ...I thought it was a sister shop to Nana Screw that I hadnt found yet. You never can tell in CM, anything is possible.

Thanks a lot, everyone, for the Nana Screw reference. Stopped by there this morning and picked up a nice 8 socket set with a canvas carrier with pockets that rolls up and closes with a velcro tab. Only 380 Baht and a much sturdier set than the not so cheap set that I bought in the US. I won't have to worry about rounding out the angles of the sockets by applying too much force. Job was done 5 minutes after I got back home.

Grin