Hi bigbanddave,

Welcome - glad to have you here!

Retirement sounds as though it's going to be great!!

You've posed some excellent questions and are sure to receive some replies. You'll get a range of opinions on the components of a basic set of hand tools, but the minimum kit (I'm assuming that you currently own little or nothing along these lines) would surely include:

  • A full set of sockets, standard and metric, regular and deep.
  • A full set of wrenches, standard and metric, open and closed (combination is fine).
  • A range of scales, standard and metric, from short to whatever length will suit your work.
  • A full set of screwdrivers, flat and Phillips.
  • Bubble levels in several lengths
  • Squares
  • Clamps of all different sorts and sizes - you can never have too many!

That's just off the top of my head. Lots of extras and "nice-to-haves" that can be added along the way as required by the project at hand. There are tools I only use a few times each year, but wouldn't be without. My digital level comes to mind, for one.

What's the first thing you'd like to build?

Ken