Reel Repair by Alan Tani

Been trying to do some organization in my tool boxes.
I have lots of random stuff that I have never used, probably inherited from family members gone by.
Are these wrenches used by machinists or plumbers or are they just plain old style wrenches?

Probably multi-trade—-they work great on automotive drain plugs, transmissions etc.

I've had cut offs on water meters with square shafts.

They are "set screw wrenches...for those square head set screws. Pretty common in production machine shops/

They work great on the old square headed bolt and square nuts, too. I have lots of square nuts, and a few square head bolts, in my nut and bolt inventory. Have just about every size square nut socket, also. They get used every now and then.

Maybe this is where the term, "box wrench" originated from lol? I have some of those around here somewhere, from a machine shop I cleaned out like 30 years ago. And then I have a slightly different one, that has the company name on it, but slipping my mind currently, something water and valve co. I do believe is on it. Just saw the darn thing somewhere here, not too long ago. Now I'm gonna drive myself crazy trying to find it again LMAO!

There  were some "old" farm machines that came with these in their "tool box"....by old I mean late 1800-1930, or so. Mostly used for "adjustments", as the handles are pretty short for "heavy repairs"

Yeah, auto drain plugs.  I had a car with a French-built engine in the past, and the block coolant drain plugs were square female type; could never find a wrench or socket to unscrew them, and ended up making one out of the square shaft of an old screwdriver, using a grinding wheel/file.  I wish all car fasteners were limited to flat blade screwdriver, Phillips screw driver and hex head bolts/nuts.  Yeah, I realize these may not be the most efficient, but they sure are the most common.

Frank