About a week ago I posted an article, Families That Use Tools Together Stick Together, where I shared some thoughts about family, Father’s Day, and tools. In that article I talked about how much fun I have with my daughter just by walking into a tools store. She wanted to do that today on Father’s Day, and as luck would have it we were at a mall in San Diego with a Sears store and her wish (and mine!) came true!

A few days ago I was checking out the Sears Blue Tool Crew page on Facebook and saw them talking about an event that was taking place at Sears stores this weekend just for Father’s Day. It was called the Innovation Station, a place where you can get a demo of their latest tools, one-on-one from a Blue Tool Crew staff member, and play with them. I love tools, and so the opportunity to play with them first-hand, on Father’s Day with my family, was an event not be missed!

As soon as we entered the store, I made a B-line for the tools department (I’m habitual that way!) and I found a very enthusiastic Blue Tool Crew member named Redmond who showed me briefly which tools they had on display. I was surprised to see many of the tools that I have seen in commercials, or ones that I personally wanted to check out.

They had the very cool 8 sockets-in-1 Dog Bone wrench, the cordless auto hammer, universal ratcheting wrenches, and my personal favorite, the cordless multi-tool. After playing with each of them, I wanted them all!

Why are they cool? The Dog Bone wrench, which is made in the shape of a dog bone, comes in both standard and metric sizes (2 different bones) and having both of them gives you 16 different sockets just by carrying two tools with you. If you’re under a car, or keep a tool box in your car, this innovative turn-style wrench lightens your load quite a bit. I tested this out with various bolts they had at the Innovation Station and like all Craftsman tools, it seemed quite strong and capable.

I thought the auto hammer was pretty awesome as well because it’s a power tool, doesn’t require air, and seems to pack quite a bit of power for driving nails into wood. Just place the tip over the end of a nail, give it some light pressure and press the trigger. Before you know it, your nail is in place and the nail of the head is flush with the wood. This is great for tight spots or weird angles where a hammer is impossible to reach. There were some nails handy, with a block of wood, and Redmond encouraged me to go to town. It was like pushing a nail into a stick of butter. Effortless.

I have a bunch of ratcheting wrenches, but none that are like these. Due to their multi-point contact points, you can use these for nuts and bolts no matter how many points they have. It’s one wrench that can work with 4 point heads, 6 point, 8 point, and more. Very cool tool tech here! The Innovation Station had a great assortment of bolt heads for testing them out, and I have to say that these wrenches were easy to use. No problems getting them on or off the bolt heads, and they grabbed ‘em tight!

Finally, the cordless multi-tool. I love tools that have multiple purposes, and as you can see from this group of tools, Sears has quite a few of them. The multi-tool is no exception. With multiple head attachments, you can sand, grind, cut, scrape, and easily remove grout, caulk, and a lot more. Plus it’s cordless, and like the auto hammer, is powered by a 12-volt Lithium-Ion that packs a lot of power. Redmond had the cutting attachment already on the multi-tool at the Innovation Station, and after making a few test cuts in a block of wood, I put it to the test by carving more odd angles. Carving up a piece of wood, even at strange angles, was a breeze.

Look for future episodes of Motorz where we’ll put these tools to work on the show, in situations that will help you with your next project!

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