Hi,

I am starting my new project, a Healey 100 restoration and need some imperial spanners. I would ideally like coloured spanners but don't know where I could get some from. If you know then I'd be delighted to here from you.

Cheers
Steve

what do you mean by coloured spanners? all my metric, and imperial spanners are silver colour

I've got a colour coded set of sealey metric combination spanners - and very pretty they are too - but couldn't find any imperial ones (current project is a 1967 TR4a), so ended up buying a Halfords Professional set (all silver!)

Chris

I doubt youl get coloured imperial. Seally do coloured metric and so do some other makes. never seen imperial.

wrap a short piece of coloured inslation tape - I posted ages ago about this and pelpe laughed but it works for me.

Even getting imperial (nb Imperal Whitworth and BSF as opposed to" Unified" AF) sizes from general tool shops is difficult these days, if you buy from the likes of Frost's they will charge you through the nose and remember you will need two spanners of the same size to deal with some jobs
I would recommend you do a tour of autojumbles, car boot sales and flea markets

http://www.frost.co.uk/item_Detail.asp?productID=8726&frostProductName=Whitworth+Spanners+(Set+of+7)&catID=19&subCatID=29&FrostCat=Eng ine%20&%20Mechanical&FrostSubcat=Engine%20Tools

You will also encounter a fair number of AF sizes and unified threads on the Healey as BMC were in the middle of converting to UNF and UNC threads in the period.

[Edited on 28/3/09 by britishtrident]

Do Ebay search on "Whitworth Spanners" also search "Whitworth Sockets"

Kind of confirms my opinions on Frost's prices

All kinds of cheap Imperial here in Canada and the US, they won't be colour coded. You also need a 1/4" Whitworth for the brass nut on the starter motor.

Thanks for the advice. I bought a bucket of spanners on ebay for £2.50 including postage, must be a mistake?

I wanted the coloured types of spanners to avoid confusion with my existing metric stuff but hey ho.

The Healey does have two types of thread which is a pain but probably the least of my challenges on the project.

Cheers
Steve

Forget the spanners have you any photos of the Healey best car in the world

You could try getting some heat shrink and put over the shanks of the spanners.

Forget the tape, heat shrink and paint etc, sounds like a great reason to get the other half to buy you a powder coating kit

The ebay purchase was too good to be true, oh well, there are plenty more fish to fry though.

I have attached a picture of the healey in its current state. The middle of the car is all the bits of steel I have to stick it back together with.
Rescued attachment Healey 100 on its way home March 09.JPG