>The difference is that you don't use the same wrench a dozen times a day, day in and day out. yeah, that's kind of what I was trying to say with the bit about

>The difference is that you don't use the same wrench a dozen times a day, day in and day out. yeah, that's kind of what I was trying to say with the bit about how I care very much about the tools for dealing with rackmount computers and how I have a favorite screwdriver. I didn't care about screwdrivers either until I started using them a lot. I would bet money that you are right and that if I worked on cars more, I would care more about getting a really nice set of automotive tools, but I don't work on cars that much, so I don't really understand how the really good tools are different from the merely "good enough" tools, because that comes with experience. But my main point was that there are tools that are adequate for the shadetree mechanic that are cheap enough to more than pay for themselves after a single use in a shadetree level project. If you can afford to have your car fixed, you have the capital to buy adequate (maybe not really nice... but adequate) tools to get started with your automotive hobby or the beginning of your education as a mechanic. I do imagine that like IT people, most, or at least a whole lot of mechanics start out as hobbyists. The two seem similar enough to me.