Adventure Bike Rider Forum

I'm about to buy one after years of borrowing or struggling but there's a big variance in price. Experience tells me you get what you pay for and tools I rely on heavily for work I don't cut corners with but its only occasional home use. Cheap kits off the net start at around £15-20 going into the £100s so what have you got that works (thumbs) Thanks in advance chains in question are usually 520s

I have a hein gerik one from years ago still does the job at splitting and the reviveting soft rivets does both 525 and 520 with spares available...a good hand file helps ...

Picking a (quality) chain tool is only limited by your budget and frequency that you'll use it, a whale chain tool is probably mid budget and ideal for everyday use. Personally using an angle grinder to grind off the heads of the rivet & split a chain, and a ball pien hammer to rivet does for me. However definitely stay away from those generic tools you see online costing £20-£50, as the pins bend/snap

I've seen a few cheap ones fracture when the strain is put on them, also pins bend, I always think that a group purchase between riding mates for rarley used tools is a good idea, unless all your mates are on shaft drives.

I have a Motion Pro kit that I use in the workshop for soft links and a DRC(I think) alloy, splitter only, that I carry when travelling along with some bits of chain and spare links.

The terra-X gets good reviews and there's also a monster thing that I can't remember the name of

Bought a cheap one from M&P which I had to take back 3 times as it was made from chocolate ( kept snapping pins). Got my money back and bought a DiD one with a lifetime warranty


http://www.mandp.co.uk/index.php/defaul ... veter.html

yes, I bought a couple of cheapies from M and P .. waste of time, broke/snapped crap. I got this one from Thunderroad ..

Oxford Chain Tool

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/OXFORD-MOTORC ... 0814879560


not used it yet, but looks good and robust, a bit heavy (but not too much) 420-530 chains .... £60

I've had/got a few different ones and I've found that the cheaper end can be a bit variable, bought 2 similar to the one garyboy linked to (me and my dad) and mine has lasted for years but my dad had nothing but trouble with his.
I also have one of these https://www.manomano.co.uk/mechanic-too ... AuRs8P8HAQ bought from a stall at a show and it seems to be fine apart from my cousin borrowed it and bent it slightly somehow :blink:

My favorite though is one of these http://www.ajs-shop.co.uk/acatalog/CHAI ... R-CB1.html if you can find an original Renalds one they are fantastic for smaller chains or non O ring chains but not too good on large modern O ring chains.

Steve

garyboy wrote:yes, I bought a couple of cheapies from M and P .. waste of time, broke/snapped crap. I got this one from Thunderroad ..

Oxford Chain Tool

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/OXFORD-MOTORC ... 0814879560


not used it yet, but looks good and robust, a bit heavy (but not too much) 420-530 chains .... £60

I have a lookalike of this design, bought 20 years ago and still going strong on both farm kit and bike chains. I do however grind off the rivet head where possible on larger chains as it makes life much easier.