Need a good set of helping hands? Step inside.

[RaisedByWolves]

I have been buying items from a company called Couty comm for a few years now and knew they had a really nice set of helping hands that would improve my wiring/soldering/small parts assembly game, so I finally sprung for a set, and boy I'm very glad I did.

Their a little pricy, but having had and used several alligator clip type units over the years I can honestly state these are worth every penny.

DIY Hobby Hand Kit - Stainless Steel By Maratac®

This DIY Hobby Hand kit is designed and fabricated 100% in house on a contract basis for one of our sister companies. This unique kit makes it easy to tackle your daily hobby needs without the use of a 2nd person to hold your "gear in place" while soldering, painting, glueing and more. The...

countycomm.com

I have no affiliation to CC, and I take no responsibility if you wind up spending way too much money with them. Their products are far and above what you can get elsewhere. Yes they are pricy, and you need two kits to make a pair of hands, but you really get quite a bit for the money. See the link for the full list of contents,

Just passing this on as these really are a great addition to your shop. They are so much better than the cheap alligator clip type helping hands and these have the benefit of being able to be mounted permanently to the bench or mounted to solid movable stands for better placement and articulation.


Here I'm using them to lengthen the yellow control wire in the control circuit in a bit of a confined space. You can see I'm holding down the one base with a pair of pliers. Each kit comes with 5 arms and enough clamp sections and hardware to link them all. The 5 dogbone pieces are SS and the clamp "figure eight" pieces are titanium. The base as received is a large 1.5" x 5/16" disk of stainless. I'm going to mount mine to some heavy movable steel bases once I work out a viable storage solution for the whole kit.

 

[Mauzinette]

These are superb, I have one too

I also recommend to check out their non-slip project mats and parts trays

Awesome Roll Up - Non Slip Project Mat

Pick Your Color! The Awesome Roll Up - Non Slip Project Mats are used by military and civilian small arms armorers to keep all those pins and parts from rolling off the work bench and getting lost. The mat features a wide recessed channel groove all the way around to prevent anything from...

countycomm.com

Parts Tray - Armorer - Non Slip

Pick A Color... These non-slip parts trays are used by military and civilian small arms armorers to keep all those pins and parts from rolling off the work bench and getting lost. Avionics technicians also use them to those tiny screws from magically disapearing.Features non-slip (inverse golf...

countycomm.com

Love these!

 

[rabler]

Thanks for the link, seriously considering buying a couple, have been looking for something a little beefier than the common alligator clip versions.

I'm going to mount mine to some heavy movable steel bases once I work out a viable storage solution for the whole kit.

I might consider velcro or magnets for attaching.

 

[ChazzC]

I have been buying items from a company called Couty comm for a few years now and knew they had a really nice set of helping hands that would improve my wiring/soldering/small parts assembly game, so I finally sprung for a set, and boy I'm very glad I did.

Their a little pricy, but having had and used several alligator clip type units over the years I can honestly state these are worth every penny.

DIY Hobby Hand Kit - Stainless Steel By Maratac®

This DIY Hobby Hand kit is designed and fabricated 100% in house on a contract basis for one of our sister companies. This unique kit makes it easy to tackle your daily hobby needs without the use of a 2nd person to hold your "gear in place" while soldering, painting, glueing and more. The...

countycomm.com

I have no affiliation to CC, and I take no responsibility if you wind up spending way too much money with them. Their products are far and above what you can get elsewhere. Yes they are pricy, and you need two kits to make a pair of hands, but you really get quite a bit for the money. See the link for the full list of contents,

Just passing this on as these really are a great addition to your shop. They are so much better than the cheap alligator clip type helping hands and these have the benefit of being able to be mounted permanently to the bench or mounted to solid movable stands for better placement and articulation.


Here I'm using them to lengthen the yellow control wire in the control circuit in a bit of a confined space. You can see I'm holding down the one base with a pair of pliers. Each kit comes with 5 arms and enough clamp sections and hardware to link them all. The 5 dogbone pieces are SS and the clamp "figure eight" pieces are titanium. The base as received is a large 1.5" x 5/16" disk of stainless. I'm going to mount mine to some heavy movable steel bases once I work out a viable storage solution for the whole kit.



View attachment 479994

Mine are from GRS, and come mounted on a plate:

I have Titanium "points" for silver soldering (and when I got mine 5 years ago they didn't cost $200!)

 

[markba633csi]

Wow, very fancy. I'm old school and just burn my fingers doing it one-handed
If I really need two free hands I hold the iron with my teeth
I also solder behind my back too like Hendrix

 

[RaisedByWolves]

Mine are from GRS, and come mounted on a plate:
View attachment 480017
I have Titanium "points" for silver soldering (and when I got mine 5 years ago they didn't cost $200!)

Wow, their prices are insane!

$457

California Air 4610AC Ultra Quiet Air Compressor, 110 V - GRS

The California Air Tools 4610AC Ultra Quiet & Oil-Free Air Compressor is ideal for anyone working inside where noise is...

grs.com

VS $287

Loading…

www.amazon.com

I do like that their hands have Belleville washers for keeping tension on the dog bones though, I might steal that.

 

[ChazzC]

Wow, their prices are insane!

$457

California Air 4610AC Ultra Quiet Air Compressor, 110 V - GRS

The California Air Tools 4610AC Ultra Quiet & Oil-Free Air Compressor is ideal for anyone working inside where noise is...

grs.com

VS $287

Loading…

www.amazon.com

I do like that their hands have Belleville washers for keeping tension on the dog bones though, I might steal that.

The extreme cost differential on the AC is probably because they’re not selling in numbers to get better than retail prices on their end. The tools they sell are also small quantities to a targeted market. Other than the 3rd hands and similar items the market is most likely too small to attract copies.

The ones I have are excellent quality and stay where you put them; can’t comment on the “aftermarket” versions.

 

[wachuko]

Mine arrived. Assembly in progress…

 

[Aaron_W]

Curse you Raised by Wolves!!!

One more tool I have to add to the list They look like they would be very helpful for my model making and soldering.

I'm thinking mounting them to strong magnets and then using them with a steel plate would allow a lot of flexibility and something like a 12x12" piece of 1/8" plate would be pretty stable.

 

[RaisedByWolves]

Ok, so I have been doing a thing to make these kits into a workable.....kit that will suit my needs better.

The plastic boxes these come in are nice, but the small size requires you to completely break down the entire setup to store them and that was bugging me.

That coupled with the fact that I wanted a larger base to stabilize these put me on the lookout for a suitable case to hold these and their bases in first so I would know what size bases I could make.

I found a really bad chineses toolbox? that wasn't really up to any other task so it seemed like a good fit.

I found that 5"x5" bases would fit nicely in this box and fabbed up a pair and blued them. I lined the bottom of the case with 1/8" rubber to prevent things sliding around and making noise. OK, the case alone felt really cheap and the rubber added some heft and made the case feel nicer when handling.

So here they are in all their glory.







One of my kits arrived with the plastic storage case broken so for now I have all the pieces stored in one box which fits neatly between the arms folded down for storage.

I started this thread looking for ideas on ways to arrange the spare parts, but I think I'm just going to mill some slotted holders out of plastic and screw those to the lid.