About the only thing duct tape can’t do is take things apart. For that, you can either have a six-by-four-foot tool chest with five hundred wrenches varying in size from 1/32” to two feet, or you can have one adjustable wrench. But, of course, all that means nothing if you don’t know how to use it.
Open the jaws by turning the cute little auger in a clockwise direction—or left to right, depending on whether you have the wrench out in front of you or are straddling it. Now place the jaws around whatever you’re trying to undo and tighten them up by turning the auger the other way. Once they’re snug, slide the wrench off and tighten it another smidge. This will make the wrench a little hard to get back on the nut, but it will be worth it. Now you can horse on the handle until the nut starts to turn. If you need more leverage, you can slide a piece of pipe over the end of the wrench, but don’t exceed the manufacturer’s warning that you will void the warranty if you use a pipe that is more than ten times the length of the adjustable wrench.
Close the jaws tightly. We’ve all seen people flailing away at a pipe or an engine block with an adjustable wrench with the jaws wide open. This to me is the sign of an amateur handyman who has no respect for his tools. Close the jaws tightly and, with a firm grip in the strongest of your hands, make large, sweeping arcs with the wrench until it comes in contact with the target. Clear an area under the target so you have room to start the swing with the lower body; this will greatly increase the torque and your WHS (wrench head speed).
Slip the handle of the wrench under whatever it is you’re trying to pry, then open the jaws up so they are slightly narrower than your heel. Now stand on the jaws. If that’s not enough leverage, use a fireplace poker. You’ll need the one with the crossbar a few inches from the end. Set the wrench jaws wide enough to take the poker, but narrower than the crossbar. Insert the poker as shown and push down where the arrows indicate. If your family has a circus background, you could even try standing on the poker handle.
Sometimes when you’re trying to pull your snowmobile out of the lake, the tow chain needs just another few inches to reach the runner pin, and you can’t back up your vehicle because the floorboards are already under water. So slip the handle of the adjustable wrench through the last link as shown. The width of the jaws will prevent it from slipping all the way through; then, just slip the hole in the wrench handle over the pin and haul away. If you’re going to tow the snowmobile for a mile or more, I suggest you wrap both ends of the wrench with the Handyman’s Secret Weapon.
