The All-Purpose Portable Multi-Tool

By Oscar H. Will Iii
Published on March 1, 2007
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Tap-rooted weeds are no longer a problem with Leatherman's Hybrid™ in hand. The tool's weed-digging blade ensures you get the entire root every time.
Tap-rooted weeds are no longer a problem with Leatherman's Hybrid™ in hand. The tool's weed-digging blade ensures you get the entire root every time.
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What do you do when the tractor won’t start? Reach for a multitool such as the Leatherman Crunch™ and u se its file component to clean the battery's terminal posts and cable clamps.
What do you do when the tractor won’t start? Reach for a multitool such as the Leatherman Crunch™ and u se its file component to clean the battery's terminal posts and cable clamps.
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Leatherman's new Hybrid™ has everything serious gardener needs, including tools to help you graft your favorite grape scion to that heirloom rootstock.
Leatherman's new Hybrid™ has everything serious gardener needs, including tools to help you graft your favorite grape scion to that heirloom rootstock.
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Since the side of the Crunch™ houses the pliers' locking mechanism, it has relatively few other tools, but it does include the essential screwdrivers, file, and cutting blade.
Since the side of the Crunch™ houses the pliers' locking mechanism, it has relatively few other tools, but it does include the essential screwdrivers, file, and cutting blade.
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SOG’s Powerlock™ design includes gear reduction between the handles and the pliers. This innovation results in a hand-force multiplication that is especially handy when performing repetitive tasks such as cutting hard wire or crimping blasting caps.
SOG’s Powerlock™ design includes gear reduction between the handles and the pliers. This innovation results in a hand-force multiplication that is especially handy when performing repetitive tasks such as cutting hard wire or crimping blasting caps.
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Like the Swiss Army knives before it, Victorinox's Spirit™ packs an incredible number of tools into an easy-to-handle package, and the components lock into position and are meant for more than occasional use.
Like the Swiss Army knives before it, Victorinox's Spirit™ packs an incredible number of tools into an easy-to-handle package, and the components lock into position and are meant for more than occasional use.

Take the portable multi-tool with you for easy tool access on the go. 

They’re here to stay, getting more sophisticated every year, and you shouldn’t go anywhere without one. No, I’m not talking about cell phones. I’m talking about multi-tools, those incredibly useful toolkits that fit neatly in your hand.

I would choose a multi-tool over a cell phone — even though both are handy — for the simple reason that the portable multi-tool empowers you to help yourself, while the cell phone limits you to calling for help.

Found objects like rocks, bones and antler tine were among the first multiuse tools our ancestors took in hand, but luckily they were never quite satisfied with what they found. Fast-forward through the ages to the Industrial Revolution and significantly more purposeful designs emerged including cast-iron hammers with handles that doubled as wrenches and multi-bladed folding jackknives.

Originally considered an aristocratic novelty, the jackknife evolved from gentleman’s accessory to hard-working gizmo, and, by the mid-1900s, most agriculturists carried a jackknife. Handy as it was, the jackknife notably lacked pliers or wire cutters — essential implements that farmers tucked into dedicated leather cases worn on the belt. Most farmers also gathered screwdrivers, saws, files, hammers and other indispensables in a five-gallon bucket left to rattle around in the back of his or her pickup truck, which led to the ultimate dilemma: Which tools do you carry to that back-40 fence repair that’s only accessible on foot? There had to be a better way.

Tim Leatherman wasn’t worried about which tools he needed for rough country fence repair when he envisioned the original pliers-based multi-tool in 1975. He was concerned with keeping his old car roadworthy on an epic European journey, returning to this country with sketches and a cardboard mockup of what eventually became the Pocket Survival Tool™ (PST). Leatherman launched his namesake company (and an entire industry, as it turns out) in late 1983 with two somewhat skeptical orders for the innovative PST — it was an instant hit with farmers, tradespeople, bicyclists and virtually everyone else who picked one up. I received my PST shortly after its debut, and it quickly replaced just about every tool in my five-gallon bucket except the hammer. The PST also whetted my appetite for similar tools.

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