There’s something about miniature tools that sounds cute to me, and the fact that these are recognized brands makes them seem even cooler.
If you look at the above product image of the Ken Elephant DIY tool collection, the tools look detailed enough to perhaps pass off as real, but they’re not.
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Online product descriptions say you get 6 items, or rather 6 groupings of items for (up to?) 12 tools in total, although there’s no guarantee that this is what you’ll get as they’re “blind packaged.”
There’s no information on the scale that I could find, even from Japanese websites, but a USA listing says they’re just the thing that your favorite [action or collectible] figures need.
Possible items include:
- Gel grip hammer with Hyper Scraper 200
- Tool Wagon Royal
- Torx L-type wrench with ball-grip driver & crystal line driver
- Ladder
- Hip paint can with paint roller
- G-Lock 25 tape measure
The tools are not necessarily sized in scale with each other, and a set of tools might contain duplicates.
There are Vessel screwdrivers, which is perhaps what triggered the “aww that’s so cute” response in me, since I’ve used the real version of the ball driver before.
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Here are real-life versions of the Vessel Balldriver screwdriver.
There’s an Olfa scraper and a Vessel gel hammer.
And what looks to be a larger-scale Tajima tape measure.
Here’s an Amazon listing for the real-life Tajima tape measure. It looks like they even got the sticker plate copied perfectly.
A set of these miniature tools will set you back a pretty penny – $50, which seems a bit steep, but that’s likely due to the lengths the maker went to create authentic-looking models.
When I was looking around online to see if I could scrape up some more details, I found that there are a few other brands of scale and miniature toys, including dollhouse-sized Bosch cordless power tools.
And yes, I’ve seen that there are mini cinder blocks and wood pallets, which I’ll likely post about on a slow tool news day.
If you like this kind of stuff, there’s also a whole world of scale RC accessories out there.
Kurt
I found a couple of cool miniature tools on Ebay – a Jet branded table saw, and a Jointer. They are maybe 6″ high.
I contacted Jet who said that are samples from their manufacturers, and the person who replied didn’t know any more about them, or if there were other machines replicated.
If anyone else has heard or seen more of theses, I would be interested to know about them. They are great display pieces for woodworkers!
fred
The Veritas (Lee Valley) miniatures are rather nice and offer functionality as well:
https://www.leevalley.com/en-ca/shop/tools/hand-tools/miniature-tools/101508-veritas-miniature-tool-sets
A warning is that they are not kids toys – plane and chisels coming with edges that are sharp – ready for honing.
JoeM
To be fair, these aren’t literally miniatures. They aren’t meant for display, even though they’re WORTHY of it. They are functional tools, that do the identical job of the larger sized Veritas tool they’ve been cloned from.
They are actually designed so you can use them. I hate to say “Doll House” here, because their scale isn’t accurate to every miniature club’s standard, which doesn’t mean you are guaranteed to get the right size for the dollhouse you may build. I’ve met several Dads out there, who have daughters that fall on the Autism spectrum in one way or another, and they take all their manly builder skills to scale down and build a miniature dollhouse, to code, for their daughters. Usually WITH their daughters, as a Daddy-Daughter project.
Well, the spoke shave planer works the same in miniature, on balsa wood dowling rods, as the full sized one does on pine or oak logs. Various Planers (the things they do the MOST Miniatures of, because… Veritas makes AWESOME Planers… I’ve never used them, but every time I say I’m a Lee Valley customer, with a customer number and everything, the response I get from other Lee Valley customers is usually “Have you tried their Planers yet?”) work exactly as they’re supposed to, assuming you scale down the workshop you’re in as well as the project. Smaller items require smaller clamps, smaller jig surfaces, and all that comes with that project.
Lee Valley, I think, considered making them as a novelty item at one point, but somewhere along the line, found it was somehow in their best interest to make them all fully-functional. Including the chisels and gauges. And I don’t think the first one they released even got as far as being completed as a prototype before they had already decided to make it fully functional.
This is a little bit strange, for me. Because my Mother did Miniatures for a very long time, and explaining that these tools are not only to the right scale for their REAL counterparts, they’re also fully functional for MAKING Miniatures… It falls on deaf ears with her. She says they are too big for the scale she worked on… but she doesn’t understand that they’re not for Miniature shows, they’re for MAKING the Miniatures too… She doesn’t grasp the fact that they’re fully functional, for working on very small scales, they aren’t there to be collected.
You COULD Collect them, and set them all on a shelf, and be proud of them. But they are fully functional, not novelties. Whatever crazy idea got Lee Valley to make these made the novelty aspect hard to sell.
Jim D
To be fair!
Toolfreak
Seems like great material to prank someone with, replacing their full size tool with the mini version when they set it down. Be sure to record the reaction when they discover their newly-shrunk tool and try to work out what the heck just happened.
Per
Available on Amazon Japan too:
https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/dp/B08241BYY2
Not sure about international shipping.
There is a Bosch miniature set too:
https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/dp/B07JXSQFW9
I’m not sure how big these are exactly, but they look like the kind of thing you would get from a capsule vending machine.
Doresoom
Reminds me of Marco Terenzi’s work on Instagram, but his miniature tools are fine works of art: https://www.instagram.com/p/BTFwo45Ffzs/
Matt J
I had a set of mini tool keychains similar to this when I was a kid:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32818122136.html
I thought I was so cool at the time…I remember the scissors actually cut and the adjustable wrench and pliers all worked. Mine were brass if I recall correctly. I think at one point I hung them from the chain on my chain wallet ?
tim Rowledge
There’s a whole world of miniature making out there. A colleague from when I lived in Silicon Valley built a 1/12 scale model of Norm Abrams’ workshop complete with a miniature Norm. She even got to show him around at some exhibition or other. She was even making 1/12 scale dovetailed cabinets etc for it!