What Makes a Sturtevant a Sturtevant?
If you know the Sturtevant Richmont brand, you are familiar with the fact that the tools and testers are more accurate, reliable, and durable than other brands. You know that the tools are easier to calibrate and they hold calibration much longer than other brands.
The question is, why is that fact?
Or, put another way, what makes a Sturtevant a Sturtevant?
Relentless Pursuit of Quality
W. Edwards Deming said that quality can’t be inspected into a product, it must be built-in. We wholeheartedly agree because we’ve always done it that way. We look at the tiniest details for building in quality.
Pick up a Sturtevant Richmont wrench and you will notice that despite the lightweight, it feels robust. The secret is simple. We use higher-grade steel in our tools. The higher quality steel grades mean we use less steel but the wrenches are stronger.
The housing for our Exacta 2, along with the 1100 Series, 1200 Series, and 1250 Series Exacta 2 wrenches are all made from aerospace quality aluminum. That gives the housing extra strength. The aerospace quality aluminum housing is the reason this wrench fares so well in the drop test. It is also the reason why you can run over an Exacta 2 with an SUV and the wrench isn’t damaged.
Lack of lever sensitivity is another quality design factor. The Shear Beam transducer design in our Exacta Series digital torque wrenches is a great example. The Shear Beam transducer is flat and it sits in a flattened case. The transducer is guided by 8 proprietary steel grade ball bearings. These factors work together to ensure that the wrench is more accurate, reliable, and durable.
A round case is subject to bending, which induces sideloading. If you aren’t familiar with the term, sideloading is torque application at an angle different than the requisite 90 degrees from the fastener. Veering away from the 90-degree plane changes the lever length, thus changing the torque formula and the torque output of the wrench. The Shear Beam design and flattened case eliminate side loading and facilitate more accurate torque application.
Respect for the Environment
Long before California pass statutes on Hexavalent Chrome, Sturtevant Richmont was already using Trivalent Chrome. Why? We shared the health and environmental concerns about Hexavalent Chrome plating.
Most companies place their tools in the chrome electroplating bath for 24 hours. We keep ours in the bath for 96 hours to give the wrench a thicker plate. That thicker chrome plating makes the wrench look better and makes it harder to chip, scratch, or dent the tool. It adds to the structural integrity.
We’ve been recycling since we started making torque wrenches. It wasn’t easy back then, but we did it. We continue to do it today. We conserve water, we recycle, we use rechargeable batteries. We care about the environment.
Our choice of batteries is rechargeable, NiMH batteries. These batteries last longer and provide a more stable power curve for the tools in which they are used. More importantly, they are environmentally friendly. And when the battery has seen the end of life, it can be recycled.
Durability in our DNA.
There are countless stories about all of our tools having legendary durability. The tools are so durable because, from day one, we designed durability into our tools.
CAL 30 Torque Screwdriver
We stopped making the CAL 30 screwdriver in 1972. We still get them back for calibration. We have a customer in Canada with forty CAL 30 screwdrivers. They get used each and every day. Those torque screwdrivers are 50 years old. The company takes good care of the tools and the tools last. That is durability in our DNA.
Beam Wrenches
We've had the same beam wrenches on a car company assembly line since 1993. The beam wrenches are used every day, on every car. Sturtevant Richmont torque tools hold up. This is why our customers tell us that our tools are durable.
Torque Testers
In 1968, a NASCAR team bought a torque tester from us. In 2013 they called us and bought six new TorqTronics 2 units along with 333 torque wrenches. They asked us if wanted the old tester back. Of course, we said yes. When we got the tester back we put it on the calibration bench and it was within tolerance. That tester worked for that NASCAR team for 45 years. They certainly saw a gigantic ROI on that piece of equipment.
If the tester still worked, why did they buy new ones? As you can imagine, space in a NASCAR garage is at a premium. The six TorqTronics 2 units that they bought took up the same amount of bench space as did the old tester. And the TorqTronics 2 units have an accuracy of +/- .5% while the old tester had an accuracy of +/- 1%.