Timeline for How does "spanner" come to mean "a wrench"?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
10 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Jul 2, 2014 at 10:44 | comment | added | Rupe | As for pliers, in the UK that is another similar kind of tool, distinct from wrenches and spanners. Pliers can be used for bending, squeezing, and manipulating pliable materials more generally (and in a bigger range of directions than wrenches/spanners which are primarily if not only for turning or opposing a turn). | |
| Jul 2, 2014 at 10:43 | comment | added | Rupe | I should point out that when I say "this is what I was taught as a child", that was 40 years ago. It may be that usage has changed over the years, due I suspect to more international products being sold here. As I was taught it, the difference between an adjustable spanner and an adjustable wrench is precisely that the former has flat parallel faces. | |
| Jul 1, 2014 at 11:54 | comment | added | Tristan r | Robusto, the word pliers is used in the UK, with this meaning dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/pliers?q=pliers and en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pliers | |
| Jul 1, 2014 at 11:48 | comment | added | Peter Shor | @Robusto: ... and I should have read the post and your comment more carefully before commenting. | |
| Jul 1, 2014 at 11:45 | comment | added | Robusto | @Peter: Not saying you're wrong. I'm just saying what the poster described is something different. I should have made that clearer. | |
| Jul 1, 2014 at 11:21 | comment | added | Peter Shor | @Roberto: O.K. Maybe in addition to adjustable wrenches, some kinds of pliers (the ones designed to grip things with two parallel jaws) are also called wrenches in the UK. But when I search UK hardware stores for "spanners", I find non-adjustable wrenches, and when I search UK hardware stores for "wrenches", I find adjustable wrenches. The description above of "fixed parallel flat faces opposing each other so as to be able to grip an object of the appropriate size" does not cover an adjustable wrench. | |
| Jul 1, 2014 at 11:12 | comment | added | Robusto | @PeterShor: "A wrench will typically have two handles which need to be squeezed together . . ." That describes pliers, not an adjustable wrench. | |
| Jul 1, 2014 at 11:05 | comment | added | Peter Shor | @Robusto: no, I think we call it an adjustable wrench, while a spanner is a non-adjustable wrench. | |
| Jul 1, 2014 at 10:59 | comment | added | Robusto | I think what you call a wrench in the UK, we in the US call a pair of pliers. | |
| Jul 1, 2014 at 10:52 | history | answered | Rupe | CC BY-SA 3.0 |