6Pcs Pin Punch Set (10")

The problem is that a pin punch has a parallel shank — the same diameter all the way down — and that is exactly what you need and exactly what makes it fragile if used wrongly. A parallel punch can follow the pin all the way through the hole and out the other side, which a tapered punch cannot, because a taper jams in the hole once it has gone in a short distance. But a parallel shank is also slender and unsupported, and hitting a pin that has not yet started to move will bend or snap it.

That is why the correct method uses two punches, and why anybody serious about the job owns both types. Start the pin with a short, stout taper punch, which has the strength to break it loose. Once it is moving, switch to a pin punch of the right diameter and drive it the rest of the way out. Doing it in that order is the difference between a five-second job and a bent punch plus a pin still stuck halfway.

Six sizes is what makes the set worth having over individual punches. Choosing the right diameter matters more than people expect: a punch smaller than the pin concentrates the blow on the centre of the pin and can swell its end so it jams harder, and a punch larger than the pin will not enter the hole at all, or worse, damages the mouth of the hole. Matching the punch closely to the pin — just under its diameter — is what makes a pin come out cleanly.

The material is chrome vanadium, which is the right choice for a slender struck tool: chromium for hardness and wear resistance, vanadium for grain refinement and toughness, giving a punch that resists bending and mushrooming without being brittle enough to snap.

The work: driving out roll pins, dowels, taper pins and cotter pins in machinery, gearboxes and engines; removing hinge pins; dismantling linkages and mechanisms; knocking out rivets after the head has been removed; and aligning holes during assembly.

The buyers are engineering and machine shops, vehicle, motorcycle and plant mechanics, maintenance fitters, gunsmiths and instrument repairers, and hardware dealers supplying workshops.

Support the work so the pin has somewhere to go — driving a pin against a solid bench simply drives it back in. Keep the punch square to the pin, since an angled blow is what bends them. And dress any mushrooming off the struck end, because those curled edges break off and fly. Eye protection every time. Ask us on WhatsApp for a price on the set.