// Personal website of Chris Smith

For a while now, whenever I’ve traveled anywhere I’ve dumped a selection of tools into my backpack just in case I need them. Originally this was mostly focused around being able to open and fix my laptop if anything went wrong, but over time has slowly expanded to include other useful tools.

Repeatedly packing these tools and then returning them to where they belonged was tedious, though. I couldn’t just leave them in the backpack as I often needed them for non-travelling purposes, and I didn’t want to just buy duplicate tools that spent most of their life a few meters away from each other, so I ignored the problem and just dealt with the tedium.

Eventually I acquired enough tools that — while not quite duplicates — I wouldn’t miss often if they were kept in the backpack. Building on these I’ve created a little travel toolkit that contains everything I might want (and more) while away.

The base

The biggest challenge I had before was finding a screwdriver set. I have an iFixit Mako set that did the in-and-out-of-the-bag routine for several years. Nothing else covered the range of drivers I wanted for generic electronic tinkering and more chunky work. I finally found one in the form of a Wera Tool-Check PLUS TR-Edition. “TR” stands for “Tool Rebel” and is Wera’s “fan club” brand. Its signature features over the normal Tool-Check PLUS are a fancy fabric case and a 152mm bit extender; but it also comes with a much different set of bits, which is why I picked it up.

Here’s a comparison

There are only five bits present in the standard version that are missing in the TR edition: 5mm hex (pretty uncommon) and four sizes of security torx (rare). In exchange for those and the removal of a bunch of duplicates, you get two extra phillips sizes (0 and 00, both very useful for electronics and spectacles), some pozidrive bits (extremely common on random hardware/furniture/etc), smaller hex bits (for electronics, 3D printers, and so on), and a few other bits and pieces.

Overall it’s a vastly superior selection for my needs. And while it doesn’t have the full range of bits provided by the iFixit kit, it does cover almost everything I’m ever actually likely to need while travelling, and it’s probably around a third of the size.

The other core part of the toolkit is the bag. I had a UGREEN “travel accessory” bag hanging around unused, and noticed it was almost the exact right size for the Tool-Check. Now, how many other tools could I stuff in there?

All the tools

The kit can be broken down into a few sections:

Screwdriving

• The aforementioned Wera Tool-Check
• Its 152mm bit extender

I’ve talked enough about this already, I think, so I’ll spare you any additional commentary on screwdrivers and bits.

Splitting, gripping and cutting

• Engineer tweezers
• Engineer mini snips
• Engineer mini screw removal pliers
• Knipex mini waterpump pliers
• Two iFixit spudgers (one metal, one plastic)
• iFixit jimmy

I have bigger or slightly different versions of these that stay in my normal toolkit. The tweezers and snips are useful in a variety of situations, and the spudgers are handy for getting inside laptops and other devices. The pliers are less useful, but they’re one of those things where when you do need them there aren’t any good alternatives.

Sewing

• Two needles
• Some black thread
• Set of mini clips

You never know when you’re going to rip a seam in something. I find the clips a lot less fiddly than using pins for keeping material in place when I’m trying to sew.

Computering

• Retractable ethernet cable
• RJ45 coupler
• USB-C to RJ45 adapter
• Dual USB-A and USB-C thumb drive, with an Arch ISO on it

Sometimes Wi-Fi just doesn’t cut it, or you need to fiddle with a router that doesn’t expose its admin UI over Wi-Fi. The USB-C adapter is for use with my phone, as it’s often easier to move that get the laptop where it needs to be.

I can boot from the thumb drive into an Arch environment, and from there reinstall my laptop from scratch if needed. There’s enough space left over so it can be used to transfer files as well.

Miscellaneousing

• Fabric tape measure
• Spirit level
• Sharpie
• Superglue
• Spare batteries: 2 CR2032s, 2 AA, 2 AAA

I’m almost certain I won’t use the spirit level, but it’s tiny and I had a spare so it went in. Everything else is just in the “generally handy to have” category.

Putting it all together

The Tool-Check PLUS fits almost perfectly into one side of the UGREEN bag, leaving a little wiggle room along the side for the longer parts like spudgers. The middle pockets can’t fit much in, but keep the batteries and sewing bits out of the way. Everything else is in a big zip-up compartment in the other side, which is slightly messy but still easy enough to dig through to find whatever I need.

The complete kit weighs in at around 1.2KG, so it’s not exactly lightweight, but it goes in a bag with a heavy laptop and all of its peripherals so it’s not as noticeable as it might otherwise be.

It remains to be seen how much use I’ll actually get out of any of this. Maybe I’ll put a bit of paper in so that I can track how often I use each tool…