Its difficult to find (or even know) which tools are made in the USA anymore. Like you I grew up on Craftsman. I am an admitted tool-a-holic. I got tired of Craftsman running tool sales in the Sunday paper and then not having them when I drove over there. Also, their 1/4" ratchets became "junk". Right out of the store they didn't work . I bought a battery powered drill and it was great. The next time I bought one, the quality was down and the battery didn't last. Replacement batteries cost as much as the a drill&battery on sale. Gave up on them and bought Dewalt. Rugged drill, but when the 2 year warranty was up....they always failed. I had several Dewalt drills and batteries. When the last of the batteries failed I gave them to my son who still had some good batteries.
I started looking at Kobalt (Lowes). They have some pretty nice wrenches for a reasonable price and some good toool sets. I also like their brushless lithium ion drills and other tools. Yep, its not as well known, but those drills are powerful and long lasting. When buying these little power tools, I look at replacement battery cost and warranty. Kobalt batteries are substantially cheaper and have a 3 year warranty vs two years for others. A 4ah battery can be had for $50 (on sale) vs $100 for a Craftsman or $180 for 2 Dewalts.
I really don't care what the brand name is as most well known names make good quality wrenches. You have to look at availability. One of the best ratchets (flexable) is a Husky. I like some of the Stanley wrenches because they are longer, but you can't find them easily or complimentary stuff for a "set" of tools. I have more wrenches with different names on them than I can count, and I don't care what the names are. So, no real brand loyalty from me........but for a starter set I would look at Kobalt.
Here is a pegboard I made that has metric and standard wrenches arranged by size. I put the decimal size above the wrench size and parked this thing next to my lift. Now when I'm working under a car that has both std and metric fasteners..........if the wrench I have don't fit something I just hang it on the pegboard and grab the next larger/smaller size. Don't have to walk across the shop and grab 2 or 3 wrenches to make sure I get the right size. So again, no brand loyalty in my shop. The last picture shows that I was a Craftsman guy.................not any more though. I buy for value.
