Chris Hanrahan was in the right place at the right time.
The Wisconsin-based technician was working at a Toyota dealership when Rusty Wallace paid a visit. So it was only fitting that Hanrahan asked the former NASCAR champion to autograph his 1998 Rusty Wallace Edition Matco combo box. Wallace obliged, as did drivers Stephen Wallace and Brendan Gaughan.
“When they were racing at Road America, here in Wisconsin, for the first time, he and his teams made stops at several Toyota dealerships,” Hanrahan says. “It was just perfect timing.”
In addition to the signatures on the outside, Hanrahan’s toolbox is packed with tools on the inside. “I’m jammed full,” he says. “I have between $75,000 and $80,000 invested.”
Hanrahan, who has been a technician for 26 years and currently works at Boucher Hyundai in Waukesha, Wis., purchased his box in 1999 and added a side cabinet less than six months later. He has a Snap-on cart that matches the blue toolbox, and he also bought a locker two years ago “because I was just plain running out of room.
“The big thing that I like about the toolbox is the top box has three full-width drawers, and you can’t buy toolboxes like that anymore,” Hanrahan says about his double bay box. “Having the big drawers on it, it lets me categorize my tools.”
He uses the top drawer for miscellaneous items like pencils, picks, wiring diagrams, dial calipers and brake micrometers. “The next drawer is all my screwdrivers, all my ratcheting screwdrivers, all of my interior tools,” Hanrahan says. “And then bottom drawer of the top box is all my heavy duty stuff – my slide hammers, my specialty pullers, my air hammer and that sort of thing.
“Having the full-width drawers makes it so much easier, so I don’t have to search two or three drawers to get the tools I need to do the job that’s at hand,” he adds.
His favorite tool – a pocket screwdriver – doesn’t need a home in the box because he uses it “every day, all day long.”
Having easy access to tools is critical for Hanrahan because he has to perform a wide variety of work at the dealership. “We have to do it all,” he says. “I’m about to do a used car inspection in one bay, and I’ve got an engine tore down waiting for parts in another. So we have to do everything.”
