The VEX V5 Tool Kit We Buy for Every Team

Every season a team loses a match because a shaft collar backed off, or loses an hour because the one T15 bit in the box went round. The fix is boring and it is cheap: give each team the same complete kit, and make sure everyone knows why each piece is in it.

This is the list Knuckle Sandwich Robotics Inc. (KSR) buys for a VEX V5 team. One kit per team, sized for four to six students sharing a pit. Prices were read from the live product pages on 19 September 2026 and will drift, so re-check before you order.

Nothing here is sponsored, and KSR earns nothing from these links. We are publishing it because coaches keep asking what to buy.

Section A: Hand tools

Amazon Basics by SKIL 4V Cordless Stick Screwdriver, 10-pc bit set ($30.00 at Amazon). Primary driver for the whole build. Three torque settings keep students from stripping T15 heads. USB charged, so no battery packs to lose.

Wiha 71515 Torx T15 Insert Bits, 1/4" hex drive, 10-pack ($11.30 at Amazon). The bit that turns every VEX V5 #8-32 star drive screw. Bits wear out and walk off, so buy them ten at a time.

6" Magnetic Star Drive Bit, T15 ($4.99 at RoboSource). Reaches screws behind a plate or inside a drivetrain. The magnetic tip holds the screw while a student lines it up one handed.

12" Magnetic Star Drive Bit, T15 ($7.99 at RoboSource). The deep reach bit. The shaft passes through the holes in VEX structure, so it gets to screws nothing else can touch.

6" Magnetic Star Drive Bit, T8 ($4.99 at RoboSource). Long reach T8 for collars sitting behind structure. Heads the T8 group below: shaft collars and coupler screws are all T8, never T15.

Wiha Star Drive Bit, T8, 1" (10 x $0.99 = $9.90 at RoboSource). The everyday T8 power bit for the electric screwdriver. Under a dollar each makes these consumables, not tools. Ten means nobody stops building because a tip went round.

Precision Star Drive Screwdriver, Heavy-Duty, T8 (2 x $3.99 = $7.98 at RoboSource). Hand driver for set screws. Collar screws want feel, not speed, and a power driver strips them. Two so the drivetrain pair can both work.

T8 Star Drive Key, 10-pack, double ended L-keys ($7.99 at RoboSource). Built for VEX V5 coupler screws and shaft collar set screws. Reaches collars buried inside a drivetrain where no driver will fit. One per student plus spares.

Klein Tools 646-11/32 Nut Driver, 11/32", 6" hollow shaft ($8.99 at Amazon). The workhorse. 11/32 inch is the across-flats size of every VEX nylock nut, and the hollow shaft lets a long screw pass straight up through the handle.

Klein Tools 646-1/4 Nut Driver, 1/4", 6" hollow shaft ($11.99 at Amazon). Same 646 series in 1/4 inch for #4-40 hardware on sensor mounts and light brackets.

CRAFTSMAN 11/32" Combination Wrench (CMMT44692) ($9.16 at Amazon). Holds the nut in tight spots where the nut driver will not fit. Open end for speed, box end for torque.

Capri Tools 1/4" Combination Wrench, 12-point SAE ($6.99 at Amazon). For #4-40 hardware and the smaller fasteners on sensors, brackets and license plate mounts.

TEKTON 11/32" Socket, 1/4" drive, 6-point (SHD03009) ($5.00 at Amazon). Single socket, no set. Six-point grips the flats instead of the corners, so it will not round off a soft nylock the way a 12-point can.

Capri Tools 1/4" Shallow Socket, 1/4" drive, 12-point SAE ($5.20 at Amazon). Single socket, no set. Pairs with the 1/4 inch nut driver for #4-40 work where a ratchet is faster than turning a handle.

HORUSDY 1/4" Drive 90-Tooth Quick-Release Ratchet Handle ($6.98 at Amazon). Sockets do nothing on their own. This is the handle that drives them. A 4 degree swing arc reaches inside a drivetrain, and it includes a 1/4 to 3/8 inch adapter. Skip this line if the shop already has 1/4 inch drive ratchets.

Hotehce 2" Universal Table Vise, 360 degree swivel, clamp-on ($15.99 at Amazon). Clamps to any pit table and comes off in seconds. Holds stock steady for hacksawing and filing. No permanent bench needed.

HAUTMEC 12" High-Tension Hacksaw, 24 TPI bi-metal blade ($9.59 at Amazon). Cuts VEX aluminum C-channel, bar and standoffs. 24 TPI is the right tooth count for thin aluminum and leaves a clean edge.

kapoua 6-Piece Metal Needle File Set, hardened alloy steel ($7.99 at Amazon). Flat, warding, square, triangular, round and half round, each with a handle. Squares up a hacksawed end, opens a hole a few thousandths, and cleans an edge the rotary tool would overshoot.

AFA Tooling Deburring Tool, 11 M2 HSS blades ($9.99 at Amazon). A different job from a file. The swivel blade rides the lip of a drilled hole and shaves the burr off in one pass, including inside bores a file cannot enter.

ValueMax Corded Rotary Tool Kit with accessories ($25.99 at Amazon). The grinding tool. Grinding stones, cutoff wheels and sanding drums for cleaning up cuts, opening slots and easing sharp corners.

SPEEDWOX 7" Long Reach Needle Nose Pliers, slim extra long nose ($8.99 at Amazon). The thin one. Fine smooth tips on a long slender jaw, for fishing a nut out of a C-channel or holding a connector deep in the frame where nothing else reaches.

Klein Tools J203-6 Long Nose Side Cutting Pliers, 6-3/4" ($29.99 at Amazon). The strong one. Journeyman induction hardened jaws that grip, bend and twist without flexing, plus a side cutter in the same tool. This is the pair that lasts past graduation.

WORKPRO 3-Piece Pliers Set: 6" slip joint, 6" long nose, 6" diagonal ($16.99 at Amazon). The general purpose set. Slip joint for grip, long nose for reach, diagonal for cutting wire and zip ties. Drop forged carbon steel with soft grip handles.

Channellock CHL430 10" Straight Jaw Tongue and Groove Pliers ($18.95 at Amazon). The real thing, not a lookalike. For pressing bearings, pulling a stuck shaft, or holding a standoff still while a screw backs out. The one tool in the kit that supplies serious clamping force.

WORKPRO 2-Pack 6" Precision Flush Cutters ($9.99 at Amazon). A flush cut leaves no sharp stub on a trimmed zip tie, so nothing snags on the field or on a hand reaching into the robot. Two so the wiring pair is never waiting.

TICONN Clear Safety Glasses, ANSI Z87.1, 12-pack ($14.95 at Amazon). Required any time the hacksaw, rotary tool or drill press is running. Twelve covers the team plus visitors and spares.

Section subtotal: $308.86

Section B: Drill press station

Hoteche Variable Speed Mini Benchtop Drill Press, 1/4" chuck ($69.99 at Amazon). Square, repeatable holes. Hand drilling thin aluminum walks and tears; a press does not. The 1/4 inch chuck covers every bit in this kit.

Hoteche 2.5" Quick Release Drill Press Vise ($13.99 at Amazon). Never hold aluminum by hand under a drill. The quick release jaw resets between parts fast enough that students will actually use it.

13-pc M35 Cobalt Drill Bit Set, 1/16" to 1/4" by 64ths ($8.99 at Amazon). Covers #8-32 exactly: 11/64 inch is the clearance hole and 3/16 inch is the next size up for slop. Cobalt holds an edge in aluminum.

Section subtotal: $92.97

Section C: Consumable hardware

Screws and collar hardware are consumables, so most programs budget them separately from tools.

Color Coded Star Drive Screws, 2,200-pc Variety Pack, #8-32 T15 ($187.99 at RoboSource). Screws are color coded by length, so students stop guessing and stop mixing sizes. 1,000 screws in 10 lengths plus 500 nylocks and 400 washers.

Star Drive Shaft Collar Set Screws, 8-32 x 0.125", 100-pack ($5.99 at RoboSource). Grade 8 T8 replacements for VEX shaft collars. Collar screws strip and vanish constantly; a hundred spares ends that problem for a season.

Section subtotal: $193.98

Optional add-ons

Not counted in the kit total.

CRAFTSMAN 16" Lockable Tool Box ($18.98 at Amazon). Gives the kit a home and makes the pre-event check a 30 second job instead of a scavenger hunt.

GRIP 6" Stainless Steel Magnetic Parts Tray ($7.99 at Amazon). Catches screws and nuts at the table edge. Pays for itself the first time a team does not lose a collar screw under the field.

CRAFTSMAN 11/32" Combination Wrench, second unit ($9.16 at Amazon). A second 11/32 inch lets two students torque opposite ends of an assembly at the same time.

Section subtotal: $36.13

Kit total

Sections A, B and C together come to $595.81 per team. The optional add-ons add $36.13.

Why these sizes

New mentors ask about this every year, so here is the reasoning in one place.

T15 star drive. Every VEX V5 #8-32 structural screw takes a T15 Torx bit. A Phillips or hex driver will round the head out. Buy T15 bits in packs; they are consumables, not tools.

T8 star drive. Shaft collars and coupler screws take T8, a different and smaller bit than the T15 used on structure. A kit with only T15 cannot tighten a collar, which is the most common reason a drivetrain goes loose mid-match. This kit carries T8 four ways: power bits for the driver, a long reach bit, hand drivers for feel on set screws, and L-keys for collars buried in the frame.

11/32 inch wrench, socket and nut driver. 11/32 is the across-flats size of a VEX #8-32 nylock nut. This single size covers almost every nut on the robot, which is why the kit carries it three ways: nut driver for speed, wrench for tight spots, socket for long runs.

Hollow-shaft nut driver. The Klein 646 has a hollow shaft, so a long screw can pass up through the handle. A solid-shaft driver bottoms out on anything longer than about 3/4 inch and becomes useless on real builds.

1/4 inch wrench. The across-flats size for #4-40 hardware, used on sensor mounts, brackets and lighter subassemblies.

11/64 inch drill bit. The clearance hole for a #8-32 screw. The screw passes through freely instead of threading into the aluminum and binding.

3/16 inch drill bit. One step larger than 11/64. Use it when a hole needs a little slop so a bracket can be shifted into alignment before the nut is torqued.

Cobalt bits, not black oxide. Aluminum loads up and dulls cheap bits fast. M35 cobalt holds its edge through a season of C-channel.

24 TPI hacksaw blade. Tooth count matters on thin wall aluminum. Coarser blades grab and tear the edge; 24 TPI cuts clean and needs less deburring afterward.

Two needle nose, on purpose. A thin long-reach pair and a heavy pair do opposite jobs. Thin tips fit inside C-channel and around connectors but bend if a student leans on them; the heavy Klein pair grips and twists but will not fit anywhere tight. Buying one of each is cheaper than replacing bent thin pliers every season.

Channel locks earn their keep. Tongue and groove pliers are the only tool in the kit that applies real clamping force: pressing a bearing flat into a plate, backing out a seized standoff, holding a shaft while a collar comes loose. Buy the Channellock, not a lookalike; the jaws stay parallel under load.

Files and the deburring tool are not the same. A burr cuts hands, fouls bearings and keeps plates from seating flat, and it is the step teams skip and then pay for at the event. The deburring tool swivels along the lip of a drilled hole and shaves the burr in one pass. The files reshape: squaring a hacksawed end, opening a hole slightly, easing a sharp corner. Buy both; neither does the other job well.

Clamp-on vise, not a bolted bench vise. A clamp-on vise travels to competitions and comes off the table in seconds. A bolted vise does neither, and most pit tables are not yours to drill.

Safety glasses. Required any time the hacksaw, rotary tool or drill press is running. The 12-pack covers the team, visiting students and the pair that always go missing.

Buying notes

Quantities are sized for one competition team of roughly four to six students sharing one pit kit. If a second team shares the box, scale the T15 bits, the screw pack and the safety glasses first. Everything else holds at one per kit.

If the 2,200-piece screw pack is more than one team needs, RoboSource sells single-length 100-packs starting around $7.99.

On sourcing: we priced this at RoboSource and Amazon. RoboSource came in cheaper on star drive tooling and #8-32 hardware, and Amazon covered everything else.

Questions about any of this, or want to compare notes on what your program buys? Email us at info@ksbots.org.