Park Tool AK-5 Advanced Mechanic Tool Kit: Rider Review

Our "Rider Review" article series features honest reviews from verified purchasers of Worldwide Cyclery. They contain the photos, thoughts, feedback & overall review you are looking for.

Park tool has been around for a long, long time. With the years of experience manufacturing the best bike tools on the planet, you bet they offer a home mechanic kit built for the pros. Even though quarantine is starting to ease up, a lot of people are still stuck at home and attempting to work on their bikes themselves. That is exactly what Renee did. Let's see how it worked:

Renee's Review

I received the Park Tool AK-5 Advanced Mechanic Tool Kit about a month or so ago. I needed some tools to do simple maintenance and install upgrades on my bike. So far I have used almost all the tools. The chain cleaning tool especially surprised me, I had heard mixed reviews about it, but it worked wonderfully. One of the main reasons I ordered the Park Tool AK-5 Advanced Mechanic Tool Kit was to swap over my cassette to a new rim. The chain whip and adjustable spanner came in handy, as well as the F-5 lock ring for my specific cassette (SRAM NX Eagle).

Another tool in this set which I think every mountain biker should have would be a torque wrench. This tool allows you to make sure the bolts on your bike are tightened to the right torque setting. This is very important especially if you have carbon components or a dropper post. This is because over-tightening a carbon bar or seat post could cause it to crack. And over-tightening a dropper post will affect how it descends into its travel.

Easily the best thing for me in this tool set is the high-quality Allen key set. Before I purchased this set I was using some random metric Allen keys. It is important to have a set of high-quality Allen keys, this is because the specifications of a lesser quality set could be off, meaning you could strip the bolts on your bike. This would be caused by the poor Allen keys being slightly too small and wearing out the bolt. So it is a relief to have a set I can trust. The triangular Torx tool came in handy for me, before this purchase I did not have any Torx tools. This meant I could not move my SRAM shifters and brakes. So once I had my hands on this tool I got my cockpit dialed in.

Yet another helpful tool in this set was the wire cutting tool. I had purchased a KS Lev CI and was waiting for the tool kit to arrive so I could install it. If I had attempted to install this dropper before the tool kit arrived it would have surely been a disaster. There would have been all sorts of frayed wires. The high-quality wire cutting tool let me cut the wire to the correct length with ease and confidence.

Conclusion

"The theme with this toolset being they are of very high quality and there is a tool for almost every basic maintenance job you would need to do. The only thing I would purchase with this is some grease and an assembly compound. Other than that a great product and worth it, this set has saved me money from going to a bike shop every time I need a small fix." - Renee