Product awards 2017

Our expert test team names 15 of the best car accessories

WANT the best tech and accessories for your car? We’re here to help. The second instalment of our Product Awards 2017 recognises the finest kit we’ve tested over the past year, following our car care awards in Issue 1,478. This time our focus turns to gadgets, tools, electronics and safety items like wipers and headlight bulbs. Our team of experts has tested more than 120 products to sort the Best Buys from the overpriced and under-achievers, allowing you to shop with confidence when you want to upgrade the gear in your car.

Price: £20 Contact: www.amazon.co.uk

IF you have lots of small items such as nuts, bolts or fuses, and you want to keep them with your tools, then this Curver box is well worth looking at because it has two sections for storing such odds and ends.

The storage boxes are removable, so they can be filled elsewhere without taking the whole toolbox, and have multiple divisions within each one.

We found the Curver successfully made the balance between being large enough for a DIY mechanic’s kit, but still being sufficiently small to carry easily. Our sockets fitted neatly into the tote tray’s small sections, and the box held our test tools with ease. Good value for money makes it our choice.

Price: £56.40 Contact: www.sealey.co.uk

IT’S the really neat touches that take the eye with this 27-piece socket set from Sealy, rather than the vivid green case, which is a change from the company’s usual red livery.

Take the 1/2-inch to 3/8-inch drive adaptor: it can be threaded over an extension and used as a breaker or T-bar. The fine-toothed ratchet features a telescopic handle so that you can apply extra force. The ratchet mechanism also runs smoothly.

Add in sockets which easily passed our tests, along with a good selection of deep and shallow versions and extension bars for a sub-£60 price, and you have a winner.