Here's my observations from the dealership side of things. GM, Ford, Chrysler, etc. had particular tool vendors who did their "factory" tools for the techs to use. In the case of GM, the dealership got "credits" for purchasing the "Required Tools" for particular model years of vehicles. Our service manager usually did those things. Many times, when you got the mfd-recommended tools, you got way more things than you'd need, but you had to get them to keep everybody happy. Some were broken, some got lost (somewhere), and were generally not watched too closely by management. IF it was something that got a good bit of use, everybody made sure where it was or who used it last. For the less-used items, not cared about, much.
In some cases, IF you were going to sell particular vehicles, you HAD to order an appropriate special tool set to work on that vehicle under warranty. The local small-town Chrysler store didn't opt to purchase the electronic test stuff for the '80s Imperial coupes, so when a local doctor wanted one, he had to finagle getting him a car and not having to spend ($3000.00) for the electronic testing item. We opted-out for the GM ZR-1 Corvette tools back then, too, as we didn't expect to sell any of those, gladly letting another Chevy dealer do that. AND this situation still goes on today! No tools? No warranty work, on specific vehicles.
These "special tools" were meant to address certain specific repairs, only. Very few had multiple uses, from what I recall, other than on components which were common for several years (transmissions, engines, rear axles, etc.). The "better techs" bought their own special tools from Snap-On, or similar, who had similar items under their own brand name. They were typically a base tool that might need an adapter to customize it to the particular referenced factory tool? The particular "factory tool" was the way to ensure the repair was done correctly and not "shade-tree-d" by dealership techs, for the best result. Only thing was that many smaller dealerships couldn't afford that yearly bill for special-use tools, so it was up to the techs to "make it happen as best they could" . . . OR send the vehicle to a larger dealership to get the work done. From that perspective, they took care of the customer's warranty repair, didn't need to spend hundreds of dollars, and everybody was happy.
Seems like some of the Clymer manuals have "work-arounds" for the factory tools, in some cases?
Make a copy of the image of the factory tool in the service manual. Take it to a local tool rental place and see what they might have that would work. Rent it, learn how to use it, do the repair, and take it back. Pay the rental fee, get your deposit back. Be done!
As mentioned, most of these tools, when obsolete, were "stored" and later discarded when storage space was needed, the dealership "sold out", or whatever. Back then, very FEW if any saw the open marketplace for resale. They were that specialized in model year uses with very little value to anybody else, other than scrap value.
Chrysler usually used Miller (Miller-Falls?), GM used Kent-Moore, and I'm not sure who Ford used. They had catalogs to order these items, but as things progressed, the older ones were dropped. The dealerships usually had an "open account" via the vehicle manufacturer, so "consumers" were not allowed until more recent times, as I recall. Many of these suppliers have different names now, I believe.
In general, there ARE alternatives to these things.
CBODY67
