One of the blogs I keep an eye on is Gizmag, which I’m sure used to describe itself as “the emerging technology magazine”, although it now seems to have dropped that slogan.  According to its “About” page, Gizmag is over 10 years old and is “a celebration of human endeavor”; as you can see from the spelling it’s US based. The Gizmag owners say “We aim to inspire, not ridicule. We cover technology, not the politics or the money behind it.”  All in all, that seems to be a pretty laudable goal and it’s certainly a good blog to follow if you’re interested in technology.

One of the gadgets that recently featured was of particular interest to me as a cyclist.  This was the Nutter, a very cunning looking bike multi-tool.

Multi-tools are very popular amongst cyclists, as they enable you to carry several different screwdrivers and allen keys (and sometimes other things) in one small, handy package.  That’s great for taking with you on a bike for doing roadside repairs and could be used by more generally by cyclists on a tight budget, although I generally find it much easier to use dedicated tools when I’m working in the relative comfort of my own garage.

The small size of a multi-tool, which is one of its main strengths, is also one of its biggest weaknesses, since having very short handles they don’t provide much leverage and therefore make it harder to loosen very tight screws and allen bolts (or, conversely, to tighten them very hard — though for most purposes you can get things sufficiently tight with a good multitool).

The Nutter is designed to overcome this problem, by the simple expedient of making a longer tool.  It does this by combining it with a tyre lever, which is another tool that most sensible cyclists would carry as a matter of course.   From the photos, it looks a bit bigger than the tyre levers I usually use, but again the extra size would give more leverage and make it easier to get tyres on and off.  In any case, the increased size would be offset by the fact you wouldn’t need to carry separate tyre levers as well as the multitool.

In addition to the tyre lever and a fairly standard set of allen keys (aka hex keys) and screwdrivers – which are supplied as removable bits, rather than on separate shafts – the Nutter comes equipped with a 15mm spanner and a spoke spanner, as well as a handy carrying case.

Apparently the Nutter hasn’t yet gone on to the general market but if they become available at a price within my budget I’ll certainly consider getting one, as it looks like a very useful tool to have and a well-designed (and made) bit of kit.