['97ventureowner]

From my many years of experience and what my father told me a long time ago. a 6 pt socket is better to use over a 12 pt on most bolts because there is less chance of slippage and "rounding off" the bolt head. This is especially true of cheaper quality sockets . The 6 pt seems to grip better and allow you to use more force to loosen a bolt. I have also found a 12 pt. comes in handy with slightly rounded off bolt heads where a 6 pt doesn't seem to want to fit properly. I have been known to use a hammer to pound the 12 pt socket on the slightly rounded bolt before I attempt to get the bolt loose. A slightly smaller size socket works well with this attempt. I know what i just said kind of contradicts the earlier portion of this post, but there are certain circumstances where one type works better than the other. In my younger days, I was known to use 12 pt.SAE sockets to remove metric bolts, because I didn't have enough money at the time to have a proper metric socket set Seems many of the cars I owned back in the '80s from the '70s era had a mix of SAE and metric bolts on them which at the time was a pain in the ass when you didn't have the proper tools. Now I know better.