How to tighten gland nut earthing ring?

So why not reverse engineer it:-;?

Why not make off the SWA, fit it to the gland and then remove it from the gland.

Then fit the cone section and the earthing nut with ease and then remake the SWA termination onto to the gland.

If you are doing it properly just after you have "finished" you realise that the boot is on the wrong way around etc.

Having had a number of single-cylinder Velocettes, I now recall the plug spanner came in different forms. Most were a short box spanner with loose tommy-bar as shown in the link. but one I had was based on a very short box spanner, shortened to just above the flats, with a short tommy-bar welded or brazed onto one side of the spanner. Doing this made it quite short in height, and turned upside down it looked like a pipe for smoking tobacco. Box spanners are cheap and cheerful, and if anyone wanted to DIY a tool for tightening the SWA gland nut, this could be a way to go.

Although if the cable is in place, you have to be able to thread the box spanner onto it, past the tommy bar, so that you can get it anywhere near the nut.

But it's doable with a box spanner, unless the cable is actually connected, as you can thread the cable through the box and past the tommy bar.

A short piece of box spanner with a handle welded on (rather than going right through) seems to be the ideal solution to me, why electricians toolboxes don't have such a thing as 'standard' I can't understand.

Socket and ring spanners are not so good because they tend to have a chamfer at the working face so, given that the SWA ring nut is so thin, they don't hold well. A box spanner generally doesn't have such a chamfer.

A set of such things (box spanner with welded on tommy bar) for, say,

I suspect the answer is that its not considered enough of a problem to make a special tool worthwhile. (much as I like "the right tool for the job", I am also conscious that my electrical tool box is 'kin heavy already!)

(it may also be there is enough variation in the locknut sizes as to make one tool a non starter anyway in much the same way as there will be times you always need an adjustable of some sort for some plumbing jobs).

I tend to find in many cases you simply need to stop the inner nut spinning, and then you can tighten from the outside - before fitting the SWA to the gland permanently (i.e. not inserted at all, or inserted but the the armour grip nit not fully tightened).

In those cases just jamming something (e.g. screwdriver between end of case and nut or between two adjacent nuts) against the inside nut is enough to start tightening against it from outside, and then it tends to hold in place anyway once its got a bit of grip.

On the rare occasions I use banjo nut rather than a piranha, I find my small (6" or so) grips work well enough since they have one slim jaw, and can grip well and parallel onto the opposing flats of the nut. They also grip when pointing perpendicular at the nut, and that gives some clearance over any cable coming through the gland). It also helps that when the banjo tag is in place, that spaces the slim nut away from the enclosure a bit making it easier to grip.