For various reasons, the use of compressed air to drive a pneumatic torque wrench
is a common practice in those industries where such tools are used frequently. A pneumatic torque wrench is smaller and more manageable than an electrically driven model of similar capacity. For this reason, air driven tools tend to be far more powerful in reasonably sized packages than their electric counterparts such as the powered torque wrench. Pneumatic torque wrenches are also cost effective to run. This is because the generation of a compressed air source is cheaper than using electric tools. Powered or manual torque wrenches often come equipped with only a limited number of tension settings.