i too like the flanged japanese style hex heads. unfortunately, they are impossible for us to polish. since 99% of our business is polished stainless, we never got into them.. i've not had much problems with dirt packing into the allens. if you rinse your bike off regularly, it usually comes right out.. allens strip easier? stainless is a lot harder than the mild steel allens you normally see, they do not strip easy. high quality allen wrenches plays a big part of this also. i'm a huge fan of the wera hex plus t handles. extremely well built tools...
http://chadstoolbox.com/index.asp?Pa...S&Category=593