Unable to efficiently read rotation euler values as feedback

Hello, I have been trying to make a vr game where you tighten bolts by rotating a wrench around them. I had no idea how intricate rotations really are. I'm tring to make it so a bolt only rotates on its local x axis to follow a hand. I accomplished this using hinge joints and the appearance is great. The issue comes when measuring the turn so only clockwise motion is effectively tightening a bolt. I assumed it would be as easy as "when x rotation increases (righty tighty) tighten the bolt (represented by a health bar for the bolt) and when it decreases (lefty loosey), loosen the bolt (replenish health)."

I discovered that in the editor, when a hinge joint goes past 180, it loops back to 0 so I simply said if the absolute value of the rotation since last update is above arbitrary value, subtract 360 to have it represent the visual change in degree and vice versa.

my code to accomplish this is as follows:

     [Range(0f, 100f)]
     public float health = 100f;
 
     float prevRot;
 
     float rotChange;
 
     float degToHealth = 360f / 100f;
 
     private void Awake()
     {
         // Put in some starting value
         prevRot = transform.localRotation.eulerAngles.x;
     }
 
     void Update ()
     {
         rotChange = transform.localRotation.eulerAngles.x - prevRot;
 
         Debug.Log(transform.rotation);
 
        // Handles any issues with rotation rolling around to 0 when reaching 360
         if(rotChange > 300 || rotChange < -300)
         {
             rotChange = rotChange > 300 ? rotChange - 360 : rotChange + 360;
         }
 
         // remove health as necessary
         health -= rotChange / degToHealth;
 
         // bind the health
         if (health >= 100)
             health = 100;
         else if (health <= 0)
             health = 0;
         
         // store the previous rotation to use in the next fixed update loop
         prevRot = transform.localRotation.eulerAngles.x;
     }

My issue is that when I try to read these values and represent the health, they are different when reading them from the transform and what is displayed in the editor.

For example the editor reads rotation of my "wrench" as (152, 0, 0), but reading from transform.localRotation.eulerAngles.x gives me (38, 180, 180). I understand it is flipping the other two axes, and showing the distance from even ground, but why? Why is it different from what is shown in the editor? and how do I correct for this when making my calculations for health?

Link to gif of issue (couldn't post a longer gif without losing legible framerate and quality) https://plus.google.com/photos/photo/112004969329323323975/6394542961768124482?icm=false&authkey=CNX8s5Pqr7_iEw