Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck

[Travelover]

Some pretty good deals here for $5 when you spend $50 LINK

 

[lens12]

I have a farm & use tools hard . I was buying tools from Harbor Freight when they were only mail order. the quality of wrenches has improved a lot. I used to buy them to put a set in every tractor. I'd rather loose a cheap wrench than an expensive one.

I've bought quite a few of the 4-1/2' angle grinders. If you don't push them to hard they last quite a while. Sometimes I paid less than $10 for them.

I have 2 porta powers. work great.

14" chop saw. I'm on my fourth one. One of them didn't cut square. They have brushes so you can't force them very hard. They give you a second set of brushes but I usually burn them up before they need new brushes.

I bought an hammer drill for concrete 15 years ago. My employee borrowed it & burn it up before I had a chance to use it. They have different ones now.

I think a lot of Menards brand tools are the same as Harbor Freight.

 

[5030]

The Merlin extended reach blow gun is on sale with an ITC card for 4 bucks and it's a very nice blowgun even at the regular $9.95 price.

 

[5030]

Sometimes I paid less than $10 for them.

They are again... On sale in the Black friday flyer. I gave up on them a while ago. I was finding the smoke in them way too often and stinking up the shop. They really stink when they expire. Typically, they get overly hot, then start slowing down accompanied with stinky smoke and finally the stop entirely. Never trip a breaker, just expire to nothing and the gearboxes are always noisy too.

 

[IndyJay]

 

[Root Cause]

View attachment 738861

No doubt a lot of truth to this saying above.

Parallel to this, it has been stated that it takes, on average, 3 attempts to perfect a product.
-The inventor develops the original and needs to get it to market to recoup the investments.
-The Copycat sees a way to make it a bit better or simpler
-And the 3rd producer makes the best product as they have now had time to learn from both the producers and the consumers.

I think both perspectives have their place.

 

[IndyJay]

No doubt a lot of truth to this saying above.

Parallel to this, it has been stated that it takes, on average, 3 attempts to perfect a product.
-The inventor develops the original and needs to get it to market to recoup the investments.
-The Copycat sees a way to make it a bit better or simpler
-And the 3rd producer makes the best product as they have now had time to learn from both the producers and the consumers.

I think both perspectives have their place.

The meme references the fourth producer.

 

[Travelover]

The meme references the fourth producer.

The whole purpose of this thread is to highlight some of the tools at Harbor Freight that are good VALUES. They might not be the best, but some are well worth the money. Anyone can stand back and sniff that their Snap-ons are better. Undoubtedly they are but that is not the purpose of the thread.

 

[jyoutz]

The whole purpose of this thread is to highlight some of the tools at Harbor Freight that are good VALUES. They might not be the best, but some are well worth the money. Anyone can stand back and sniff that their Snap-ons are better. Undoubtedly they are but that is not the purpose of the thread.

Years ago I bought some of the cheap Pittsburgh plyers sets (needle nose, water pump, et…) to use around the house and so the kids would leave my good shop tools alone. I thought they would need replaced after a few years. Twenty years later after lots of use, they are still good tools.

 

[5030]

I'm going to have to say (from experience) that the HF Icon line of hand tools is as good as (and sometimes even better) than the tool truck tools. So are the Chief line of air tools. While not loss leaders, they are still less than say Snap-On or SK Wayne or MAC.

I'm 100% satisfied with them and have had zero issues.