The Harbor Freight Tool Support/Hate Thread!

[UpstateMike]

The Chinese stuff is better?

[M-technik-3]

When did craftsman go china? That sucks. Sell outs. First tools I ever bought were craftsman.

Deal was inked out roughly two years ago. Tools started showing up about a year ago. Professional Line is still made here in US and Taiwan which is still China but not mainland. The level of quality was/is considered better.

[vertvertvert]

hey smoke30 i've got a set of HF impact sockets, and they work great...
I also lost about half of them, but who care they were something like $15 for a set from 10mm-32mm.
However, my HF impact gun is a POS

in my opinion harbor freight is the bee's for a mechanic on a budget that favors parts to tools.

[Larzzz]

The grinders are great, first one broke and im on my second right now

[UpstateMike]

When did craftsman go china? That sucks. Sell outs. First tools I ever bought were craftsman.

[SmokeE30]

ive been eyeballing HF tools quite a bit lately as im about to get back into wrenching and need to gather a few tools that im soon to leave in my home garage. at the moment ive been looking at impact socket sets but im not so sure I want to rock the HF impacts, not that I think they will brek just concerned with damaging bolts, ive been looking at the Ingersol Rand impact sockets as they are pretty cheap but still seem like they would be another quality product from IR.

[M-technik-3]

pawn shops and used tool shops

I use this place on occasion.

http://www.used-tools.com/

That being said now that craftsman has gone the way of china, not many decent lower priced tools out there anymore.

[UpstateMike]

Pretty good I'd say. They know the stuff is cheap so they rely on volume.

I had no problem with returning the split socket much to my surprise!

[reelizmpro]

Pretty good I'd say. They know the stuff is cheap so they rely on volume.

[UpstateMike]

I have a split impact socket that's about five years old. What Would my chances be that they would take it back?

[GillesBigCowboy]

Last week, I returned a several year old broken rod puller thingy, and they gave me a newer, nicer one no questions asked, no receipt, etc...
They seem hungry for business and customer focused... Overall tool quality seems to be creeping up also.

[Nick_S]

I have a basic craftsman ratchet and socket set but just about everything else has come from HF. Some are great, some are crap.

[shameson]

Got a breaker bar from for really cheap, no more than $15 and a nice little dolly to move things around. Came in handy when working on the jet skis. Other than that just about every other tool I wrench with is Snap On :p

[UpstateMike]

I use a lot of craftsman, husky, evercraft (napa) and gear wrench brand tools. I own one snap on tool and thats my impact gun. The thing rips. I do own a handful of hf items and for the money I like the cheap hvlp spray gun, the die grinder and the red auto darkening welding helmet. Hope this info is useful to someone.

[Kevinl]

i dont do enough wrenching anymore to buy snap on, matco, cornwell

I used to buy husky or craftsman Home depot cut there tool selcetion to practically nothing and craftsman isnt what it used to be

I like harbor freight hand tools. I wouldn't touch there power tools though