Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck

[CompactTractorFan]

I've been looking hard at the foldable shop crane - waiting it for it go on sale. Maybe for my wife on Valentines day. She still hasn't gotten over the new tractor seat I got her for Christmas.

Yeah, I want to get one of those at some point...

 

[par4n1]

Talk about a folding crane...RIP and God bless their familes

YouTube - Big Blue Crane

 

[sixdogs]

The ones that are considerably stronger, and a "winner" at HF, are not black, but a darker compound and not at all shiny or colored. The black ones, colored ones and shiny looking ones have all failed in short order. Honest to goodness, the I've not had a single one of the other series fail. I throw all the packaging away, but I thought I recall them even stating that they were XX% stronger than their standard socket. I looked on their website, but can't find them.

Dargo----This is regarding their impact sockets that are extra strong as opposed to sort-of strong. Are the extra strong ones straight sided and sort of a dull compounded sandblasted grey-black color? They came in a plastic box with a paper cover that says they are "super strong". Their sticker price was $49.99 and they are now discontinued. The so-called brand might be Pittsburgh and I believe these are the stronger ones. Straight sides with no stepped base.

The ones sold now are sandblasted black and have a "stepped" arrangement to the base of the socket with a groove around it. An odd-looking base is the only way to describe it. Stores seem to be dumping the old "super strong" ones and replacing inventory with these. I believe these are the weaker ones.

I know the colored and shiny sockets are inadequate but hope you can add a liile more on your impact socket experience. Any info you have would be helpful..

 

[SPYDERLK]

Two questions for the HF shoppers:


1) Last weekend I bought one of their ceramic kitchen knives. Awesome...... slices roast beef so thin my inlaws will never come back ! When these dull, are they a throw away? Or are these sharpened like any other knife?

You can sharpen with a diamond matrix "stone" if they get dull enuf to need it.
larry

I was not aware of this. How hard was it to sharpen and what grit of "stones" did you use?
Were you able to get the nicks out of the blade?

I just bought one of those knives for shop use to maintain a good edge for clean slicing rubber, etc. No doubt it will do this - just dont let a country wife loose with one. My wife broke the tip off it immediately by trying to cut the top off a plastic detergent bottle. She then used a steel knife which worked fine. Dont believe the label - "Stronger and Superior to any steel knife". It is harder and stiffer ... not stronger. So for general purpose use as a knife the item doesnt not suck. When I exchanged it I found 1 of the knives on the shelf to have the blade broken off at the handle. I just need it for a good dull resistant edge so Im pretty sure it will do well for me.
... I also bought a set of Diamond Hone Blocks [item # 36799] to sharpen the knife. The finest - 360grit is almost fine enuf to produce a good "factory" edge. [I was able to get a decent edge on the point of the new knife.] The only real problem there is that the 3 hones are each bonded to a support backing and the glue has failed. I exchanged that too. Same story with the new ones. I may go thru their whole inventory on that one. It is not reasonable to allow China to sell items that are not suitable for their purpose just because they are cheap. Succumbing to lowered expectations is the first step to doing the country in.
larry
larry

 

[leeinMT]

I went into the store today to inspect the shop cranes that I have been thinking about and seeing if they are on sale, maybe as a Valentine gift for mein frau. I wanted to see if they could be adapted to an electric hydraulic pump for easy raising and lowering. It looks like it can if the pump valve is removed.
Has anyone done this? It could be powered by a lawn tractor battery strapped to the lower chasis.

 

[JD955SC]

I went into the store today to inspect the shop cranes that I have been thinking about and seeing if they are on sale, maybe as a Valentine gift for mein frau. I wanted to see if they could be adapted to an electric hydraulic pump for easy raising and lowering. It looks like it can if the pump valve is removed.
Has anyone done this? It could be powered by a lawn tractor battery strapped to the lower chasis.

I haven't done it, nor seen it done, but judging from the hazy memories of the last shop crane I put together/used...it shouldn't be too hard at all to adapt if the electric hydraulic jack will fit...I think the last one I put together was a Torin Big Red folding crane...

You can see the Harbor Freight crane uses a big bolt at the top and bottom of the hyd cylinder...should be changeable. Neat idea, I had to use the one I put together at work frequently (had to fold it up, move it into an area, unfold it, rig and lift a certain valuable object, lower object onto cradle, remove crane, and repeat to return the object a day later. Pain in the but and slow...electric jack would have made it a LOT faster.

Now, giving it as a Valentine's gift...yeah, I want to see the video of how that goes...unless your wife works on cars...

 

[patrick_g]

HF is definitely the place for casters. I especially like the 3 inch nylons with the foot operated brake. Everything in my barn / shop is on wheels.

Bummer about the 20% coupon not usable on sale items and a bunch of other stuff.

I've been looking hard at the foldable shop crane - waiting it for it go on sale. Maybe for my wife on Valentines day. She still hasn't gotten over the new tractor seat I got her for Christmas.

I have bought a bunch of casters from HF and all were OK but I am building 28 cabinet drawers for my wife's tea room and am using caster wheels instead of glides. As this is 112 wheels and a light duty application I was shopping price. I beat HF a bunch at Midwest Caster (Home of CasterMan!) I paid $0.85 each plus shipping. They are rated for 90 lbs each which is way over my needs.

About the hydraulic folding shop crane. I have one and bought the HF air over hydraulic replacement cylinder for it to automate raising it using shop air. It works like a dream. I built an adapter to go on it for raising sheet goods overhead to screw to the ceiling. So it makes a pretty good drywall lift too, way better than using a drywall lift for a shop crane. The air over hydraulic cylinder still has a manual pump capability for when shop air isn't available.

The only down side is the wheels don't roll well in gravel but that is not a design flaw that is an unreasonable expectation on the part of the user.

Pat

 

[John47]

The ones that are considerably stronger, and a "winner" at HF, are not black, but a darker compound and not at all shiny or colored. The black ones, colored ones and shiny looking ones have all failed in short order. Honest to goodness, the I've not had a single one of the other series fail. I throw all the packaging away, but I thought I recall them even stating that they were XX% stronger than their standard socket. I looked on their website, but can't find them.

I hope they bring their higher line, but still an honest bargain, back. Although I'm known as the HF basher, I try to give an honest assessment. My first tirade about their extremely dangerous strut compressor apparently was true and on the mark. They long ago dropped that product like a hot potato and their new strut compressor looks completely different. I strongly feel you can find true "winners" there but you can also buy stuff that isn't worth taking if it were given to you free of charge and is just plain dangerous.

I have a bad habit of dropping voltage meters since I don't have 3 hands. The cheap ones seem to work fine, but are almost always history with their first meeting with the concrete floor. Anyone bought the (extremely expensive for HF) higher priced one with rubber padding and a stronger case? I think it lists for something like, gulp, $39.95. However, as many of the others that I've dropped and broken as soon as I get them, if their higher end one is good and will last me, I'll save me a 20% off coupon and buy me one the next time they are on sale. I don't want 20 of the cheap ones (they eat batteries awfully fast too) and I don't have time to run to buy another when I'm working on something. So, who has one of the high end multi-meters from HF?

The only meters that will stand some real heavy knocks were insulation testers I used that had a modified patent needle movement. I was an electrician for many years and have been involved in electronics almost as long. Even instruments costing many hundreds of dollars do not stand up very well to being dropped on concrete floors.

 

[leeinMT]

I went in today and got the 2 ton non-foldable shop crane. It has a longer and higher reach than the foldable and I got the room for it. The manager marked down the floor display unit as clearance and then took my 20% coupon on top of that - ended up $127. That made my day.
It's already assembled so it's going to be hard to gift wrap.
I'm going to scrounge around for a used hydraulic pump and maybe put a 12v motor on it. I'm intrigued with the compressed air application that was reported to work well.

 

[Gale Hawkins]

That was a steal. I blew a $500 bill tonight but got a buggy full. :laughing:

The Feb flyer coupons on some items was 50% off their normal high prices. I got the 2000/4000 inverter for $129, the 2/10/55 6/12v battery charger for $30 because a man needs a manual charger around the place that he can pack. Got 5 silver 12x19 tarps for $15 each to go over equipment, etc.

Bought more adjustable wrenches, screw drivers to try to cut done on hunting and walking time. :thumbsup: