Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck

   / Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck #2,191  
Americans got too expensive...

NO:mad: American Businesses are over taxed, over regulated, and increasing minimum wage only causes them to hire less people not make them richer. Until the politcians get out of the way of businesses we will loose everything to developing countries.
 
   / Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck
  • Thread Starter
#2,193  
I picked up the new version of the chain saw sharpener 68221 for $30. The old version had good reviews, so I was a little leery of the new one. The first sample that I bought had a bad switch, so I plugged in the second sample at the store before leaving. As you might expect, it is a little sloppy, so I installed thin washers at the key pivot points and it is much more consistent. I bolted it to a piece of 2x4 which clamps nicely in my vice. It has a bicycle hand brake lever that works a chain lock through a cable. This works OK, but tends to lift the chain a little as the cable tightens. So, when you adjust the cut, you need to have the chain in the locked position. For the price, it is more than adequate to meet my needs.



Electric Chain Saw Sharpener
 
   / Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck #2,194  
If my dad hadnt showed me how to hand sharpen chainsaws, I might get one of those.
 
   / Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck
  • Thread Starter
#2,195  
If my dad hadn't showed me how to hand sharpen chainsaws, I might get one of those.

I have been hand sharpening for years with a file, but my new Stihl seems to have a harder chain or else I have been buying softer files.:laughing:

Anyway, it does a nice job.
 
   / Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck #2,196  
I have been hand sharpening for years with a file, but my new Stihl seems to have a harder chain or else I have been buying softer files.:laughing:

Anyway, it does a nice job.

I buy the stihl brand files, they seem to work well. A lot of my saws are vintage ones that I have collected, most from the 1950-60s, so those chains are really old. The rest are new(ish) stihls, and one new husky, they have new chains. (12 saws in total at last count)
 
   / Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck #2,197  
Dolmar and Stihl files are the best by far in my view.
 
   / Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck #2,198  
If my dad hadnt showed me how to hand sharpen chainsaws, I might get one of those.

MAN, you just brought back a flood of memories. Dad and I would go cut wood all summer to heat the house through the winter. I remember sitting down for lunch and taking bites of peanut butter sandwich in between sharpening teeth on the chain. We'd usually be sitting on a newly felled tree that we'd block up when lunch was over. We each had a saw, and we'd try to keep them sharp. I wasn't as good at keeping mine out of the dirt, so I usually needed to sharpen my saw before Dad did.

I can even smell the pine as I write this.

Those electric sharpeners wouldn't have done us any good as we were nowhere near a power source.
 
   / Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck #2,199  
NOOOO!!!! HF outsourced their customer service to India! :thumbdown::thumbdown::thumbdown::thumbdown:

After 30?? years of excellent service I finally for the FIRST TIME, just got CRAPPY, IGNORANT answers from Customer Service.

HF has a new store in Fairfield, Northern California. (On I-80 close to Travis AFB). It's so new that Google doesn't show a phone # for it. Fine, I phoned HF Customer Service. After MANY repeated spellings of 'Fairfield' the kid had no idea what I was talking about - even after I told him to look on Google so he could see what I saw. I gave him the zip code, even the store #, he resisted this 'unapproved' ?? description of their store and said what I saw on Google didn't exist. I've been in the store several times; he didn't believe me. I hung up on him.

So I called 'place an order' #, got a huge blast of too-loud something, they (India again) weren't authorized to look up a store phone #; transferred me to another huge blast of ear-shattering racket then another Customer Service rep in India. This guy was helpful and polite but he said that store was so new (4 months?) that its phone # isn't yet available internally to HF employees. He said he would put in a request that the number be added to their website.

Whahappened? The Camarillo employees were always excellent. This is a big step down.

Should have asked for Peggy;)
 
   / Harbor Freight Tools that don't suck #2,200  
NO:mad: American Businesses are over taxed, over regulated, and increasing minimum wage only causes them to hire less people not make them richer. Until the politcians get out of the way of businesses we will loose everything to developing countries.

:thumbsup:
 
 
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