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OT: no more discounts

gwelo62

Cast Iron
Joined
Sep 17, 2011
Location
ga,usa
I see Harbor Freight have ended the 20% off discounts and Hobby Lobby, their 40% discount vouchers.
Sad days indeed.
 
Make no mistake, this is just inflation in disguise.

Haven’t seen a good discount from Zoro for a year or more either.

Couldn’t care less about Harbor freight. Last time I bought something there I realized it was garbage as soon as I got home and threw it away without even using it.
 
Couldn’t care less about Harbor freight. Last time I bought something there I realized it was garbage as soon as I got home and threw it away without even using it.
The more fool you. Were you too stupid to look at it before you bought it ?

My $12 Harbor Freight heat gun was a-okay wunderbar, stripped many hundreds of square feet of fifty year old paint no problemo, took a licking and kept on ticking. You're just not very bright, I guess.
 
The more fool you. Were you too stupid to look at it before you bought it ?

My $12 Harbor Freight heat gun was a-okay wunderbar, stripped many hundreds of square feet of fifty year old paint no problemo, took a licking and kept on ticking. You're just not very bright, I guess.

Don’t need to be a dick about it.
 
Don’t need to be a dick about it.
Exactly. So why were you smearing Harbor Freight for no reason ?

What's good for the goose is good for the gander. It's like a hobby around here for people to slam Harbor Freight.

Sure, lots of it is cheap junk - but sometimes, that's all you need. And other times, their stuff works pretty good. Heat gun for example - for $12, no chemical strippers or hours of sanding, just a whoosh and a spatula and off the crap comes in sheets. I was so happy I almost wet my pants.

Their wrenches and sockets are decent enough for places where you don't want to spend $100 on a single box-end, too. In reality, lots of Harbor Freight stuff is plenty good enough for what it's asked to do. Just don't try to hold tenths with their micrometers.
 
Exactly. So why were you smearing Harbor Freight for no reason ?

What's good for the goose ...

For no reason?

HF sells GARBAGE. Plain and simple. The junkiest of the junk. Not even worth the pennies they charge for it.

Everything I have purchased from them has failed. The wheels broke off of my engine hoist at half the rated capacity. The bandsaw couldn't even be assembled without modification, and eventually the wheel arbor bent. The thin metal on the ratchet straps deformed the first time I put them under tension. Even the packing blankets have disentegrated into blue dust. The air fittings all leak.

The thing I threw out was a tire inflator, the pot metal was cracked and it wouldn't hold pressure. It only cost $3 and it wasn't even worth the drive back to return it. That's when it became clear to me that they are literally just selling garbage.

So yes I was stupid, but no stupider than you or anyone else that ever shopped in HF. At least I learned my lesson.
 
So yes I was stupid, but no stupider than you or anyone else that ever shopped in HF. At least I learned my lesson.
Horse crap. Their wrenches and sockets are okay, especially for occasional use. The heat gun was a big winner. Drill bits, small power tools, consumables, just as good as Tru-Value or any of the other higher-price big box hardware stores.

If you are too dumb to judge the quality of what you are looking at, so be it. But that's not Harbor Freight's fault.
 
Horse crap. Their wrenches and sockets are okay, especially for occasional use. The heat gun was a big winner. Drill bits, small power tools, consumables, just as good as Tru-Value or any of the other higher-price big box hardware stores.

If you are too dumb to judge the quality of what you are looking at, so be it. But that's not Harbor Freight's fault.

Sounds like you're the one incapable of judging the quality of what you're looking at. It's good your heat gun hasn't broken YET, you must not use it often. Honestly you're coming across as very inexperienced, I suppose you're just a hobbyist? You must not use your tools very hard if you're still buying HF junk.
 
Hmmm long time members, not often to post in this section. . .

O/T title, also a bit unusual for this section. . .

I'd bet a dollar that some joker moved this thread down from the General section, or somewhere under Manufacturing Today as a gag. :D :D

Ha ! Jokes on you ! We'll soon have all the participants singing "Kum Ba Yah" in a hippie love fest here shortly. :D
 
The more fool you. Were you too stupid to look at it before you bought it ?

My $12 Harbor Freight heat gun was a-okay wunderbar, stripped many hundreds of square feet of fifty year old paint no problemo, took a licking and kept on ticking. You're just not very bright, I guess.

hey brother, I agree with everything you have said about HF, BUT... really no need for the personal attacks, be nice!

I have to admit, its pretty funny the OP is calling you a hobbyist, got a good laugh outa that!

in my case, as an example a few things i've bought there; "carabiners" for non critical use like chaining up tanks, the tiny dollies, but you DO have to look over them carefully. some have wood that will obviously split if loaded in the center and casters that don't swivel, the step drills work pretty well, and some air die grinders on sale for 20$, you just buy 3 and if 2 work, im ok with that.

having said that, ive spent many, many hours and thousands of dollars searching for and buying quality stuff made somewhere in North America on the principle that I will pay for quality, and I like to support my neighbors. I haven't gotten any payback for that, except the satisfaction of fooling myself im virtuous, but im still going to do it.

having said that, you gotta pick your battles, go ahead, get some things at HF, with care. I'm not buying a welder or a lathe there, LOL!
 
hey brother, I agree with everything you have said about HF, BUT... really no need for the personal attacks, be nice!
Yeah, I know, but I have a problem with people piling on. He buys a $3 knick-knack then says all harbor freight items are pure garbage.

Well, I bought a shirt once at Macy's that was missing a button, so everything from Macy's is garbage. And I got a box of Sandvik inserts with a chipped edge on one once, so all Sandvik stuff is garbage. Talk about idiot reasoning. If he'd been around more than a week he could apply that to Enco, too.

Truth is, some stuff at HF is junk, some is average and once in a while there's a real bargain. Picked up an edge trimmer there once for $20, I had maybe thirty feet of formica to trim, then I used it for some simple routing, it's been on the shelf since, I'm supposed to pay $229.95 for a deWalt that's made in Vietnam anyhow, just to tell myself what a craftsman I am ? That's stupid. It did the job and did it well. That's all I ask. Guess I am the exception, it doesn't make my dick bigger to see a red plastic body on a tool.

About your other point, I also spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on Made in USA tools for the same reasons. It was fun while it lasted but look around you - Fanuc Fanuc Fanuc and oooh, Makino ! Mazak ! Ikegai ! Toyota Tundra ! They slobber themselves worshipping guys from WW II then they go buy Jap stuff. That's like a jew buying a Mercedes.

People here are bigtime hypocrites. When they put their money where their mouth is, maybe I'll listen. But probably not. Once burned, twice shy.
 
Yeah, I know, but I have a problem with people piling on. He buys a $3 knick-knack then says all harbor freight items are pure garbage.

Well, I bought a shirt once at Macy's that was missing a button, so everything from Macy's is garbage. And I got a box of Sandvik inserts with a chipped edge on one once, so all Sandvik stuff is garbage. Talk about idiot reasoning. If he'd been around more than a week he could apply that to Enco, too.

Truth is, some stuff at HF is junk, some is average and once in a while there's a real bargain. Picked up an edge trimmer there once for $20, I had maybe thirty feet of formica to trim, then I used it for some simple routing, it's been on the shelf since, I'm supposed to pay $229.95 for a deWalt that's made in Vietnam anyhow, just to tell myself what a craftsman I am ? That's stupid. It did the job and did it well. That's all I ask. Guess I am the exception, it doesn't make my dick bigger to see a red plastic body on a tool.

About your other point, I also spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on Made in USA tools for the same reasons. It was fun while it lasted but look around you - Fanuc Fanuc Fanuc and oooh, Makino ! Mazak ! Ikegai ! Toyota Tundra ! They slobber themselves worshipping guys from WW II then they go buy Jap stuff. That's like a jew buying a Mercedes.

People here are bigtime hypocrites. When they put their money where their mouth is, maybe I'll listen. But probably not. Once burned, twice shy.

I understand. You just have low standards. For some people, garbage is good enough.

So I'm curious, from your point of view, is there anything WORSE than Harbor Freight? Can you name even a single vendor that sells tools of consistently lower quality? Or can we at least agree that HF is the bottom of the barrel?
 
Worse than HF? Anything named "...mart". :) Ebay. Amazon. Crap is everywhere.

Lots of vendors sell tools of inconsistent quality, even American manufacturers make duds. I'm mostly a used American made kind of guy, but just bought General tool cabinets from HF after looking for months at absurdly priced used American made. They don't have Lista weightbearing capability, but for holding hand tools they work really well.
 
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I don't agree with EG much, but he is spot on. Before Jwhining calls me a hobbyist, been at this since '93 and have been quite succesful, but I digress. HF is good enough sometimes. If he feels like he needs to buy snap on or matco or whatever for that one odd wrench he'll use 3 times, knock yourself out. I'll buy the good stuff that I plan on using alot, and that 1 21/32" wrench I need for one time, I'll take my chances. Who cares if it rounds over, as long as it serves it's purpose.
 
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HF is a mixed bag, some good, some not worth buying. All the 3 jaw pullers suck, but the blind hole bearing puller works surprisingly well. The 4.5" grinders are pretty good too, my only complaint is the power cords get stiff when cold, they may not last as long as a Makita, but I don't feel bad about pitching them either. In wrenches the S-O knock offs are pretty damn good, I've used them on a daily basis on rusted seized bolts and still have not broken one, even with a 3ft cheater. Best part is that if you walk away from them for 5 minutes in a scrap yard they won't be stolen, or if they fall into the bottom of a scrap hopper under 1000+ pounds of shredded metal, its no great loss.
 
People here are bigtime hypocrites. When they put their money where their mouth is, maybe I'll listen. But probably not. Once burned, twice shy.

I already did put my money where my mouth is, where have you been? I refuse to buy anything that has been offshored (Apex Tool Group, Danaher) or has been imported to a price point. 99.9% of my tools are made in USA back in the 60's, or in Germany, or Switzerland.

This is the SB forum, I own a SB and I use it. I could have gotten a brand-new import for the same price. I refuse to make some rich bastard even richer by encouraging them. I can't afford the rich. Those guys are the reason why America no longer has a manufacturing sector, and a dying middle class. That is why I refuse to shop Walmart, Amazon (unless you stick a gun to my head) Banggood, Alibaba, etc etc...

There is a reason why my tool collection is worth more than my house. It's because I make my living with them, and I need to be able to rely on them, absolutely. I have coworkers that run a line of credit with MAC and Snap-On, but I refuse to do that. I pay cash for vintage tools on eBay. American, German, and Swiss tools.

As far as Jews driving Mercedes? There's a guy around the corner from me that has a Mercedes. We both live in the same trailer park.
 
Call me a flunky but I will stop into HF and buy shop items as needed. Been burned a time or two but made out pretty good for the price enough times to make it worth my while.

I've bought gas powered irrigation pump that worked great during a major flood crisis. A tool grinder that works excellent to this day when I couldn't afford brand name.

Funny story, stopped late one Sunday at the end of a holiday sale and bought miter saws, small generators, small pancake air compressors. Everything was 50% off. Got great use out of everything except the air compressors. They were pretty much junk. The rest still works great.

It helps that HF is very close to my shop when I need that small item that I need right now. Not where I shop for everything but overall I'd miss them if they left town.

Not piling on anyone, to each his own. Just my 2cw.

Hodge
 








 
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