Harbor Freight tools quality?

[NOCK NOCK]

Especially power tools........Chicago electric, Central Pneumatic, etc.
Have you had good luck with them?

I have usually stayed away from purchasing them, and go with the "you get what you pay for" logic, but curious if I am wrong.  I did recently buy some drill bits, needed an odd size, they broke extremely easy.

[Holg3107]

Completely hit and miss. Their airless paint sprayer is awesome! I have painted 5 houses and 3 fences with it. It costs the same amount as renting one for 2 days so its hard to beat. Their corded tools are fine for the price. Don't touch their cordless stuff with a 10' pole. Ive also had decent luck with their grinder cutting wheels, as well as oscillating tool blades. Drill bits are worth spending the extra money on DeWalt. Also their extension cords are garbage. Had solid luck with a corded drill as well as a corded sawzall.

[Rider]

No luck with them. I tend to stick to Craftsman and Kobalt for hand tools. Prefer Porter Cable for electrical tools.

The Harbor Freight stuff is cheaply made in China crap. Little, if any, quality and even less dependability. I do not trust them enough to use them on my motorcycle.

[DOUBLELUNG]

I've had good luck with a tile saw and saw blades, also a sander - but these were for rough use expected to crap out eventually.

[Jpmiller]

I owned one harbor freight tool box and half the drawers wouldn't open because the slides were installed off square. I worked with a guy for a number of years who would only bug harbor freight because that's all he could afford and he broke and replaced his tools almost weekly.

I wouldn't get any of their stuff.

[quadrafire]

My FIL just installed their 12000lb winch on his truck. We were pulling logs 18 in logs in 15 ft sections up hill. I was pretty impressed.

[Special T]

I've bought a winch hand tools and air powered grinder cut offwheel 1/2"air gun and air chisel. All have worked great for the price. I think Thier air stuff isn't as good or powerful as name brand stuff but for occasional use its not bad. Thier hose clamps suck and have heard to stay away from eletric tools.

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[Sakko300wsm]

Guess it all depends what you're going to be doing with the tools- in my opinion it's all complete junk! But I also do aluminum fabrication and aluminum boat building - so I really like high quality tools that last

[NRA4LIFE]

I buy their tools if it's something I will only be using occasionally.  I've had pretty good luck with most of their stuff, however some of it was pure garbage.  I got one of their freeby sets of screwdrivers and proceeded to break all of them.

[Curly]

Their nick name isn't "China-Freight" for nothing. 

[BigGoonTuna]

they used to have the best cheap screwdrivers, back when they sold the plain orange handled ones for a buck each.  i have a little flux core wire feed welder and sawzall from there, both are 10+ years old and work fine.

i tend to buy tools there for a job, if they get broke they get replaced with real quality stuff. 

[netcoyote]

When I was 20, I bought good Craftsman tools and still have a lot of them. When I reached geezerdom, I realized even the cheaper tools are likely to outlast me, so I'm buying more HF these days. As others have said, some of their stuff is junk and others are good value. I bought a HF belt sander for a deck project a few years ago. Had to nurse it along at first until I tweeked a few design flaws and it lasted the whole project and is still usable.  Not many would care to debug some of the power tools like I did though.

[SniperDanWA]

Here's the way I do it.  If I can't buy name brand new, I check pawn shops.  If I can't get at a pawn and it's not going to be used daily, weekly or monthly, but irregularly I'll buy HF.  I have a fair amount of one-time tools from them.  If the break, so be it.  I do buy the extended warranty, which is cheap insurance.  I've returned very few tools.  I've broken very few tools.  I'm not afraid to use them nd use them hard either.  I have air tools, electric, hand, etc.  for a few bucks, I outfit many of the vehicles.  Again, cheap insurance when needed.  With 4 vehicles, 1 travel trailer and 1 utility trailer, I can leave the tools in the vehicle.  If stole, so what.

That said, I love my Craftsman tools.  I've had then for over 20 years and they have been replaced free when broken.

[Stein]

I have done pretty well, but I usually only buy stuff I will occasionally use.  I have a bench top drill press I bought for $49 about 15 years ago and it works perfect.  I just bought an air nailer and nails for 1/3 to 1/4 the cost somewhere else (find coupons and shop sales).  The boards didn't seem to mind the nails or gun were cheap.

Stuff that breaks easily I avoid like c-clamps and wooden handle hammers.

[trophyelk6x6]

Hit and miss is very accurate, I still have a 8000 winch that works great, several Chicago air tools still working but air shearers broke a bolt/pin within 3 hrs use. They take this stuff back and offer cheap warranties so a non professional occasional use guy can get by.  I have also bought a 20 dollar 18v drill driver and had it run for years but like most everything else the battery dies and quits charging and cost more than the drill.