Harbor Freight Clamp Deal...

[Jeff A. Smith]

Yeah... I know... It's Harbor Freight!!!

But...

Today, I bought a couple of their 12" reach (that's 12" deep) 18" throat clamps for on sale for $9.99 ea. They're not a Bessey or a Jorgensen, but this is the kind of clamp I will only use sparingly, and when you need one with a deep reach, seems like nothing else will do the trick. It's a really heavily-built clamp, and at that price -- seems like a real deal -- nice rubber grip and heavy cast aluminum frame. Shows it's build quality (or lack thereof) a little in the threads, but overall not too bad. If you've ever found yourself wanting for a deep reach clamp, it might be a good time to pick one of these up.

Sure beats having the wife standing on top of a cabinet's middle 'til the glue dries -- poor gal. :cool:

Jeff Smith
Athens, AL

[Bill Fields]

Jeff--Thanks for the HF heads-up.
I have several different clamps from HF and the only real disappointment was in their cheapest 3/4" pipe clamps--VERY poor quality.

After getting some mid-sized bar clamps from them I am ordering a bunch now on sale.

-12" bar clamps @ $2.49 each
-30" bar clamps @ $3.49 "

ALso--a note--in comparing HF prices to the local borgs--unless the HF stuff in on super sale staus--the borgs are about the same for Chinese tool.

BILL FIELDS

[Bart Leetch]

What about a product number?

[Andy Henriksen]

With the big HF clamps, it's more critical than normal to alternate up down up down with your clamps, cuz those things flex like crazy. Still worth the money, but you have to think about what you are doing a bit more, and triple check alignment before the glue sets.

[Jeff A. Smith]

What about a product number?

Although it's listed (both in the store and on their web site) as 20", I think the actual tag on the clamp says 18.

Item number 45908.

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=45908

Jeff

[Jon Toebbe]

I picked up some of their aluminum bar clamps in 24" and 36" sizes on a sale recently. I don't have any "nice" clamps, but these do their job without complaint. Their F-style bar clamps seem pretty good, too -- in shorter lengths. 18" clamps seem fine. I bought some longer ones and they literally flexed like a strung bow -- they went back the next day. As with all things from Harbor Freight, sometimes you score and sometimes it's junk. Save your receipts. ;)