I would not be surprised if Milwaukee, Craftsman, DeWalt, Lowes, Home Depot all have their tool boxes built by the same one or two companies in China, Malaysia, Vietnam. One or two companies make all the good tool boxes. On e or two other companies make the lesser grade tool boxes. All the boxes b y these companies come from the same place. All are pretty much identical. Except Orange Home Depot, Red Milwaukee, Yellow DeWalt, Red Craftsman, Bl ue Lowes. Does Home Depot also make a black box?
I just returned from Home Depot. Lowe's Kobalt are either blue or stainless steel. IIRC the Stainless Steel are the better grade of box but I was not impressed. The ball bearing slides were crotchety on all three of the boxes that I looked at.
Actually Porter Cable has a box that is grey and black and lools like the Milwaukee and DeWalt.
Home Depot boxes/ Husky are black.
I rearranged my garage this morning. Some how my 3 car garage was more crowded than my old 2 car, and no new equipment so to speak. Anyway I needed to see if I could fit in a 46" box and I ended up with an additional 80" of wall space. So I thought I might look at the HD Husky 52". This particular one was a lot like the Milwaukee. Wrinkle paint, soft close drawers and deeper drawers than the regular 52" Husky.
Closer inspection revealed a less stout/robust bottom. Caster bolted to sheet metal rather than 6 gauge "L" brackets all around the bottom and crossing in two extra places for the casters. I spied the China country of origin label on the box. AND it has some gimmicky bright black stick on trim. Nice box but I think the Milwaukee will let me sleep better at night.
AND from yesterday to today the Milwaukee went up from $698 to $749. I easily talked them into letting me buy it for yesterdays price. When they pulled my name up they were happy to see that I had also bought the
30" Milwaukee last week. :~)
I paid $497 for the 30" in stock. The 46" Milwaukee are strictly special order,5~10 days. Expected on the 31st.
I got the 46 for $698.
Aspirin, Xerox, Band-Aid,...
Might just as well buy HF, now. Craftsman isn't any better.
The Milwaukee and DeWalt boxes look similar but quite different from HF, Lowes, or the HD boxes.
I bought a box last Christmas for the garage. It's normal price was $400 but the Black Friday sale (that lasted the month of December) had it for $250. It's really quite a nice box. The drawer bearings are quite good and it's heavy enough.
I still have my first screwdriver, from '65 and a hammer from '71. Still my favorite.
krw wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:
HF has a gem or two in their toolboxes. One of the larger ones that usually sells for around $380 or so is one of them. I've got two, one under my little lathe. The drawers move easily and accurately and it's good quality metal.
Puckdropper
You know I shopped the HF boxes last week. Their boxes are really not much less expensive than the competitions.
This one,
and this one,
Heavier duty than many but my local HD has a Husky with almost as much weight capacity in a 52" for $699. 2500lb capacity and the smaller drawers are rated at 120 lbs. Plus a 5 year warranty. They have two in stock but I could not find it on line.
And I prefer the clam shell top which is the direction many are going. I really thought HF had the lowest prices but for just a fraction more you get at least equal.
I have a Harbor Freight flare nut wrench that slips on various fittings. So I figured I'd upgrade to Craftsman. Theirs slipped too. Finally I bit the bullet and shelld out the 30 bucks for a Snap-On for the size I most commonly encounter. It slips too.
$1200 left at Home Depot in a week. You are definitely on their Christmas Card list for the rest of your life.
$1200 for tool boxes. The times have changed. Close to 25 years ago I spe nt $500 on a USA made Delta Contractor saw. Thought that was a fair amount of money. Now it would just get you one tool box storage container to sto re the thousands and thousands of dollars of real tools.
And this morning I noticed that the 30" Milwaukee box cropped from $499 to $449.
I have already send this information to my CC company. They give me price protection credit up to $500.
Perhaps you are using the wrong sized wrench. 3 in a row and different brands slipping sounds like the wrong sized tool.
To take to a jobsite, I'd probably use a knaack box. Their data vault series are quite useful, per my contractor buddy.
For the shop, there is nothing more satisfying than making ones own.
IIRC, it used to be a requirement for an apprentice to build his own toolbox before graduating to journeyman.
Yes, this is true if you will be there several days. I do most of my work in my shop 95% of the time. Almost all metal rollaround tool chests have been geared towards the mechanic. It seems only in the last few years that the box makers have begun to include woodworkers. Probably why you see Milwaukee, DeWalt, and Porter Cable with their own versions now.
Well it certainly saves money. When I was looking to upgrade for the first time 10 years ago I built this one. Back then a box similar to the one I have ordered but a bit smaller was north of $1000.00
I also have an under bench 6 drawer cabinet that I build a yer or so ago. Nothing nearly as nice as the one pictured above. My Craftsman stacked boxes did not fare well when we moved 5 years ago and we used a box truck with lift gate. The one above did fine and is a valuable storage chest in my shop.
This time around I have too many people waiting for me to build so I am buying a replacement for the Craftsman.
I meant to include this one.
I guess you don't subscribe to Adam Savage's theory that "Drawers are where things go to die." ;-)
I was specifically talking about sockets, ratchets, and wrenches but sure, some of their boxes are pretty nice (even if not pretty ;-).
No I do not. I know where everything is at.
That guy has too many pliers, grabbers and cutters... ; ) I sort of subscribe to the drawer theory though--"out of sight, out of mind". I related thought I preach is "if you don't know where it is, what good is it?".
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