Ah, where to start? I guess the first place is with the myth that Sears ever did make quality tools (I know Sears didn't make them, but for simplicity, let's just use the phrase). I have more than a little experience with Crafstman tools, and I know what I'm talking about.
I grew up in a woodworking/DIY household and I remember many, many trips to Sears and visiting the tool department (9, for those of you who wonder how Sears numbers their departments). Compared to the sorry pieces of 3rd hand junk my father was using in his shop, some of those tools looked positively magnificent. Perspective jolt: this was in the '50s/'60s.
I remember well the Christmas my mother bought my father a set of Craftsman power tools: saber saw (that's what we called a jig saw in those days), drill, sheet sander. Admittedly, they had steel bodies, but however robust they may have appeared, only one of them was still in his shop when I cleaned it out after he died, and I'm not sure it was working. I didn't even bother keeping it.
At one time my shop looked like a Sears catalog. Stupid? No. In the '60s, '70s, and '80s there weren't the places to buy Delta, Powermatic, and Porter-Cable tools like there are now. Makita and Hitachi were still on the horizon. There was no internet. There were precious few magaizines advertising them. Shoot, where I lived you couldn't even buy hardwood. I never had a piece of real hardwood until I was 30. (I can hear it now: you had softwood? We WISHED we had softwood. We had to build bedroom suites out of cardboard and we were grateful.)
I started out in 1972 with a Craftsman radial arm saw. Problems: well documented lack of stability in alignment. Cheesy table to frame attachment and fence clamp. My saw was one of the last with a solid cast iron column; they subsequently built them with bolt-together castings. It's waiting to be sold.
Around 1973 I bought a Craftsman drill press. It was okay. In fact it had a couple of features that I really came to appreciate when it came time to look for a replacement, as most Delta/PM/Jet didn't have them: quill lock, light. That said, eventually some slop developed in the quill--not axially; vertically. I tried and tried and tried to figure out where it came from and how to fix it and couldn't I replaced it with a Delta 17-925...with a quill lock. If I had to, I could lift the Sears DP. The 17-925 is around 250 lbs.
Around 1974 I bought a Craftsman bandsaw. Problems: pain in the butt one piece door that made blade changing tedious. Other than that this was actually not too bad a tool. I replaced it after nearly 20 years with a Delta 28-280. Same story as the one below about weight. It was impossible for me to get the saw up on the stand by myself without a block and tackle. And after a few times at the saw I could see there was a world of difference between the saws.
A year later ('75) I bought a Craftsman jointer. I could adjust the gibs on the infeed table perfectly square to the outfeed table OR I could adjust the height of the table with the adjustment knob to change the depth of cut. In years of trying to reengineer the thing, and with a second table from Sears I was never able to make the thing work like it was supposed to. I could edge joint boards reasonably well, but forget about face jointing. If you think that Craftsman and Delta are even remotely equivalent, I could lift the Sears jointer up and down off its stand by myself with ease. I challenge you to try that with a DJ15, much less a DJ20.
After initially building a lathe and never being satisfied with it, I bought a Craftsman lathe. It's okay, but my Jet mini lathe (acquired many years later) is twice the lathe, even at 1/3 the size. Also, in a common theme with other Sears tools, all the attachments are an odd size. Fortunately, that size is accommodated by most of the after market manufacturers, unlike some of the other odd size selections in Craftsman tools.
Table saw. Here we get to the heart of the myth that Craftsman used to be something. My saw, obviously acquired used, is vintage 1955 or thereabouts. It is essentially the same saw with respect to table and innards as the saws sold right up to Emerson's ouster in the late '90s. The fence rail *looked* better and I always thought had been a long lamented victim of lowered specs to meet a price point until I actually had it. What a piece of crap. I later added an aftermarket fence which does a reasonable job.
The trunnions are some sort of non-cast iron metal. I don't think it's quite pot metal, but then I'm not sure what that is anyway. They're nowhere, no way near as substantial as even contractor saws by other manufacturers, much less the redoubtable cabinet saws of Delta/Powermatic/Jet. And any thought of robust construction is dashed when you see and feel the sheet metal body that holds it all together. Again, I can lift the saw up and down off the base by myself, contrasted to the 400+ pounds of my Unisaw.
The miter slot anomaly of the Craftsman is legendary. They use a .750" slot (with a .746" bar) where other manufacturers use a .750" bar in a .755" slot. Sears advertises a "standard 3/8 x 3/4 miter slot", but it's only standard in Sears' saws.
Belt sander. I can't remember when I bought this, but the tensioning mechanism is a bastard set up if ever I saw one. I have to reengineer the damn thing every time I change belts. Consequently, it doesn't see much use. If I needed a belt sander any more than I do, I'd junk this one and get a new P-C, Bosch, or Makita.
Jig saw. I fought and fought with this piece of crap for years. The blades wouldn't stay straight and they wouldn't stay in place. Cuts were a crap shoot every time. I thought it was the nature of the beast (jig saw, not Craftsman) until I bought a Bosch. My god, what were they (Sears) thinking?
Router. ARHA (Automatic Random Height Adjustment). Need I say more? I've been bitten so many times by it that I'm ashamed to admit it. When I started buying Bosch, P-C, Hitachi routers, I realized just how all encompassing the Craftsman lie is.
Drill. Almost any other manufacturer's drills (except B&D) were more compact, smoother running, and more powerful than any Sears drill I ever had my hands on.
Circular saw. Bulky, underpowered. Compared to my P-C 347 and my P-C SawBoss, Craftsman saws are a joke. Even my throw-away Skils were better.
Folks, they are not tools that any true professional that depends on their tools for a living would tolerate for very long. They have gimmicks like lights on drills, and rack and pinions on routers that seem important to the uninitiated (they're not) but also mask other shortcomings. Flash, not substance.
They are not good value, unless you consider them as one or two job throw away tools. Sure you can make them last longer than that, but do you want to? If you've never used Porter-Cable, or Makita, or Hitachi, or Bosch tools, you may think the Sears are adequate. They are not.
No one can defend Sears tools by comparison to any of the "professional" grade tools such as P-C, Makita, Hitachi, Bosch, Delta, Powermatic, General, etc. If they try, it's because they've never used any of them.
Now there will be some responders who will talk about their particular Sears tool that they've had for years and can't kill. Fine. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day. But if you want long term comfort, power, reliability, precision, suitablilty for the task, etc., avoid Division 9 at Sears like the plague.
Craftsman is not, and never has been, any better than the current Black & Decker/Skil level of homeowner tools. The possible exception (particularly because I value Charlie Self's opinion) is the new Sears cabinet saw recently introduced. For me however, it's long been too little and too late. I will never, EVER consider a Craftsman tool in any way again.
And, yes, that includes hand tools. I've completely replaced all of my Craftsman screwdrivers with Klein. What a difference. The Craftsman chisels are gone; replaced by Sorby. The wrenches are slowly being replaced by Husky which feel better and look better.
One day, I will be truly Craftsman free. And they earned it.
- - LRod
Master Woodbutcher and seasoned termite
Shamelessly whoring my website since 1999
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