I'm a winner at the Harbor Freight Casino!

[gellfex]

I got about 40 stainless pop rivets into a 200 rivet job and said enough, I'm going to risk the $32 after 20% coupon HF air riveter despite 83% positive mixed reviews. A WINNER! Holy crap is that sweet just pulling a trigger instead of dreading each rivet. It's so weird there, some utter crap, some real useful stuff.

[Ed ke6bnl]

I have what I believe is a cheap air riviter at least I paid a cheap price $10 new works fantastic

[Bob La Londe]

I had an air riveter from HF, and it never worked well for me. I'm glad yours did. Instead I use this one which works very well. I have three of them and put a different size tip in each one for involved riveting jobs. https://www.harborfreight.com/heavy-...tle-66422.html It pops 3/16 stainless blind closed rivets very well. Smaller stuff is no effort at all. Stainless or aluminum. My only issue with them is of my own making. Often I am using them in conjunction with 3M 5200, and I have to soak them in gasoline to clean out the gunk.

[Bob La Londe]

P.S. When I saw the title my first guess was you ordered something on-line recently and they actually shipped it. LOL.

[Ed ke6bnl]

I have the large hand riviter as well

[gellfex]

I had an air riveter from HF, and it never worked well for me. I'm glad yours did.

From the reviews it seemed a crapshoot. I really think maybe it's just luck. Long ago someone told me a lot of the difference between good brands and cheap crap often isn't the design: it's the quality control. We bought my son a $100 'Starcaster' Asian made acoustic guitar for his 11th birthday, figuring if he sticks with it we'll get him a better one eventually. Well he's 21 and still LOVES that guitar, and experienced guitarists think it plays great. Just luck, got one of the good ones.

[mickeyf]

We bought my son a $100 'Starcaster' Asian made acoustic guitar for his 11th birthday, figuring if he sticks with it we'll get him a better one eventually. Well he's 21 and still LOVES that guitar, and experienced guitarists think it plays great. Just luck, got one of the good ones.

Many years and half a dozen careers ago I had a music store. Even with the identical model from a reputed manufacturer there were usually noticeable differences from one guitar to another. Design, quality control, and that fact the wood is an organic material. And Luck - Good or Bad.

[RB211]

Thought it was funny, one of Abom's recent videos on Youtube, he was using his "trusty hammer drill from HF" that he had for so many years, and it started to fail him on the video.
I agree, some of their stuff awesome fro the price, like the 20 ton shop press.

[gellfex]

Many years and half a dozen careers ago I had a music store. Even with the identical model from a reputed manufacturer there were usually noticeable differences from one guitar to another. Design, quality control, and that fact the wood is an organic material. And Luck - Good or Bad.

When we were 21 my buddy and I decided to become rockers, he bass and me drums. He bought a crap bass, and when he found a good bass teacher later on, the guy took him down to 48th St in Manhattan, which at that time was lined with music stores. The teacher said G&L was a good line made by Leo Fender, but QC was weak (they were still relatively new). He sat there and went through a dozen before he found one he approved of.

[challenger]

I have a HF pneumatic riveter that I'm using right now and it's been outstanding as much as I hate to say it as I'm a BIG non chinese made tools ranter.
I think the best thing to do is to disassemble it and clean. Seems that more often than not these tools are shipped with no quality control and swarf can render them useless in a short time. Doing an initial check will almost always present something that could provide problems after 1 to 500 uses.
I also think these tools need to to be kind of babied. Today, before I used it, I have to change the nose piece for smaller rivets. The nose pieces are stored on threaded holes in the base. I removed the one I needed and screwed the one I removed into the threaded hole from the one I installed and sure enough it cross threaded. I just screwed it home and said to hell with it. The hardware and threading on most cheap Chinese stuff is almost never quality or even close to it.

[Randy]

A couple of years ago I set about making a power drawbar for my Bridgeport copy, using a typical butterfly impact wrench. I had an old one from HF, but it had a broken element from being dropped (still functional, though), so I decided to buy a new one. Same item number, about the same price I think, made in China. Really disappointed in the quality. The old one from Taiwan was much nicer, so I designed the mount to accommodate the broken part of the wrench. Came out very nicely. I still keep the cheap Chinese unit in my toolbox for the rare occasions that I really need it.

[darryl]

I've used an air rivet gun- how nice to be able to set a rivet that easily- almost makes you want to rivet things together. Ours was not a cheap gun- and it was recommended by people who use it commercially- but it did still jam more than I thought it should. Could have been a later production of what was once a good tool. So handy though.

[Ringo]

I have 2 electric hand planers from HF.
1 is crap, and the other is awesome, go figure??

[gellfex]

I have 2 electric hand planers from HF.
1 is crap, and the other is awesome, go figure??

Same model? I have one from like 15 years ago that mechanically was ok but the knives dulled ridiculously easily. I've been thinking about getting some carbide knives for it. It's an odd Hitachi pattern.

[JRouche]

I got about 40 stainless pop rivets into a 200 rivet job and said enough,

Haa, no chit. I think most folks use pop rivets like the type you get at the hardware store. Aluminum.

I have some steel pop rivets that take an 18" handle. It was slow going. Then bought one of the HF air units.

This was 16 years ago. Very good tool.. JR