6 ms·

You sound like all the snobs who tell me my $10 (well, they're $15 now) harbor freight angle grinders are crap compared to their $100 Milwaukee You know who ne

You sound like all the snobs who tell me my $10 (well, they're $15 now) harbor freight angle grinders are crap compared to their $100 Milwaukee You know who never has to swap between wheels because he always has a grinder that already has what he wants on it? This guy. Ditto for basic socket sets placed at typical work areas, tape measures all over the fuckin place, etc, etc. Quantity has a quality all its own.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
bambax 4y ago
I like that you're comparing Birkins to angle grinders. But do you scrape the stickers and replace them with ones that say "Milwaukee", just to pretend you can afford the expensive brand? Because that's what we're talking about here.
pkulak 4y ago
I feel like there's a pretty hard line between professional purchases and all other. The calculus of "spending" totally changes when it can directly impact "earning".
stickfigure 4y ago
AvE does a lot of teardowns of power tools. Here's a comparison of a HF vs Milwaukee item: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cSiI9MB9MA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cSiI9MB9MA I've watched a few of these and the upshot is that there's definitely a quality difference between HF and name brands. I've burnt out a HF angle grinder (which they replaced under warranty). For the most part, HF tools work fine for hobby use and sure they're cheap. But when this angle grinder dies again I'll buy a name brand one (for probably $50) - it gets a lot of use and driving to HF is annoying.
- Arrath 4y ago
  This is the way. If you're not sure how often you might use something: Buy the budget Harbor Freight equivalent tools, if you use it enough to wear it out/burn it up, upgrade to a better brand. If you never push it so hard it dies, you're perfectly fine with the HF version.
  - BenjiWiebe 4y ago
    Or if you got lucky and got a truly good HF tool, in which case you are set there as well.
    - Arrath 4y ago
      Win/win!
  - dokem 4y ago
    The HF subreddit also has good discussions on the quality of various tools. I'm kind of dissapointed that the HF quality and price has been going up over the years. A lot of people are only going to need that random tool a couple times a year, or maybe only for this one project. HF was perfect for that. Now they're trying to be a slightly cheaper Milwaukee/HomeDepot. Might as well spend a little more and get something that you know is going to last, in many cases. I'm mostly referring to their power tool line. RIP Chicago Electric.
grrrrrbox 4y ago
Quantity is usually more expensive than quality in the long run, though. This idea has been succinctly popularized by the "boots theory of socioeconomic unfairness": >The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles. But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while a poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boots_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boots_theory
- throwaway0a5e 4y ago
  That's BS and everyone who's not trying to justify a bunch of money they sunk into "premium" products knows it. There is some relationship between price and quality (and I find this to be most true with things that are short term consumables vs longer term ones like clothing, home goods, etc). Namely you never get more than you pay for. But even assuming you're not getting less than you pay for (which happens a lot) the relationship is still rarely close enough to linear to work out in favor of anything but the cheapest goods or the cheapest goods that meet some specific criteria or feature that yields longer life. Rich people's stuff lasts longer in large part because they can afford to over-provision and objects that are getting used at a fraction of "what they're good for" whereas poor people are buying the bare minimum and using it at 10/10ths right out of the gate. Think about where a clipboard warrior on a construction site goes and what they do. Of course their clothing lasts longer than the general laborer who's climbing/crawling all sorts of places over all sorts of things and moving all sorts of material. They could buy the crappiest boots money can buy and still have them outlast anything the laborer wears. The wealthy person buys a premium mixer that's more than up to the task of mixing what they want to mix. The poor person mixes bread dough with their Amazon-China special and hopes it's good enough. The wealthy person pays for delivery or rents a truck. The poor person paid for the bump stops he's gonna use the bump stops. And by wealthy here I mean HN white collar class people vs mid range blue collar type stuff.
digisign 4y ago
I also buy no-name ~$250 bikes online (now more) because I live in a high theft area and don't enjoy maintenance either. So I get a new one every year or two when they get stolen, or broken then recycle the old one. Extra parts are in good supply as well.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

bambax 4y ago

I like that you're comparing Birkins to angle grinders. But do you scrape the stickers and replace them with ones that say "Milwaukee", just to pretend you can afford the expensive brand? Because that's what we're talking about here.

pkulak 4y ago

I feel like there's a pretty hard line between professional purchases and all other. The calculus of "spending" totally changes when it can directly impact "earning".

stickfigure 4y ago

AvE does a lot of teardowns of power tools. Here's a comparison of a HF vs Milwaukee item: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cSiI9MB9MA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cSiI9MB9MA I've watched a few of these and the upshot is that there's definitely a quality difference between HF and name brands. I've burnt out a HF angle grinder (which they replaced under warranty). For the most part, HF tools work fine for hobby use and sure they're cheap. But when this angle grinder dies again I'll buy a name brand one (for probably $50) - it gets a lot of use and driving to HF is annoying.

Arrath 4y ago
This is the way. If you're not sure how often you might use something: Buy the budget Harbor Freight equivalent tools, if you use it enough to wear it out/burn it up, upgrade to a better brand. If you never push it so hard it dies, you're perfectly fine with the HF version.
- BenjiWiebe 4y ago
  Or if you got lucky and got a truly good HF tool, in which case you are set there as well.
  - Arrath 4y ago
    Win/win!
- dokem 4y ago
  The HF subreddit also has good discussions on the quality of various tools. I'm kind of dissapointed that the HF quality and price has been going up over the years. A lot of people are only going to need that random tool a couple times a year, or maybe only for this one project. HF was perfect for that. Now they're trying to be a slightly cheaper Milwaukee/HomeDepot. Might as well spend a little more and get something that you know is going to last, in many cases. I'm mostly referring to their power tool line. RIP Chicago Electric.

grrrrrbox 4y ago

Quantity is usually more expensive than quality in the long run, though. This idea has been succinctly popularized by the "boots theory of socioeconomic unfairness": >The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles. But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while a poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boots_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boots_theory

throwaway0a5e 4y ago
That's BS and everyone who's not trying to justify a bunch of money they sunk into "premium" products knows it. There is some relationship between price and quality (and I find this to be most true with things that are short term consumables vs longer term ones like clothing, home goods, etc). Namely you never get more than you pay for. But even assuming you're not getting less than you pay for (which happens a lot) the relationship is still rarely close enough to linear to work out in favor of anything but the cheapest goods or the cheapest goods that meet some specific criteria or feature that yields longer life. Rich people's stuff lasts longer in large part because they can afford to over-provision and objects that are getting used at a fraction of "what they're good for" whereas poor people are buying the bare minimum and using it at 10/10ths right out of the gate. Think about where a clipboard warrior on a construction site goes and what they do. Of course their clothing lasts longer than the general laborer who's climbing/crawling all sorts of places over all sorts of things and moving all sorts of material. They could buy the crappiest boots money can buy and still have them outlast anything the laborer wears. The wealthy person buys a premium mixer that's more than up to the task of mixing what they want to mix. The poor person mixes bread dough with their Amazon-China special and hopes it's good enough. The wealthy person pays for delivery or rents a truck. The poor person paid for the bump stops he's gonna use the bump stops. And by wealthy here I mean HN white collar class people vs mid range blue collar type stuff.

digisign 4y ago

I also buy no-name ~$250 bikes online (now more) because I live in a high theft area and don't enjoy maintenance either. So I get a new one every year or two when they get stolen, or broken then recycle the old one. Extra parts are in good supply as well.