# $9.99 Digital Caliper sale at HF



## Silviron (Sep 16, 2005)

Just a headsup: 

Newest Harbor Freight flyer shows a 6 inch composite digital caliper on sale for $9.99

Metric and inch, accuracy +-.001 in. / .2mm
Plastic construction. From the photo in the catalog, the slide is yellow, the LCD housing is blue and the "jaws" appear to be black

Heck, the LCD readout alone ought to be worth at least that much. Cheap enough to buy several units, so you can have one handy in several places. I'd order 10 myself if I wasn't broke right now. 

No photo or description on the website, but if you click on the "order from printed catalog" link in the left hand frame and enter *93293-1UEC* in the box, the correct item and price shows up.


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## Rothrandir (Sep 16, 2005)

ten bucks ain't bad i guess, but i wouldn't trust the accuracy to .001.
plastic will bend and flex, i'd consider this .005 minimum. even mitutoyo plastic calipers are only rated accurate to .008.

still, i might have to pick one up if i buy anything from hf in the near future. would be a good pair to butcher.

are they still going to sell the metal ones i wonder? i picked up a set for $15 a while back, and wish i'd have gotten two at the time. just so i had one i could modify a little bit for special purposes.

would also be nice to use them as a spare at work, when i dont' want to stick my brown and sharpe's into a coolant soaked machine...


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## rdshores (Sep 17, 2005)

I think these are a better deal....
http://cgi.ebay.com/6-Inch-Electron...itemZ7547121373QQcategoryZ25269QQcmdZViewItem


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## ABTOMAT (Sep 17, 2005)

Unless you were looking for cheap calipers to hand out to fabricators, I think I'd skip anything totally made of plastic. The eBay ones look decent, even with the shipping cost. I think the eBay style is the design with a digital interface hidden inside. If you crack them open you can access special features.


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## gadget_lover (Sep 17, 2005)

Yeah, the e-bay one looks just like the $16.99 HF "centech" model. http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=47257

I use the 4 inch model more, http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=47256

The HF shipping is not too bad if you are buying two or three items. If you pay to join the Inside Track group you find some even better prices.

Daniel


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## Wingerr (Sep 23, 2005)

What are some typical deals with the Inside Track membership?
They'd probably sell a lot more memberships if they posted the prices and items that are available to members, so you can see if it's worthwhile.
I'm a tool junkie, probably would blow way too much money if I signed up...


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## gadget_lover (Sep 23, 2005)

Wingerr said:


> What are some typical deals with the Inside Track membership?
> They'd probably sell a lot more memberships if they posted the prices and items that are available to members, so you can see if it's worthwhile.
> I'm a tool junkie, probably would blow way too much money if I signed up...




It's so hard to compare. Sometimes the IT members just get advance notice. Sometimes they get better prices.


46506-4VGA BORESCOPE WITH CASE AND LIGHT $179.99
46506-3VGA ITC Member Price $159.97 

At 159 I'm considering it.

Daniel


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## 1331 (Sep 23, 2005)

A while back I went to the H.F. store to get another one of the 6" metal ones I was going to modify. I took it out of the package at home and when I took it out of the box, it turned on by itself, off button didn't work and it would reset on its own when sliding the jaw (yup, shoulda checked it out first). I went back to the store and the clerk gave me another one to try. After about the fourth one not working correctly, I saw in the showcase a 4" size. I tried several of those with the same results. The store manager came by, refeunded my money and he said he would look in the instrucions to see how they are supposed to work. A couple weeks later when I was there, no 6" or 4" were on the shelves. (Apparent bad batch). Last week I was there and some 6' metal ones were in stock. I had two 6" ones, one works alright and the other spit out a partial display after replacing the battery and now refuses to work at all. I will try purchasing another 6" metal one agian.


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## Wingerr (Sep 23, 2005)

gadget_lover said:


> It's so hard to compare. Sometimes the IT members just get advance notice. Sometimes they get better prices.
> 
> 
> 46506-4VGA BORESCOPE WITH CASE AND LIGHT $179.99
> ...



Not for medical use... 

I have one without a light, but mine uses fiber optics and is flexible; that one appears to be rigid. Wonder how the clarity compares-
The diameter of mine is too large to fit down the bore of a rifle (shotgun maybe), so I guess that one would be more useful for that application.
Instructions say to use a cotton tampon to clean it after use- hmm.
Can't say I've put mine to any real use yet; maybe I'll try to look down some spark plug holes to see what it looks like, even if it's pointing in the wrong direction to see the valves and stuff.

Maybe if the IT was a fixed percentage discount, it'd be nice. The catch as catch can aspect seems hit or miss.


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## gadget_lover (Sep 23, 2005)

Just to balance the quality reports...


I have 5 or 6 ( I lose count) of the 4, 6 and 8 inch calipers. There are two different styles. One turns itself on when you move the jaws. 

All of them have worked well. They do run through batteries quicker than I'd like. I've cut one in half to make it shorter (1 inch travel for tight spaces) and one has had the jaws cut (and ground) off so I can use it as a depth gage in tight spaces.


They go into a blink mode when the battery starts to die. This can be disconcerting.

I've not checked for accuracy, but I do use them interchangably and all of mine seem to be the same. A .901 reads .901 on several of them.



As for the Insider Track. I've lost money by subscribing. It cost $25, and I've bought at least $100 worth of stuff justy because the prices were good.

Daniel


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## Wingerr (Sep 24, 2005)

I have a couple of the digital calipers and tend to use them infrequently, and noticed the batteries didn't seem to last as long as I expected either. Problem is there's some standby drain that runs them down sitting on the shelf, so I just store it with the battery out, and keep a neodymium magnet in there to make it easy to pop the battery in and out quickly. Haven't had to change the battery in a long while-


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## cave dave (Sep 24, 2005)

My HF digital run through batteries pretty quick. At least they are LR44s and I had some free from a crappy LED light. I have several Vernier type and sometime I like using those better.


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## gadget_lover (Sep 24, 2005)

I'd purchased a batch of LR44 batteries a while back. 3 cards of 10 for $15 on e-bay. I thought it was a good deal and has kept me from worrying about the calipers battery wastage.

I just did a search for LR44 on e-bay and found there are hundreds of people selling LR44 in bulk.

One of them was 100 cells for only $4.99 (buy it now) with $5 shipping and 100% positive feedback. That's 10 cents apiece.

Daniel


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## Lynx_Arc (Sep 24, 2005)

I bought a 10pack of LR44s at a local dollar store and tested all of them at 1.55v
cost me $1.09. 10 of them should last me a year perhaps.


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## Vee3 (Sep 25, 2005)

Hmmm...Lemme see - .2mm =~.008". So I guess don't work in metric mode if you need precision. Why would they list the inch/mm precision as being so different?

Many HF Chinese tools are perfectly fine for some non-critical work. I think the 1" travel indicators at the often on-sale price of $7.99 are a bargain for a disposable tool. They work okay MOST of the time (But I still don't trust them for critical work. I've seen a couple of them fail when least expected. You gets what you pays for).

I'm a Manufacturing Engineer and my company buys many types of measuring tools, cheap and expensive. For the Machinists and inspectors at my place, most HF measuring tools are only used for the least critical measurements, and even then only with a double-check in many cases. We don't even allow Mitutoyo plastic calipers to be used by anyone (Although they seem to be pretty good).

Plastic Chinese calipers? I might use them to train my son to inspect his Thomas the Train parts, but not anything more critical than that...

JMO


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## Rothrandir (Sep 25, 2005)

manufacturing engineer? what exactly does that entail?


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## tvodrd (Sep 25, 2005)

I wish Mitutoyo would make a 4" "scaled-down" dial caliper like the 4" Harbor Freight sells. Mitutoyo's existing 4" is just a shortened 6". I have a couple of the HFs and only needed to tighten one a little. I've learned I can trust them for everyday routine stuff.

I carried a Manufacturing Engineering title for many years. It's a mixed bag combining classic Industrial Engineering, (work flow, line balancing, time and motion and floor layout/general material handling) knowledge of materials and their associated processes, (machining, molding, stamping, finishes and assembly) and process automation. (Pneumatics, hydraulics, sensors, machine vision, feeders, and robotics) It is a mixed bag! I dropped my membership years ago to SME.

Larry


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## gadget_lover (Sep 25, 2005)

Vee3 said:


> Hmmm...Lemme see - .2mm =~.008". So I guess don't work in metric mode if you need precision. Why would they list the inch/mm precision as being so different?
> 
> JMO




I pulled up the product manual and got error < .02mm for measurements under 100mm.

.02 millimeters = 0.000787401575 inches (gotta love google) 

The .2 was a typo.


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## Vee3 (Sep 27, 2005)

gadget_lover said:


> I pulled up the product manual and got error < .02mm for measurements under 100mm.
> 
> .02 millimeters = 0.000787401575 inches (gotta love google)
> 
> The .2 was a typo.



******************

I suspected so after I thought about it. I still wouldn't trust them to read accurately down to .0008". That's micrometer territory...


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## Vee3 (Sep 27, 2005)

Manufacturing Engineer - Certainly a "mixed bag" in my case. I do everything from designing inspection and production tooling to conducting safety meetings and spanking employees for not following work instructions (And everything in between).

My job description changes daily. I'm still waiting for someone to ask me to clean the toilet. No doubt they'll add that soon...


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## chevrofreak (Sep 28, 2005)

rdshores said:


> I think these are a better deal....
> http://cgi.ebay.com/6-Inch-Electronic-Caliper-Digital-Ruler-New-Calipers_W0QQitemZ7547121373QQcategoryZ25269QQcmdZViewItem


 

I have a set of those, fantastic bargain, and I use it all the time.


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## Osprey_Guy (Oct 2, 2005)

My most all-consuming hobby is making knives, and folding knives require a pretty fair amount of accuracy if they are to work smoothly, at the very least to .001" (I do a lot of hand-lapping on a precision-ground, granite surface plate). I've got 5 of the HF calipers located at every workbench/workstation in my shop. 

About 6 months ago I finally broke down and purchased Brown & Sharpe calipers. They were on sale for $135. They're rated IP67 which means that they are basically dust and water proof. Good for me, especially when I'm at the grinder working with wet and grimey steel (need to dunk the steel in the water after every one or two passes on the grinder in order to keep it cool). 
I was more than a little surprised when I began to compare and discovered that the HF calipers were surprisingly close in accuracy to the Brown and Sharpe's. With the exception of one "lemon" (which I returned to HF), they have consistently been within .0005" of the Brown and Sharpe! This might not be good enough for some needs, but it's certainly good enough for most of what I do.* I must confess however that the HF calipers are not even close to being as smooth to operate as the Brown & Sharpe...not even in the same ballpark. But they are cheap and they are handy...and besides, I've got a HF about 20 minutes from my house......No shipping! 

*If I needed more accuracy than that I'd start using a micrometer.


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## Osprey_Guy (Oct 14, 2005)

Just a quick qualifier to my comments above...

I now understand the earlier references to "plastic" calipers. On the cover of a recently received HF flyer they show the $10 sale calipers...and they are made out of a composite. All of the HF calipers I own have stainless steel bodies. I would be inclined not to trust the plastic calipers for anything critical.


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