USA tools vs Chinese tools

Lets take a look at two Craftsman ratchets, one manufactured in the USA, one in China and lets see if there are any differences

[davogifman]

I learned that when your company is about to go under; you'll do almost anything to stay afloat even if it's just another year, or two. Such as having your tools made in the same country that basically bankrupt you. lol

[shiweicai]

This guy is honest and telling the truth! You don’t expect to buy a Mercedes if you pay the price for a Ford.

[simonmcneilly]

My right ear must be made in China, cuz it don't work on this video.

[NOBOX]

those ratchets are not the same bro, the american one is made of good alloy, the chinese version is a rice beer can alloy plated with shiny bamboo

[tomallen]

What about the tolerances of the rachet mechanism, the design of the gears, the heat treatment, metallurgy? What you can't see is what's critical to strength and durability.

[EricChee]

Iphone, made in china, has tighter tolerence than Aerospace industry has? this guy is just mind fuked.

[kiksperez]

I am sure many things made in China can have good quality and can be really cheap. My choices in buying goods, however, are not just based on these criteria, which are very important. I would like to buy quality and affordable goods made from different countries so that no one country will become so powerful economically that it behaves like a modern day imperialist and tolerate an authoritarian regime just because they are becoming more prosperous and a superpower. So I guess my choice is essentially also political in that sense. I am happy to hear that Samsung has moved parts of their production away from China into Vietnam and other countries. Our behavior and choices as consumers can actually help to defend rights of people in China and in other countries that China bullies and exploits. As consumers we can also help reduce China's greenhouse gas emissions by buying products made in countries promoting and supporting use of low-carbon technologies, renewable energy, and environment and labor friendly business practices.

[danr]

The older Craftsman ratchets have the same type of release as the China one. Made in the '70's. I'm old.

Sears will be out of business in the next five
to ten years.

[farrukhaliakbar]

Kindly tell me best Powertools brand which is equally good like hilti Milwaukee Makita Dewalt etc.

[stevenhardy]

Consider SK hand tools. After 15 years of French ownership put them into bankruptcy...They're back and make excellent, strong durable tools. Their  mantra now is "if it has sk on it, its made in the usa". There sockets and wrenches are still cold forged using chrome moly steel. The finish is excellent but more importantly, the fit tolerance is excellent on their ratchets...that is there is much less wobble between the sockets and the driver.The internal stamping is also much more thorough .The only down side is you just don't find that many wall in stores carrying them and those that do are outrageously priced. Fortunately, you can find some excellent deals on amazon. I recently bought a 3/4 full socket set . Grainger wanted around 1200 bucks ...I ordered them through amazon for 550 bucks. The manufacturing quality of them is absolutely flawless. Their catalog is huge and there are different styles of ratchet's available. I am now awaiting the arrival of two sets of xframe ratcheting wrenches...I am like a kid waiting for Christmas morning.

[zohaaz]

powertool for work and not for children's toys is hoped this tool can help make it work more efective

[ad]

i wont buy Chinese made craftsman tools, sorry sears all of the craftsman that i do own are the older USA made variety. it used to be a buying point to buy them in the first place. they moved production to china and kept the price the same. they only did this for the profit motive. they made their tools in the USA for generations, in fact they used to advertise that their hand tools were indeed made in the USA.

if i can no longer afford to buy american made tools im going to go to harbor freight. they never outsourced to a foreign country they were always made there. im not giving my money to a company that is so short sighted they cut the american jobs and continue to overpay the man in the ivory tower. instead of cutting blue collar jobs you should make your cuts in pay at the top.

hey sears, im done with you. if i break any of my older USA made sears tools im throwing them in the trash, i will not trade them for a china made tool.

[evolu]

What kind of bullshit test was that, (the it looks good test) . Do a proper test try to undo  a rusty seized bolt and and see what happens.

[dofuller]

I like this topic and thank you for your review, however I think this just barely scratched the surface.  Contrasting the fit and finish of two Craftsman ratchets of the same basic design may be useful for the novice tool guy, but without any test results, it's pretty much academic.  The main questions I have with Chinese made hand tools involve the composition and quality of the alloys that the various Chinese manufacturers use.  What metals are really in there?  How (or how well) are they heat treated?  Has anyone published any sheer or tensile strength test data on any hand tool made in China (vs. USA, EU, or Japanese made tools)?  I cannot find this information anywhere, and I know you don't have the resources to provide this data, so no biggie. I've seen some truly crap tools made in China fail and hurt people.  I'm a lifelong Craftsman guy and I have never once had any problems with any USA made Craftsman tool, but I don't own and I won't buy any Craftsman (or any other) hand tool made in mainland China.  I do have a handful of tools made in Taiwan and they are fantastic tho :)

[chaddles]

ya should of taken the ratchets apart, and looked at the insides and compared

[BoltClevo]

You can get crap made in China or anywhere else, you just have to ask for it. You can get top quality stuff made in China or anywhere else, you just have to ask (and pay) for it. You can blame CEO's and the stock market for once quality tool brands now pumping out crap. That's what we buy in general so that's what they make in general. The biggest catch for going to China to have stuff made is to have trusted guys on the ground over there to watch the quality and origin of incoming goods as they can be switched out for crap

[stinkycheese]

Why do people keep mentioning practically irrelevant differences. Unless it even fails at its basic purpose there are two most important areas, both internal. What is the tooth count and how much force will it take before the pawl or gear strips? I suppose how hard and precise the drive piece is matters too, but generally those are acceptable except on the lowest end junk, and the pawl or gear fails first.

[ettubaby]

What most people fail to understand is how things are made across the world. Starting in the 1960s to way into the 1980s, Japan was decimating manufacturers around the world, in particular in the USA. The lessons that were learned fromJapan was a manufacturing process with quality built into it, at this time USA products were inferior. Today, these processes are standardized and have international certifications. This is why it was very important for China to gain admission to the WTO. Most USA made products today use these standards. Yes it's possible to find manufacturers in china that are not certified. But given equal engineering, materials and time, the Chinese products are equal to anything built in the USA.

[gregorymccoy]

Not a lot of useful information in this video. Very much a "shoot from the hip" style with zero research.

[silangtomilas]

its no longer necessary to rate or compare the quality of a thing/tools where it made or came from as long as it was produce by a legit company and with a decent price tag. Example is the Iphone, you may wonder why apple didn't made the iphone entirely from US instead they have a sub-contractor base in china, its because china has a low laborer wages, no Obligation, less tax and other things that may hinder the price tag of an iphone, their income, stocks and other (if iphone is entirely made from US it may cost maybe more than 1000 USD for the lastest model, Higher price means other buyer might actually shift to other brand with same quality and cheaper price) . The main reason why most (if not all) corporation have a base in china and other Asian is because of the abundance of willingly laborer to work hard and harder with a less pay-check. The reason why apple wants a cheaper price by any means even cheating to other countries, people and government is because of the competition on who could make the best quality product with less price on it, one option here is to cut the cost of laborer while not reducing the man power to produce more product. A lot of product from china is fake but also cheap so in comparison, you only got what you paid for. just take a look on some product like nike, nikon, canon, hp, mitsubishi, Aiwa, Hp, IBM, apple, samsung, most of their product are produce partially or entirely in china. My point here is that a product doesn't represent the quality where it was made from but rather the price that it came with. (of course except from scams)