Harbor Freight Jack Stands Recall

[rrnut-2]

Just received this article from Industrial Equipment News. Not sure if this is the right section to post this. But if your like me, I do use jack stands on some stuff.

"DETROIT (AP) — The U.S. government’s road safety agency is warning people not to use Pittsburgh Automotive jack stands sold by Harbor Freight Tools because they can collapse when holding a load.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says Harbor Freight is recalling over 1.7 million three-ton and six-ton steel jack stands.

The agency says the jack manufacturer has reported six injury claims from use or assembly of the six-ton stands and five injury claims from using the three-ton stands. None of the injuries was life threatening, the agency said.

The stands were manufactured by Jiaxing Golden Roc Tools Co. of China from December of 2012 through March 31, 2020. The company determined that the stands are faulty due to aging of production equipment.

The recalled three-ton stands have item numbers 61196 and 56371, and the six-ton stands have an item number of 61197.

Agency documents say Harbor Freight Tools will give buyers a gift card equal to the purchase price of the stands."

Jim B

[Bill Shields]

crappy welds

[rkcarguy]

I had some of these, where the top was formed around the cast iron post with the detents seemed like it spread open allowing the teeth to skip under load and they would drop suddenly. I'll have to see if I can get credit for them, I tossed them in the recycle bin several years ago.

[Steggy]

The company determined that the stands are faulty due to aging of production equipment.

That's a laugh. The fault is with the manufacturing people who knowingly produce an inferior and dangerous product.

[Steggy]

I had some of these, where the top was formed around the cast iron post with the detents seemed like it spread open allowing the teeth to skip under load and they would drop suddenly. I'll have to see if I can get credit for them, I tossed them in the recycle bin several years ago.

As always, you only get what you pay for.

[Greg_Lewis]

Yup. You have to shop carefully at Horrible Fright. Some stuff is great, other stuff not so much.

[rkcarguy]

I had some of these, where the top was formed around the cast iron post with the detents seemed like it spread open allowing the teeth to skip under load and they would drop suddenly. I'll have to see if I can get credit for them, I tossed them in the recycle bin several years ago.

As always, you only get what you pay for.

Sadly, at the time, I could choose from Craftsman that were twice as much and still made in China, some stands that were at the auto parts store that were made in China, and the HF ones. I have a good pair of aluminum stands that came with a hydraulic jack that have been good ones but I needed two more for an engine swap I did several years ago.

[gwrdriver]

Jim B,
Thanks for this heads-up, otherwise I'd have never known about a recall.
I had a set of these, as yet unused, and was just about to get under my truck using them!
They went back yesterday.

[Pontiacguy1]

Products made in China have a wide range of quality and workmanship. Some stuff is built very good, some is very poor, and often times the brand name will make the difference in quality. For instance, the small lathes that they sell. The same company makes the small 7" lathes for Grizzly and for several others too. The difference is that the best parts, the ones that are the tightest tolerance and have no visual imperfections, get put into the name brand machine, who demand the highest quality. Ones that have blemishes or are not quite perfect or are a little off-size get put into the lower brand machines. The no-name brand machines that you can get off the internet are basically built with all the leftover stuff from runs of the higher-end machines. My father-in-law bought one of those no-name machines and had to do a lot of rework to it to make it run. No way you could have just plugged it in and started making parts with it. He said if he had it to do over, he'd have bought the Grizzly brand for a couple of hundred more and not had to rework half of a brand-new machine. I've heard that people IN China often buy foreign branded stuff, even though it is still made in China, because the quality control and inspections are better.

[rrnut-2]

I have a customer that is all over the world. I build machines that test sand paper for them.

I had to build one for one of the plants in China and I really didn't want to do it. So I told the guy in China that they could build it over there a lot cheaper. His answer: No, we want it to work!

Your welcome gwrdriver. Since most if not all of us use Harbor Freight for some of their tools/materials, I thought that this was important to pass along.

Jim B

[NP317]

Slightly related:
10+ years ago I purchased a H.F. engine hoist on sale.
The 1-ton upper half was boxed separately from the lower frame/wheeled part.
Long story short they sold me the 1-ton upper and the 2-ton larger lower part!
Rather than return it I made the few required modifications to mate them and the results have been fine.

But I am always careful using any engine hoist!
RussN

[rrnut-2]

Here is an update from Harbor Freight.

https://em.harborfreight.com/pub/sf/Res ... bq0govbd2g

Jim B