Honestly the $40 HF one would've been fine for me except for the 90 degree
brass swivel fitting leaked. probably a bad o-ring, or poor tolerances -
didn't open it up to even look... There didn't appear to be *any* swivel
fittings online I could find (which may be a bad sign for things to come). I
can see this being a wear item on any of these reels. One leaky fitting and
the whole thing is junk.
Date: Thu, 3 May 2012 10:15:14 -0400
Subject: Re: [Shop-talk] Air hose reel opinions
From: doug at dougbraun.com
To: pj_mcgarvey at hotmail.com
CC: shop-talk at autox.team.net
I got one of the generic Chinese retracting 50-foot ones at a swap meet
several years ago, and and it has been a joy.
It leaks a little bit in really cold weather, but that is not a problem in
practice. I can't imagine having piles of hoses
all over the place. I think I paid $65, but that was 5 years ago.
I bet the Craftsman ones come from the same factory in China...
As the price of raw materials climbs, the Chinese stuff had gotten more
cheaply made. I bought
a HF welder cart about 3 years ago, and I was happy with it. It was pretty
sturdy. Then I
bought a second one recently. It was the exact same design and model number,
but
all the sheet metal pieces were about 15% thinner, and the entire thing was
about 15% lighter.
It was definitely flimsier, and I was sort of bummed.
Doug
On Thu, May 3, 2012 at 9:01 AM, PJ McGarvey <pj_mcgarvey at hotmail.com> wrote:
I've had enough with tripping over my air hose in my tight garage, so I'm
looking into an air hose reel. Learned my lesson once by trying the Harbor
Freight cheap-o model and it leaked right away, so I returned it. Craftsman
has some nice looking ones in the $100-150 range and there's a sale ending in
3-days I might jump on. When I search Amazon, there is a ridiculous array of
them at many price points....
I'm looking for one that can handle 50 ft. of 1/2" hose. Self-retracting is
not a requirement. If they sell it with out the hose that would be great.
Something that can handle typical DIY use.
I know alot of people on this list use air in their shops, so I figured it's
a
great place to ask.
Thanks
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