Harbor Freight tools thread.

lightning took out a tree and started a power line fire in the neighborhood last night. Woke up to still no power and power company not having any clue on when that may change.

Everywhere was showing sold out of generators online, but decided to try Harbour freight...

There was at least 12-18 people standing at the door when they unlocked so I had pretty low hopes. Managed to get the 2nd to last one they had!
It was even the one I was hoping to buy as I got there.

The workers were telling everyone all they needed was gas. "They come full of oil". I didn't trust HF so I bought a bottle on my way home.

Could not get the stupid thing to fire! There was oil on the district, brand new gas.... the oil warning light did flicker when pull starting it, but just assumed it needed to be running to build pressure(lots of engines shows this for 2 seconds at startup).
Finally decided to put a bunch of oil in it(location of the fill spot is horrible!! Spilt oil all over the ground trying to wedge a bottle in their.

But it fires on the 2nd pull after. Left it running powering my fridge and freezer as well as the neighbor.

I've read good things about the HF generators, but always nervous with a sper of the moment forced purchase.

 

I have a Predator 8750. Overall, I think it is very good. However, with less than 2 hrs run time, the fuel shutoff solenoid on the carb failed. Wouldn't start. After troubleshooting, I could tell it was not getting fuel to the float bowl. Removed the shutoff solenoid, clipped off the plunger to disable it, and it started right up.

That solenoid is meant to cutoff fuel to prevent air pollution by minimizing unburned gas getting sent out the muffler after the spark is cutoff. When it fails, the solenoid will not pull the plunger to the open position so fuel can flow into the system. Engine will run fine without it. Look for wire harness connection to the carb if you ever have this failure.

 

Used the grinder a few days ago cutting some 1/2” metal rod and a piece of 1/4 flat stock. Not gonna lie i was very impressed. No bogging at all. Great power to. I considered taking it back but glad I didn’t.

 

I'm thinking about getting one to replace my ancient Coleman 2000w. Closest HF is 85 miles, I wonder what shipping would cost.

 

Been waiting a few months for this to go on sale. But I decided I didn't want to wait any longer. Really deep drawers. Bike tools only, going in this one, so it's Park Tools Blue, or at least close.

 

Bought this on the last day of the sale they had. It's getting hot here in central CA. Needed a generator to power up my travel trailer. The price was too good to pass up.

 

There are many fans of that generator on the internet. For the price it is a winner.

 

Agreed. If I have any issues I'll be sure to post them here for you guys to know.

 

What was the sale price? I'm north of you in Sac. We're both looking at temps around 110 this weekend. No bueno.

 

Perhaps this price. This one has been as cheap as $699.

 

Correct. I had the $769 coupon. Yes it’s definitely going to be hot this weekend, that was what drove me to go get it.

 

I was at a local festival last fall (pre covid)). I saw one of the food vendor trailers was powering his mobile kitchen trailer with the same gennie.

I 1st told him I was not buying any food, but I was wondering if he could give me an opinion on the HF gennie. That guy could not brag it up enough! He loves it! There were 4 people behind me that wanted food, but he wouldn't stop talking about it and bragging it up.

He told me it was his 2nd summer using the thing and it has never missed a beat! That was a pretty good endorsement in my opinion.

 

I bought the 4XXX predator generator last week and have been happy with the 1 use I got out of it.

What is the different hough between a generator, and a inverter generator? There are 2 inverter style at HF. They cost so much more, for quite a bit less watts.

 

Basically they have different ways of regulating and outputting the AC voltage waveform. The output of a normal generator looks like stair steps up and down, an inverter generator will have a smooth waveform. For sensitive electronics you want the inverter, for lights and powertools and stuff it doesn't matter.

I work in live events, and if I'm outdoors at an event I demand pure sine wave inverter gennies for my electronic equipment, not construction site grade ones.

Edit: here's a nifty picture:

 

So for home power outages, sounds like no reason for a inverter. Save the $, and get more power with a generator

 

Inverter generators are generally a lot quieter.

 

And you still didn't make a purchase.

 

A question if I may... Using a normal genny connected to a UPS, is it okay to run PCs, satellite dish, TVs etc?

 

I'm far from an expert, but I'd think so? I'm assuming it's always running through the UPS's inverter, and not a super fast switchover.. I could very well be wrong though haha.

 

Thank you. I did this years ago after an ice storm took out power for a week. All I had was (still have) a Coleman 2000w genny. I am thinking about getting a new HF one. 2000w won't start my furnace. Better to have and not need, than need and not have.