Unpopular opinion: Crimpers from Harbor Freight are garbage for coax ends

Was on a big job in Denver last month running 200 drops for a new apartment building. Used a cheap crimper from Harbor Freight and had 12 failures out of 50 terminations. Switched to my old Klein and zero issues. The Harbor Freight one just wouldnt crimp tight enough even with compression fittings. Anyone else had bad luck with those or did I just get a dud?

2 comments

2 Comments

jennyh551mo ago

I grabbed one of those Harbor Freight crimpers a while back and had the same problem. Switched to a Klein and never looked back, it's just a better tool for the job.

anderson.jason1mo ago

Replacements for the fitting itself can matter too. Some of those cheaper compression fittings have a slightly different inner diameter that the Harbor Freight tool just can't grip right. Ran into that on a job where I swapped the brand of fittings and the failures dropped way off, even with the same crimper. Might not be the tool alone, could be the fittings it's trying to work with.

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