$50 tool chest

This Summer, I got an unsolicited offer for a massive tool chest/cabinet for around 6% of something smaller at Harbor Freight (like this base and this topper ~$850US as of this writing). Curious as to what $50US can actually buy in terms of a new tool chest/cabinet, I ordered one. This post covers that mini-adventure, as well as some thoughts on tool cabinets, now that this adventure has me thinking about it.

What They Said

Let's start with the product description. They said a lot, but the key points were

Milwaukee 56 top
and bottom cabinets

• Ship within 24 hours after payment, Free Worldwide Shipping
• Assembled in La Palma, California, USA
• 150 lbs. rated drawers
• 2-deep bottom cabinet drawers have double drawer slides, offering a 300 lbs. load capacity
• 18-Gauge steel frame and drawers with reinforced 6-Gauge angle iron cabinet base finished with rust-resistant red and black powder-coat finish
• digital locking system, no need for keys
• 6-outlet/2USB power strip mounted inside chest till and on exterior cabinet side wall, cord hooks included to wrap the power cords for storage
• Assembled dimensions with casters installed (approximate): 56 in. W x 22 in. D x 64 in. H and weighs 643.8 lbs.

Company Policies

First, it should be noted that on the anthead.club (seller) website, it is indicated that all shipping is done through 4PX, order processing can take 3-10 days (as opposed to within 24 hours as mentioned above) and delivery time is 3-4 weeks. I translate the 3-4 weeks to 21-28 days from their warehouse to my driveway. Last, it says worldwide shipping is free.

So, all of that sounds really great, right? Like, within 38 days after placing an order, you get this massive tool cabinet/chest combo for $50US. But, of course, how could this possibly be? And, free shipping on almost 650 pounds? This can't possibly be right. For just $50US, though, seemed like it was worth spending the money just to see what would happen. Besides, I figured this might make a good post. So, I ordered one.

Tracking

The timeline for my order is below. We should probably start with the fact that the website said that this was "Assembled in La Palma, California, USA". Not sure how that works if it is shipping from Guangzhou, China. For the benefit of the doubt, let's pretend that it ships as a pile of bits to an assembly space in La Palma where it is assembled into this final shape before continuing on its way. As I document this, it would not be fair to at least recognize that supply chains are a mess around the world. So, delays could be attributed to that. Still, the data is the data:

12-Aug: ordered, paid for

20-Aug: (8 days later) order accepted and shipped out of warehouse in Guangzhou City, China by China-Post (not 4PX). This is within the policy time window, just not the designated carrier.

23-Aug: arrived / departed Chinese port (Shenzhen) on a ship

 5-Sept: (13 days at sea) arrived in USA. Port unclear, but let's assume Los Angeles, since they're the biggest US port for ships from China.

29-Sept: (24 days in US, 41 days since left china warehouse) Message from vendor rec'd. Cabinet still not arrived, current shipper unknown. Could be languishing in a warehouse, shipping container, customs, or maybe it's with USPS and they didn't know how to provide a tracking number to me. Yeah... right...

12-Oct: (54 days since left China warehouse) posting published. No further updates from vendor nor on the trackers.

Learnings

After over 40 days days of waiting and multiple requests-for-update, I finally heard from the vendor. They indicated that there was a "problem with logistics" and that they would cancel my order, returning my $50. I wonder if it will be another 40 days before I see my $50, if ever. So, what did we learn from this? Well, I learned how to track a shipment from China using AfterShip and Track17. I think we all also learned that no, you cannot get a 56"W x 22"D x 64"H, 645 pound tool chest shipped to you from "La Palma, CA" (read: China) for $50.

Husky 52 top
and bottom cabinets

I do wonder what was actually shipped from China, where it US-landed on 5-September, and what its final destination was / will be. I mean, the tracking number was valid for something leaving China for the US. I suspect, whatever was sent will not go back to China. Instead, will end up in a LA-area warehouse for local sale, covering the real cost of manufacture and shipping with some profit cooked in. Maybe it was pre-arranged swiped off the dock a-la the second season of HBO's "The Wire". But, why the internet ruse for $50? Perhaps there are import limits placed on the local-to-LA-area seller, and this is an end-run around that? Maybe what was shipped was something else entirely, and they just needed a cover story for customs. I don't know, but there is a reason the too-good-to-be-true tool cabinet/chest combo experienced a "problem with logistics" when I have never had that experience with Alibaba or other clearly-direct-from-China orders from, like, eBay or whatever. I did discover, however, that this exact tool chest set up is available from Home Depot for $1500, and most of the images on the 2 websites are identical. Before you ask, yes I have been watching the account I used to place this order, looking for suspicious activity, and no, there has not been any.

Cabinet Options

Husky 41 bottom

I realize that I will have to break down and buy a real tool cabinet (maybe a topper chest too) if I intend to get my tools in order. The combo bottom/top "red rollie" I have now is too small (27" wide), to the point where I have tools sitting on storage shelves.... or worse, sitting in a pile on the crowded garage floor. In short, the current-state is not sustainable. I learned that too: thinking about tool storage opened my eyes to one of the underlying factors to my garage disarray. So, what are the real options out there?

Like I said, Home Depot has this exact unit for $1500. Home Depot has a Husky (this, pictured alongside "Learnings" above) that's 2/3 the price (at $1000US) of the Milwaukee brand, but 52" wide rather than 56. Of course, for 1/2 of that, I could just get the bottom 44" deal from Harbor Freight I linked at the beginning, and get the upper later, if I feel the need for more. For that matter, I could look at Husky's 41" (picture on the right) for about the same price. The Home Depot models have things like integrated power strips, a bottle opener and soft-close drawers. I figure you're paying for those, so if the prices are otherwise close, where is that difference getting made up?

 

US General "44" bottom

I have been unable to find drawer spec's on these US General "44" cabinets. So, I went to Harbor Freight with a measuring tape. The cabinet is genuinely 22 inches deep but only 42" wide, not 44. I know. It puzzled me too, so I measured twice. The image on the right here has the measurements I took. The drawer width measurements are the inside space, between the sidewalls. For height, I measured the distance from the deck with the rubber mat installed to the bottom edge of whatever is above it, be it another drawer or part of the cabinet. By measuring the actual usable space, I hope these measurements help others. I expect that as I plan my shop tool storage upgrade, these will be useful.

Comparing

As a way to consider the various options, I took the published "cubic inches" of storage and divided that by the price to get square inches or storage space per $1US. In all cases, when just the lower cabinets are considered, the square inch per dollar is lower/worse than when the top is added. For example, the upper for the US General "44" costs $330, but adds 11700 cubic inches of storage space (35.45 square inches per $1US). Since I don't know if I need an upper, I just considered lowers. In order of most to least (square inches per $1US) with some other data bits:

1. Husky 52           - 22934 cu in -  9   drawers (35.28)  - $1000US
2. Husky 41           - 17221 cu in - 11  drawers (34.44)  - $500US
3. US General 44   - 14000 cu in - 13* drawers (28)       - $500US <- $600 as of 6-Nov
4. Milwaukee 56    - 23583 cu in - 10  drawers (26.2)    - $900US
5. US General 56   - 21500 cu in - 11  drawers (25.3)    - $850US

Unless you are just going to throw everything in your cabinet with no organizational thought, overall capacity is not terribly informative. The number and shapes/sizes of the drawers really speak to use more than an overall number. So, I need to consider that against what I need. For me, overall footprint and how well it will compliment my existing "red rollie" are also factors. I intend put hands on examples of the Home Depot offerings before making a decision, but I am leaning towards the US General 44 (asterisked) because of the 2-3/4" most-shallow drawers compared to the 2" most-shallow from Husky and Milwaukee. And because there are more of them. Impact drivers and some larger wrenches would not fit the smaller 2" clearance without laying them down, defeating some of the storage "gain". Also, those other cabinets offer a few large drawers that the US General does not. For me, those big drawers may not be very useful, or space-wasteful, attracting something that could just as easily sit on a shelf (like my MityVac or Dremel, still in their plastic carrying cases). Last, I have seen negative reviews about the plastic bits in the soft-close drawers breaking in a couple years, so that might be influencing my thinking too.

That's it for today. When I get to solving my tool storage, and sorting the garage, I'll post on it. I do have to spend some weekends organizing in there. You'll know when that's happened by the lack of interesting car-related posts... like this one. Hahaha. Thanks, as always, for following along-

Zed Prime

No, not like Optimus Prime. Today we celebrate getting Zed primed in 2k hi-build primer. Before I begin, the CoViD numbers are getting flat-out scary, but it doesn't seem like folks are taking this news and processing it into action. I take a walk every afternoon for some exercise around suburban residential streets and there are lots of fellow walkers or runners out there. Please remember that just because you're outside, it doesn't mean you can walk right up to me without a mask. I'm wearing one to protect you; show me the same courtesy, dammit. Now, about that primer.

Layout

set up for ease of movement

I started out by backing Nemo out of the other covered spot, and laying a big blue tarp on the driveway where it had been. I then planned my route for moving from panel to panel with a spraygun and air hose. I moved the air compressor out of the garage, but at the edge of it's power cord. I wanted to make sure I could get at different angles without bumping into wet paint, and without dropping the air hose across a panel.

Clean

This is the part that most car shows don't televise: the endless cleaning. Garage Squad is the clear exception, but I think that's because the car owner is usually doing it. Anyway, by now, dust from the Bondo is pretty much everywhere. Your hands and the oils ever-present on them (combined with Bondo dust or not), have run all over all of the panels. Both of these things ruin paint jobs. So, we start with a bottle of degreaser and a roll of paper towels. Since the car has been outside and the weather has been windy and damp, I did not feel it was necessary to shop-vac the interior before I began. I stand by that decision, but I encourage you to vacuum or air-compressor blow-out crevices at least. With bottle and towels in hand, you clean everywhere you intend to put primer. And clean the places nearby so tape will stick. I found the degreaser left a film on plastic so I had to reclean those plastic pieces with window cleaner sprayed onto paper towel so I could get tape to stick. Neat.

Mask

driver side rear quarter

With everything clean, I completed the masking next. I had started a few weeks ago, masking off the engine bay and the windshield. The sides of the dashboard near the doors, the door seals and some of the door hardware all needed to be masked. The fuel inlet did too. Again, it is probably worth stating that the purpose of masking it to keep paint off of stuff you don't want painted. That sounds obvious, but sometimes we get aggressive with tape and overdo it. So, with that perspective, it is better to under mask and have a little bit of rubber or chrome get paint on it than to over-mask, and have a line of unpainted body when you pull tape. Been there; it really sucks. Removing a little paint from rubber or chrome is way better than trying to get paint on that edge after you've messed up the masking. Last, I cut up some kitchen garbage bags and covered the tires. I'm not sure if we are going to keep them or not, but either way overspray would make them worth less. 

Paint Gun Assembly

I knew that once I had metal etching material applied, I was all-in on priming. Metal etch is an acid that converts rust, but it also cuts into the steel, making primer adhere better, but also creating a means of rust suddenly appear where it otherwise wasn't. With mid-Fall NorthWestern Oregon weather (read: damp), you do not want to create a rust opportunity. So, I set up my paint gun next.

A while back I got 3 of those purple Harbor Freight paint guns. I figured I would have a different gun for each of the various steps: prime, paint and clear. Well, since then I got a much better gun (ATOM X27) for applying the color and clear. For primer, though, especially this high-build stuff that has some thickness to it, I did not want to put that through the new gun.

The purple Harbor Freight paint gun ships with one tip, a 1.4mm one. That is too small to reasonably throw thick primer. The Eastwood guide for this 2k high-build primer suggests anything from 1.8 to 2.5mm. So, I drilled out the 1.4mm tip with a 5/64" (1.98mm) drill bit to get as close to a 2mm hole as I could. I did this a few weeks ago during paint gun disassembly, cleaning with lacquer thinner and re-assembly. Now, with the gun set up with a nearly 2mm tip, I was about ready. For timing... from end-to-end, gun disassembly, tip-drill, cleaning and re-assembly took a little over an hour. I work slow.

passenger rear quarter

To the air-inlet, I applied plumbers tape, and then threaded on a regulator with a pressure gauge (like this, also pictured on the right here). On the threaded end went more plumbers tape and then a inline desiccant dryer/filter (like this) and more plumbers tape. To that last bit, I threaded on an air hose quick-release. I set the whole contraption into a spray gun stand (like this) that was held firm to my bench under the weight of a vice. Be advised, these things are not balanced, and need to be fixed to something -or- have the baseplate under something super heavy (like a bench vice that I never attached to the bench) or they will fall.

Etch

With the panels clean, the gun ready and the masking done, I grabbed my small bottle of Eastwood metal etch and a foam brush. Panel by panel, I liberally applied metal etch. Because it was in the upper 50'sF (14*C) and relatively damp, the metal etch stayed wet for quite a while. That's a good thing, as it gives the acid time to cut into the metal and convert any rust without creating flash-rust.

Mix a Batch

hood looks real flat

Again, not like Letterkenny. The Eastwood hi-build 2k polyester primer requires the addition of liquid hardener: 0.2oz hardener per 10oz of primer. The cup that comes with the purple gun max's out at 20oz. so, I made 15oz batches per spray cycle. 15oz of material needs 0.3oz of hardener. Now, I have an old plastic syringe from when I was playing with biodiesel years ago that holds up to 12ml's, but it is graded in milliliters not oz. Apply some math and we need 8.87ml of hardener for 15oz of primer.

I grabbed a plastic mixing pitcher from the kitchen baking materials (did I mention that my wife loves me? I'm a lucky man.) and with blue tape marked the 15oz. line with the top edge of the tape. I did this so that I could quickly see when I hit 15oz while dumping paint from a 1-gallon pail. I opened the can, and then spent about 15 minutes thoroughly mixing the primer, deep churning the solids off the bottom so it was consistent top to bottom. 

Once mixed, I poured 15oz into the mixing pitcher (to the top of the blue tape) and opened the hardener. The hardener comes in a tube, but is as thin as water, so getting it into a syringe was not really a fruitful exercise. To solve, I removed the plunger, turned it upright (small hole at the bottom) and covered the small hole with my gloved finger. Into the now-open other end of the syringe, I squeezed just shy of 9ml in and then dumped it into the mixing pitcher. I mixed for about a minute and then poured the now-activated primer into the gun paint cup and threaded on the lid. I repeated this process 3 more times during the primer-shoot.

Prime

passenger headlight bucket

With primer in the cup, the lid fastened, the air compressor turned on and my painting overalls on, I was ready to go. I set the air pressure at the compressor to 40 and played with the regulator at the gun to get to 30psi while spraying. I got there, but I think, in retrospect, it would have been better had I run the pressure at the compressor higher so I could get more pressure through the gun. I say that because I found that the fan was not as wide as I would have liked, which forced me to hold the gun closer to the panel (like 4 inches rather than 6-8).

It is recommended that you test your fan on cardboard. I was shooting primer and was going to be shooting multiple coats, so I was fine with getting the fan set on a fender while shooting. My car, my choice. It took me a few passes to get my pass-speed right, but after 3 coats, the coverage looks really good. I found that I was initially moving too quickly, making my first coat quite light. Also, because I have a 21 gallon air compressor, I had to wait for the pressure a few times. Honestly, I expected much more waiting.

Because of the high-build nature of the primer, I made sure that I got a nice build everywhere, and then circled back on the trouble spots (fenders) for some extra. Once it all dried overnight, the panels look very smooth, though after touching them, they will definitely require a bunch of sanding. I haven't decided if another round of primer will be necessary. I guess we'll see after the sanding. At this point, though, I am super-happy with how everything looks.

Clean Up

passenger door

Similar to the cleaning of the car prior to painting, the cleanup of tools gets virtually no coverage in MotorTrend / Velocity / Speed television shows. That's really too bad. I know it isn't terribly entertaining television, but ignoring it implies a bad habit of not cleaning things as the way that the professionals do it. We know that is absolutely not the case. I spent over 2 hours spraying primer and another hour cleaning up. I may be slow, but I try to be meticulous. I started by pouring some fresh lacquer thinner into the paint cup and sloshing it around. This didn't free the dried-on primer, but the still wet primer was now suspended in lacquer thinner. I sprayed the material out until the cup was empty, and then removed the air line from the gun. I removed the cup and set it aside while I poured more lacquer thinner into the measuring pitcher. I used the pitcher from this point as the cleaning "sink". I dunked the cup in the "sink" a few times while I cleaned other things so the remaining paint on it wouldn't dry.

I removed the mix nuzzle (on the end that sets the fan-direction vertical or horizontal) off the front spray gun and then pulled the needle from the rear. With a pair of channel-lock pliers, I removed the tip housing, and placed them all into the pitcher. I set the gun in last, upside down. I added more lacquer thinner and then started cleaning things with a brush, getting all primer off of everything, including the outside of the paint gun housing and the paint cup. Once everything was completely clean and wiped down (an hour later), I re-assembled the gun, wiped out the paint cup and put everything away.

Some might argue that these guns are only $15US so why bother cleaning them. To me, treating them as single-use is an environmentally hostile way to operate. Ideally, I would not even have these, and I would have high quality tools (like the ATOM X27) instead. Still, the way we treat our expensive tools is how we should treat our cheap ones, IMHO. I have heard that these start leaking after no more than 10 hours of use, so I may have a couple more jobs before this starts to fail on me. That's still more than once. 

Curing

I let the panels (and the main shell, of course) sit in-place and under the carports overnight. The following morning, it had started to sprinkle so I carefully moved the panels back into the warm garage. I will let them sit until I am ready to sand the primer. I expect I will know if another round of primer will be necessary or not from that. Either way, the window for painting this Fall is effectively closed. Even if I can get sides onto these carports, it will be very hard to warm 400 square feet of space to 70*F (21*C) when it is under 40*F (4*C) outside. Any cooler than 60*F (~15*C), the paint won't behave properly, and it seems like everyone encourages painting at temps closer to 70*F (21*C).

I have read that the polyester primer can protect the metal underneath if the primer is not disturbed (read: sanded). Once you sand it, it is much easier for moisture to get in. I don't know if that's true, but I will be leaving the car un-sanded in primer since I can't get paint on it, so we'll find out. For now, everything except the main shell is in the garage. The shell is sitting under a car port. So, it is semi-outside, but out of direct weather and (extremely limited seasonal) sunshine.

Thanks, as always, for following along. Once the Zed body parts were moved out of the car port, I moved Hapy in, so I expect to be returning to Hapy work in the next few posts.