where to find the best tool chests? any particular brands I should avoid? I'm looking for something like picrel but with 8-10 equally deep drawers and make it taller, like 5-5½ feet tall
good tool chests
where to find the best tool chests? any particular brands I should avoid? I'm looking for something like picrel but with 8-10 equally deep drawers and make it taller, like 5-5½ feet tall
Lowe’s and Home Depot will both have some Kobalt and Husky on sale for a few more weeks with the holidays. Those are pretty solid. Lowe’s has Craftsman too, there’s an ok mid grade (2000), and then more of a pro grade (3000), plus a cheap Craftsman 1000 series that is dogshit. That box you posted is just the bottom section though, 8-10 drawers will require the top as well.
Harbor Freight has US General, they tend to be deeper than the other brands but often a couple less drawers, like the Ironton you posted is a cheap Northern Tool budget box, it’s probably a ~28” L box and maybe 16”-18” deep, while the US General will be 22” deep, however those super deep drawers can be a little sketchy with a lot of weight in them. US General quality is on par with the Husky boxes at Home Depot and the Kobalt and Craftsman 2000 series at Lowe’s. I think Northern Tool has those cheap Ironton boxes like you posted and I believe Strongway for their mid range stuff in stores now.
There’s a handful you could order online. I always liked Homak boxes. The Milwaukee boxes aren’t too bad. The prices go way up as you get thicker gauge steel and locking drawers and better drawer slides with a higher weight capacity,
They all have a similar mechanic focused configuration though. If you want all even drawers, you might be getting into custom territory, which I’m sure you could have made if you’re willing to pay. Or get two bottom chests like your pic and stack them on top of eachother with some modification. There’s machinist boxes with even drawers, but they’re normally shallow drawers for a ton of small bits.
Us general stuff is hard to beat for the price...
It’s not as cheap as it was.
I saw some dirt cheap Husky sales over the past month or so, I almost snagged a 36”, they had the top and bottom for either $499 or $599 in-store, that’s like $400 off regular price.
Pretty sure some places you can still get series 2 cabinets on clearance. Or buy it from someone used... I picked up a US general series two end cabinet for $75 last week. Really quite heavy for it's size.
Here’s a Lista that is closer to your description but I think these have drawer dividers in every drawer.
>$3700
>3700$
but "muh drawer feels" makes it justified to tooltards
just had to look it up this comes with dividers, without dividers it would cost 2300€ in germany.
a company can deduct tax so for them without taxes 1800€ and maybe some discount for buying 500 cabinets.
but lets be fair lista is just top notch quality with a drawer holding 440lbs, there going to last 50 years or longer.
my old workplace bought the cheap in house brand from the tool suplier, holy shit these were bad, locking themself, bending jamming, the lock falling off inside.
Lista stuff is good, if you’re ever in an industrial area and you see one sitting in the scrap pile nab it. Like the best kept secret in the trades
They have some custom shit too, we have cat50 tool holders off them
I bought the deep Husky work bench for $300 on sale last spring. It's great for the money and has a nice work top
Techie techie, pay the pricy.
Rolling chests are handy for NASCAR trailers but other than that, if all you want is to store your tools for cheap, check out uline.
Rolling everything is handy for easy shop reconfig and preparation for when you get old and broken in your thirties and cannot easily move heavy objects. I do like the Air Force and all my boxes and equipment roll either with attached serious casters or removable dollies. Life is now super comfy and when I add equipment I just winch the rest where I want it.
>old and broken in your thirties
speak for yourself
I want one of these to use as a dresser. I might take the handle off, might keep it and drape a towel on it. Put a nice slab of finished cedar on top. Drawers would probably glide for decades since they're rated for like 80-100 lbs and some clothes would be like 10-15 lbs max. Not sure what ladies would say when I bring them over though lol
>I want one of these to use as a dresser.
Cover it with hentai pictures that indicate what is in each drawer.
I'm not a fricking weeb
you're so negative, I bet you're a terrible person to be around. I don't much care how the drawers *feel*, I just need them to function. if I get functional drawers I can keep them working well for the rest of my life. if you're really obsessed with how it feels just buy better drawer slides and install them yourself, you'd save hundreds of dollars. as for a single shirt in each thin drawer, they're about 5 inches deep, or about half as deep as your mom likes it up her butt, so there's ample space for some socks and underwear and swim trunks. I have two walk in closets so I hang all my shirts and pants, I don't fold them.
>Drawers would probably glide for decades since they're rated for like 80-100 lbs
Here's the thing that makes me think you frickers have never used a nice tool cabinet. Price, poundage, configuration don't mean fricking DICK. The guy whining about not being able to roll it is as moronic as the rest. There is one thing you need to focus on for a nice chest and that's the drawers. How do they feel? Do they *actually* glide or do they just support the weight? Do they have a nice soft set push in? Are the latches smooth and natural to release the drawers? You homosexuals act like they're all just colored drawers and bragging rights but not one single person has gotten to what really matters in this thread.
>I want one of these to use as a dresser.
enjoy your single shirt in each thin drawer and try not to think about why chests and dressers were always made with cedar once upon a time.
The biggest difference between husky and snap on is feel.
I have a husky one from 2006 with the chrome wheels before they built the boxes down to price. And started making them a little cheaper
The main difference between that and snap on is the feel.
So when you open my husky box you can feel the ball bearings rolling on the slides and can hear the thunk of the secondary slide
The when you close it you hear thunk think crash
On a snap on it like glides more, more of a hmmmm sound when it opens then when you slam it shut it’s got the soft close so it’s a soft hiss rather than a slam
Personally I think the snap on boxes are really really nice but not $35.000 nice
I’m in the trades to make money not collect tools and debt
The thing most people start doing once they’re deep in the trades is they just buy more and more tools to do harder and harder jobs but take home less and less.
It’s great that you invested 150k in tools and tool boxes for your bosses business but do you own any profit sharing?
Nah you don’t your boss pays you hourly and b***hes when you use one of your vacation days right?
Nice business partner after you invested 150k into HIS business huh?
Also, if you have $150k in snap-on tools at your bosses business… quit tomorrow then comeback Tuesday for your tools and see how hard it will be to get them.
See if any of it disappears with your coworkers around
That’s why I’m in the keep as little as possible at work crowd
>The biggest difference between husky and snap on is feel.
And the metal gauge
And the durability
And the casters
And the slides
And the warranty
And the build quality
And the ability to resell it
And the ability to transport it loaded without it bucking on you
I think gauge is the same, but the quality of alloy used might be different. And the snap-on boxes for sure when looking my coworkers and my husky. The snap-ons have more spot welds and reinforcement
Also done better too, good spot welds vs mine that looks like whoever did them didn’t really care
But it’s a box that holds tools for an underpaying job cmon man we don’t need tier 1 shit
And the snap-on boxes don’t command as high as a resell as you’d like to think you lose like 80%
cheap boxes are dangerous, i have a shitty sunex one and it's pretty loaded down and I regret not getting a pro box or semi pro one atleast
it's easy to say well ackshully it just holds tools but having what is basically your private island in a professional setting used everyday be shit fricking sucks
I’d rather have a shit private island and go to a home I own instead of rent and have a nice tool box in a shop my boss owns and will try to likely steal when my employment comes to an end
as if a professional box is going to be the difference between renting and owning a home
and dont work in a sketchy place? literally all avoidable things
honestly, US General from Harbor Freight are great boxes. Their high end ones, I mean. I've got a bottom and top 56" unit and its great. would highly recommend giving them a serious look.
pic isnt mine, but is the same set i have.
Which one?
For what specific tools? If sockets and wrenches and similar, right side. If need to secure stuff like cordless tools etc in the top, left. Eventually, both as they serve different complementary use cases.
Mechanic specific tools
Yeah, right now I'm using an old US General 4 drawer cart and I can't use the top for shit.
If you’re thinking about getting the one on the left so you can use the top as a work surface, disregard that completely. I founf that out with the tool carts. Most people keep their sockets and most used tools in the top compartment, so whenever you try to use the top as a work surface, you have to move the workpiece every fricking 3 minutes and it just doesn’t happen.
^Wisdom. Have separate carts for carting stuff. Carts are wonderful so I collect them.
If I ever bought another cart, I would be willing to try something like picrel with the sliding top so I could get into the top compartment without moving everythi g off the lid.
Also I’m not sure about that new HF cart that anon posted, but with the 4-5 drawer carts, closing the lid locks the drawers, so you need to clear the top and open the lid if you want to get a tool from one of the lower drawers, super annoying when you have parts sitting on the top.
>something like picrel
>closing the lid locks the drawers,
This is like a 2 minute fix to to remove the locking bar.
And then you risk the drawers flying open when you move it around because they don’t lock.
And back to the original problem, still can’t have a blow molded case of whatever sitting on top and grab a socket from the top compartment at the same time, which sort of pissed me off when I first started to use the thing.
Thought about the end table thing they sell, but I have pry bars and picks and shit on magnetic strips on one side, and the handle plus mag parts trays on the other side so it would never fold down properly.
>And then you risk the drawers flying open when you move it around because they don’t lock.
The military method is more convenient. Fab two tabs, then drop flat or round bar through them.
For casual use a cargo strap solves all.
The cheap ass $200 Craftsman boxes had something like that. Or some other Chinesium ~26” box, a bar that slides down across the front of the drawers and you can put a padlock on the thing.
Man I need me a bigger box, that friggin Milwaukee or Husky or even USG 44”-46” top and bottom. My bench and the shelves and walls in my garage are filling up with stuff that should be in a box but mine are overflowing. Automotive work and random homeowner stuff adds up quick and I want me some long drawers that can fit 24”+ pry bars and breaker bars easily. And more deep drawers for power tools.
Problem is you get a new box and fill it up with more new shit fast.
>And then you risk the drawers flying open when you move it around because they don’t lock.
One of them I've done it to have the side latch on the drawer still. It's latched closed, just not locked. The other one has catches at the end of the slides that hold the drawers firmly closed while wheeling it around. I hardly ever fold the top down on that one.
I did get some folding shelf brackets off of Temu to slap on one of my tool carts so I can have a side shelf for holding more shit. I really don't work on top of my tool cart though because I have benches for that.
https://www.temu.com/folding-shelf-brackets-2-packs-heavy-duty-triangle-shelf-bracket-for-bench-table-wall-mounted-standing-shelf-brackets-for-saving--g-601099528956175.html
There is a link to some of those folding shelf brackets. There's a ton of different sizes and prices. Can probably find them on amazon and e-bay too.
What I do is balance everything on the top then snake my arm into the top. I have marks on my arm from doing that so much, but it works.