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As my Papa would say
"You buy a quality item, at a greater price, you are only pissed off about it, once"

I looked at my Wal-Mart special and it is the same design, but with a much neater weld. It is rated at 2 tons. I will show those pictures to a certified welder.

Sometimes Wal-Mart does do well. I bought a heavy duty oil filter wrench that out performs one I bought off a tool truck which was breaking into pieces. At the plant they wrench those filters on without oil and they are terrible to get off. I needed a jack stand without any hydrocarbon exposure so I bought the Wal-Mart special.

I agree that China is very successful at exploiting greed. Their military stole my security clearance file. One of the counter arguments as regards the Vietnam war is that China secretly murdered 5 million people in the name of improving their society. The USA never talked about that because it would reveal intelligence penetration. So the capitalist industrial system has signed a pact with the devil. As far as China is concerned they are exploiting capitalist pigs.

Here is a picture of 3 ton rated stands from Snap On. I wonder where they came from?

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I have an old cast iron locomotive piston that I used on my Dodge, but it doesn't work well on the new stuff.

It might be old news, but I just saw on the internet that the jack stands with the weld issue have been recalled.

dp

I'm with portlandon. Our jack stands of choice have always been 4x4's. I have bought jack stands but I still use the 4x4's along with them as I trust the lumber more than the stands.

It is not particularly funny but USA Today reported yesterday that the replacement jack stands offered by Harbor Freight for the 3 ton units found to be defective due to bad welds.....are also defective.
The press release suggests not using either the old or new and returning them for refund or credit.
I have some old American made Jack stands that I purchased at auctions at old car dealerships or repair shops that I use but if I plan on raising the car enough to sit under it( do not have a lift) I always use wood cribbing.

When companies like Wagner and GE move manufacturing to China It is hard to get angry with Harbor Freight for offering junk. Trying to find a car part produced in this country is getting more difficult. At least Harbor Freight merchandise is offered without the illusion that you are getting a quality product and it is reflected in the price. I now check every bulb installed in the dash before installation because I learned that while the brand name looks familiar , the quality is not. Easier to check the bulb than to learn that it is not a fuse or bad wire or ground that is keeping the light from working....just another Mexican or Chinese product carrying a familiar American brand name.
No sense to rant about it....just hope that the wheel cylinder or other item that you depend on for your safety was not produced or inspected by the same outfit that produced the Harbor Freight jack stands.

Here's the letter I got from Harbor Freight:

HARBOR FREIGHT
To the Harbor Freight Community:

I'm writing to apologize. I often reach out to tell you about Harbor Freight's commitment to quality and all the investments we've made to deliver quality tools at the lowest prices. Your trust matters deeply to me and I'm proud of how far we've come. So when we have a product recall, it hurts.

A few months ago, we recalled our Pittsburgh 3 ton and 6 ton steel jack stands (SKUs 56371, 61196 and 61197) due to a manufacturer's defect. We asked customers to return them and receive a gift card that could be used to purchase replacement jack stands. I felt terrible about that recall because you should never have a concern about the safety of any of our products.

Today, I feel even worse. I'm disappointed and embarrassed because we've identified a welding defect in a small number of the Pittsburgh 3 ton steel jack stands (SKU 56373) that replaced the recalled jack stands. We're now adding these jack stands to our recall. Unfortunately, this defect wasn't discovered during the initial recall investigation. If you own these jack stands or any of the jack stands in our original recall, whether or not you have had an issue with them, please stop using them immediately and bring them back to your local Harbor Freight Store for a full cash refund or store credit (see details here).

We have investigated all of our other Pittsburgh 3 ton steel jack stands (SKUs 56371, 56372 and 57308) as well as the Pittsburgh 6 ton steel jack stands (SKUs 56368, 56369 and 56370) and Pittsburgh 12 ton steel jack stands (SKUs 56374 and 56375) and did not find the defect. Although none of these other jack stands are being recalled, if you own any of them and have any concern whatsoever, please bring them back and we'll give you a full cash refund or store credit for those as well.

I want to apologize to all of our customers. While we've dramatically grown our team of engineers and inspectors, and intensified our tests and inspections, I assure you that the lessons learned from this will drive further improvement.

As the owner and founder of Harbor Freight, I want you to know that we stand behind every product we sell and that safety will always be our top priority.

Sincerely,

Eric Smidt
Owner and Founder
Harbor Freight Tools

Wes

This is one of the reasons, during all the times I was under the Clipper working on it when I had the car up on jack stands, I always had a backup jack stand positioned right next to me to catch the load before my body did. A little extra insurance. So if the car was on two jack stands, I had a 3rd right next to me. If the car was on four, then I had a 5th right next to me. Also always tried to use jack stands that were completely overkill rated. So I generally was using 6 ton ones.