I like HFT because they sell stuff reasonably and are conveniently-located. Yes, sometimes their stuff doesn't have the best tooling, but often enough their equipment gets the job done, at a reasonable price.
An example: we did a whole house remodel. The GC got bids to demo two existing baths, $1,000 apiece. I wnt to HFT & bought an electric SDS-Max bit demo hammer, and went to work. I stripped both down to the block waals, or studs, including the tile floors to the floor joists, and rebuilt the floor joists under a wet wall where the replacement of them was required. Then I sheathed the floors, and let the GC finish. I don't recall the exact price of the demo hammer, I think it was $100 on sale, and I bought a set of drill bits, and I broke a wide chisel tip, so I had the wife go to HD & get a SDS-Max Bosch replacement. So let's say, another $75 in bits.
So, about a $200 investment. HD sells Dewalt and Bosch at a $400 price point, call it nearly $500 w/the SDS-Max bits I got. Twice the price. For the amoult of use I'm going to need this tool for, the HFT was economical and it performed w/no functional issues that would have kept me from using it again, or to complete the job. I did look at online comments, and they were correct in the things they mentioned, in the use of the tool, but as I said, nothing that made it unusable. Would I rather have the Dewalt or Bosch? Sure, but I didn't need it, and the tool paid for itself, and I've already used it again to demo a slab for a plumbing pipe repair.
Another example: I have a WW II-era Delta benchtop drill press DP220, that I had wrung-off the hex bolt which is the belt adjustment mechanism, on one side, it has two hex bolts clamping down on the motor bracket support tubes into the DP head. I tried grabbing what was left exposed, not enough to get a grip to remove. I tried using my Dremel to cut a slot in the stub, and first used a slotted screwdriver,no-go, and then a hand impact driver, still no-go. I went to HFT, bought a set of left-handed drill bits, 20% off made it $6. I came home, about 15 min. w/the left-handed drills, an easy-out from my Craftsman tap & die set I bought new 39 years ago, and that recalcitrant broken-off stub came right-out. I got a grade 5 replacement 5/16 x 18 tpi x 3/4" pair of replacement hex bolts at HD, provided tension to snug the belts, but not tight, and the DP is back in operation. I them took it to my local Habitat for Humanity, where I sold it to the floor manager, a Hatian, who is sending back to the island all he can scrounge to set-up people in business there. So another example of a HFT investment of $6 allowing me to restore functionality to a tool that was built during the Battle of the Bulge, according to the foundry date (11-8-1944) I found on the bottom of the work table, and the serial # date, of 1944. Now this piece will probably live to serve in another country for many more years. Another HFT tool success.
The cheapest left-handed set Grainger's sells is $261, a Chicago-Latrobe set, 15 pieces. Better quality? Yes, I'm sure. But the set costs more than the drill press is worth. Could I have bought several bits instead of the entire set? Yes, but I didn't even try to see if Grainger's had them in-stock, because I'd recently this past week been in HFT, and saw a set there, and said, "I should get them, for when I need them." Also HFT is closer to me than Grainger's. Anyway, another example where HFT filled the bill.
Now, I know your sentiment was made as a generalization about the offshore nature of their tools as 'offshore Chicom junk,' but for me they allowed me to do repairs that needed to be done, at reasonable cost, with tools that will continue to work far-beyond my immediate specific need for them, at the time I purchased them. Yes, they will continue to 'collect dust' until I need them again, and I expect they will get the job done, reasonably.
Everything they sell is a damned dust-collector to me.
