LN47ACF (With Follow Up)

[SamAdams]

Brand new pliers, aquired through the Snap-on website. Gonna go out on a limb and say this isn't the way it's supposed to be? On the widest setting, the tips seem to align. Is this normal for these pliers? Sorry if this seems like a stupid question.

 

[kbuhagiar]

Is this normal for these pliers?

It's not normal for ANY pliers.

 

[SamAdams]

It's not normal for ANY pliers.

Yeah, I guess I know that but since it's a three position plier I thought maybe the geometry was such that they had to make a choice as to what position the jaws should align. Making a call to customer service.
Thanks.

 

[AJHD]

There have been a few threads about this issue before. Here is one of them...

Snap-on LN46ACF jaw slop – try to exchange?

i have no warranty experience with SO and don't know a truck. thankfully, this was a very recent online purchase direct from SO, but idk what to expect. due to the absurd $250 free shipping thing, i've had my hands on 2x LN46ACF (7") and 4x LN47ACF (9"). gave some as gifts. anyway, this 7" has...

www.garagejournal.com

 

[M635_Guy]

My (new) '47 pair is slightly snaggle-toothed but doesn't have an overbite.


I got a '46 with the pair above, and had one from when they first came out, and they're both perfect. I'd have an issue with the overbite, but I don't really care about the snaggletooth. Just now was the first time I checked any of them.

 

[neophyte]

Brand new pliers, aquired through the Snap-on website. Gonna go out on a limb and say this isn't the way it's supposed to be? On the widest setting, the tips seem to align. Is this normal for these pliers? Sorry if this seems like a stupid question.

This pair has way better alignment than the last thread on this topic, were the misalignment was to the side.

 

[BrandonV]

QC on SO pliers seems pretty hit or miss these days. Honestly I've had better luck with complete sets for some reason than the individual pliers.

 

[FigN⋅m]

Just spit-balling here, but any correlation at all with the "pat pending" versions vs. current production?
My PP 46's are spot on compared to what I've seen pics of, but that could be coincidental.

 

[M635_Guy]

Just spit-balling here, but any correlation at all with the "pat pending" versions vs. current production?
My PP 46's are spot on compared to what I've seen pics of, but that could be coincidental.

I'd guess it's just production sample variation. I hadn't noticed if they'd gone from "Pending" to a patent (my recently-acquired blue pairs still have "Pending" but could be older stock), but I kinda doubt they've tweaked/updated anything.

 

[Wrench97]

Do they align at the smallest setting were it would be set when using them for something that small?

 

[neophyte]

Most plier manufacturers touch up the plier tips on a grinder as one of the last manufacturing steps, so the tips match.
Sometimes this is good, sometimes it leads to tips that are not perpendicular, at least if the worker is careless, or a jig is set up wrong.
Snap-On seems not to do that with these pliers.
No clue why.

 

[mrjaw14]

Mine were misaligned like that. I didn’t figure they’d do anything and so I just filed them flat.

 

[2ndGearRubber]

I have a few of these pliers, they're all off a bit depending on what position they're in.

I tried to take a picture as zoomed in as yours, but my S22 won't focus that close with my silver work surface as a background.

 

[rlitman]

Mine were misaligned like that. I didn’t figure they’d do anything and so I just filed them flat.

OP says they're misaligned on the smallest setting, and aligned on the widest. So there's no way to file them to stay aligned, and it means that the slot was cut in the wrong position, and has nothing to do with tip correction.

 

[2ndGearRubber]

OP says they're misaligned on the smallest setting, and aligned on the widest. So there's no way to file them to stay aligned, and it means that the slot was cut in the wrong position, and has nothing to do with tip correction.

Wouldn't the error be multipled as we open the jaws to increasingly larger positons? It would be like a dial incidator at an angle, cosine error I believe its called?

The idea any pliers is going to look good zoomed on the tip, I don't think is fair. My knipex, Mac, snapon, channel lock, proto, tekton, they're all off if I squint at the end. That ignores the irregularly sized tips that aren't mirror images, one will always be smaller.

 

[rlitman]

Wouldn't the error be multipled as we open the jaws to increasingly larger positons? It would be like a dial incidator at an angle, cosine error I believe its called?...

You're imagining it right, but there appears to be both the slot misalignment AND an offset going on.

 

[Wamsutta]

Making a call to customer service.

What's the news; what they say?

 

[mrjaw14]

OP says they're misaligned on the smallest setting, and aligned on the widest. So there's no way to file them to stay aligned, and it means that the slot was cut in the wrong position, and has nothing to do with tip correction.

No, I mean exactly what I said. mine looked exactly like the OPs. Just another data point for the quality concern being discussed. What I did to fix/improve mine is irrelevant, but meant to provide something OP can do to make the tips more usable at the smallest setting, which as you pointed out is what the picture showed. Doubt it’s going to affect anything at the widest setting, but helped a bunch at the small setting.

 

[dcg1]

QC on SO pliers seems pretty hit or miss these days. Honestly I've had better luck with complete sets for some reason than the individual pliers.

I'm guessing you've got much more experience with SO pliers than me (my sample size is 11), but to add another data point - attached are a set of 97ACF from a PL600ES1RK set.

The rest of that set:
95ACF needle nose - good
85ACF diagonal cutters - good, perfect jaw alignment
87ACF diagonal cutters - slight jaw gap at the tip, can fully close with added pressure. Not what I'd consider ideal at SO prices, but perfectly usable and IMO it would be nitpicky to warranty
46ACF combination slip joint (the non-needle nose variant of OP's pliers) - good
47ACF combination slip joint - looser rivet that the 46; good amount of horizontal play in the jaws (much more than the HF Icon equivalent). Not sure if I'll try the vice trick mentioned in the thread AJHD linked above.

I do also have a pair of 388ACF high leverage diagonal cutters - those close fully at the tips not the base, and can't be fully closed with pressure. Haven't don't anything about these, but I do think more precision should be expected in a $73 pair of cutters.

All of the non-slip joints are stiff and taking a lot of work to loosen up, but that's another SO topic that's been beaten to death.

Most plier manufacturers touch up the plier tips on a grinder as one of the last manufacturing steps, so the tips match.
Sometimes this is good, sometimes it leads to tips that are not perpendicular, at least if the worker is careless, or a jig is set up wrong.
Snap-On seems not to do that with these pliers.
No clue why.

I can't wrap my head around this myself. Went and looked at needle nose pliers from Knipex, Channellock, Engineer, Tsunoda, Klein, Orbis, and Wiha - all tips align perfectly. To SO's credit, my experience with their warranty department was excellent - extremely responsive, friendly, and processed the warranty immediately.

 

[SamAdams]

Do they align at the smallest setting were it would be set when using them for something that small?

If you are asking me (the OP) then the answer is the pictures show it on the smallest setting.

 

[SamAdams]

What's the news; what they say?

They agreed it's not acceptable and that they will send a new one. They said they don't want the misaligned pliers back and to dispose of them.

 

[SamAdams]

Mine were misaligned like that. I didn’t figure they’d do anything and so I just filed them flat.

They are sending me a new pair, so we'll see.

 

[SamAdams]

Wouldn't the error be multipled as we open the jaws to increasingly larger positons? It would be like a dial incidator at an angle, cosine error I believe its called?

The idea any pliers is going to look good zoomed on the tip, I don't think is fair. My knipex, Mac, snapon, channel lock, proto, tekton, they're all off if I squint at the end. That ignores the irregularly sized tips that aren't mirror images, one will always be smaller.

Wouldn't the error be multipled as we open the jaws to increasingly larger positons? It would be like a dial incidator at an angle, cosine error I believe its called?

The idea any pliers is going to look good zoomed on the tip, I don't think is fair. My knipex, Mac, snapon, channel lock, proto, tekton, they're all off if I squint at the end. That ignores the irregularly sized tips that aren't mirror images, one will always be smaller.

 

[SamAdams]

Sorry, I don't know how I did the above (quoting with no reply) and can't figure out how to delete it.

 

[SamAdams]

Just got the replacement pliers and it seems they can make them correctly.

 

[L.Cheapo]

Glad they made it right. I have the 46s and they are perfect.

 

[2ndGearRubber]

I'm glad they took care of you. Defects happen, and they shouldn't get out, but in reality they do.

 

[cherrybomb]

I'm happy that customer service did their job.You can dispose of the old ones in my direction

 

[zktk01]

I have a pair they were the only ones that would grab this pull string in a cable I was re-terminating, I had tried some other pliers the knock offs wouldn't grab the pull string.