Harbor Freight recently launched a new Icon combination wiring tool (model PWCC-9, SKU 70400), that they say compares against the Snap-on PWCS9ACF for less than a fraction of the price.
The new Harbor Freight Icon tool is a 9-inch long nose wire stripper, wire cutter, and terminal crimper.
It can strip 8-16 AWG solid and 10-20 AWG stranded wire.
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Straight pliers jaws allow for gripping and pilling wires.
There’s also a machine screw shear for trimming 6-32 and 8-32 screws down to size, and two wire looping holes.
The crimping jaws can be used on insulated and non-insulated connectors and terminals.
The handles are covered with red non-slip cushion grips.
Price: $33
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Andrew
The knipex wire strippers would be hard to top, and it’s all about their metal.
Just in regular use many stippers fail to keep a decent edge, and even after torture tests the knipex edges stay clean for cutting.
They are double the price of the HF tool, but if the HF metal doesn’t hold up then it’s buy once cry once.
MM
I’m actually surprised these cost as much as they do. $33 for stamped sheetmetal construction? No thank you. Hard pass, in fact. My preference is also Knipex, yes they cost more but they are so much better. It’s not just the edge retention, the Knipex have better grips, the forged construction feels much more solid in your hand and has better strength for gripping and crimping.
On a budget? USA-made forged ones from Milwaukee are actually cheaper.
Jared
I concur. I’ve never had stamped metal pliers I like. I appreciate they COULD be fine, but experience gives me a bias.
Also, though Andrew might be right about Knipex steel being superior , Outdoors55 on Youtube did a very interesting analysis on why these pliers tend to perform so poorly. His efforts included changing the cutting angle and actually re-heat treating a pair of pliers to radically improve performance.
I found it very interesting and it made a lot of sense. I’m inclined to believe that it might not be a materials problem per se – but a heat treatment/geometry problem.
NoahG
I crimp terminals frequently enough that I have never been pleased by the leverage offered by these designs. You need some real gorilla grip strength to get a proper crimp with the dies before the pivot point.
TomD
These designs have never worked well for me either as stripper or crimpers – the jaws always see to leverage apart a bit and crimping is literally painful.
I prefer the strippers with much more meat on the jaws.
MM
Yeah, they’re terrible. Even if you have gorilla hands you still can’t use these very effectively because the relatively thin metal construction flexes so easily and the handles are uncomfortable.
They’re passable for infrequent use for low-force applications, like say cutting telephone or Cat5 cable, stripping the smaller sizes of automotive wire, etc. But even then their ergonomics are still crap, the only reason to buy something like that IMHO would be if you were a hobbyist or had an emergency situation where just needs to use it once or twice and you can’t justify spending a lot of money. Then the cheapo ones that cost just a few bucks might make sense. But if you’re a professional or you’re going to be using it a lot for your hobby then get forged ones.
ebt
I have an old pair of Klein strippers (yellow dipped handles $12) that are stamped but have a spring. Small enough for my pouch-bag. Easy to find (only yellow handle I have). Also have Knipex 13 72 8 Forged 8″ wire stripper that blows this HF model away. Think I had a coupon for less than $55 from TooLNut but they are like $60 now.
Billy
The Snap-on version wasn’t that good – I suspect the knockoffs won’t be better.