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Comment by kfajdsl | Hacker News Reader

My rule of thumb for tools is to always first buy the cheapo Harbor Freight special (I'll get something a little better for precision tools) and if that tool breaks then that means I use the tool enough to justify getting something better.

Spoiler alert: most of my tools are the cheapest I could find.

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I like the idea of this, and I'm sure you save a lot of money, but the downside is this: I want to do some one-off job I haven't done before. It'll be difficult, because I will be trying it for the first time. Do I really want to make it even _more_ difficult by cheaping out on tools? I've done this several times, and I've ended up doing several jobs over again with better tools after I've screwed up the first time.

Edit: In other words, cheap tools aren't just less durable, they often do a worse job (or at least make it harder to do a good job).

You would want to start with cheapest thing cause usually you don't know how good things you actually need.

Using cheep tools gives you a freedom to experiment and know the limitations of the domain area and then invest in things that you exactly need without the risk of overpaying or underpaying, all for a minimum investment.

I initially wanted to do the same (needed a drill and a jigsaw for my project, never used them before), but then decided to go with the cheapest Makita which was ~2.5 times more expensive than the cheapest brand, for one reason: safety. For example, the Makita jigsaw had an electric brake (which stops the saw immediately as you release the trigger), while the cheapest tool didn't. Since I didn't have any experience with it, I'd rather not cut my fingers than save some money.

That's a good one and this is what I mostly do.

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