rockauto... I think I'm sold

I order parts ahead and usually save half of what locals want for house brand parts.
Agreed. I sometimes stock up on essentials, like air and cabin air filters, light bulbs, etc. I do cross-check with Amazon--I ended up cancelling a larger item off of a Rock Auto order because they had the same part, same brand, cheaper at Amazon, with free shipping on top of it.

I am careful, however, to stick to known name brands. I stay away from parts that have the dodgy names I've never heard of, as well as "Economy" grade parts.

They have added automotive tools over the years as well. Prices seem competitive.

I learned the hard way, though--buy taps from Production Tool. ;)

I was in Pep Boys and had bought a tap to get out a busted bolt. Drilled it no problem. The tap was garbage. I fought with it for two hours, and just could not get it started in the hole. I was thinking any number of problems with the hole I had drilled. Even tried every variation of oil or solvent as a cutting fluid. Nothing worked.

Next morning, went to Production Tool on Groesbeck. Picked up the right size tap (which didn't cost much more than the Pep Boys crap apparently made out of chinesium), put a drop of oil on it, and had that hole tapped within a minute--it was even their "economy" tap. It cut through the metal like butter...like every other good tap I've ever used in my life. I've since had my buddy who works at [the mail order industrial supply company that mails out the huge yellow catalog with green letters] get me a couple of taps for common bolt sizes in the car, as they cost maybe a third of retail price, or less, with his employee discount.

Now I'm gun shy to buy tools anywhere. The last small set of drills I bought last year just to have around the house? This past Saturday, I drilled a hole in a metal tube with one of the bits, which was brand new. It bent the first time I used it!! Got it from Homey Depot, and it was a name brand! I've drilled literally tens of thousands of holes in metals, even in hardened steel, and never had one bend! The others dulled really quick. I think I drilled four holes in a wet plaster wall here, and now that drill bit is done; I've got older bits which I drilled dozens of holes in wet plaster with that are still sharper than this new one! Must be made of that same chinesium metal... :rolleyes:
 
or anywhere that sells Greenfield or other good quality ones. Poor quality taps are just horrible, and they *suck* to try and get out once you snap it off.
I've done the broken tap thing more than a few times. We used to have some tap extractors on hand, but most of the time, the fingers on the extractor were nowhere near strong enough and wouldn't move the tap at all. So we would end up having to scrap a part because of it. And it usually happened when we were in a rush--turn the handle a little bit off to the side, the tap catches on the metal, and *snap*! :mad: It usually broke off too deep to get a grip on it with Vise Grips. I couldn't imagine breaking one that was in something mounted to a car, that wasn't replaceable (like, the suspension parts).

We used to install threaded grease fittings in parts we shipped out (6-40 and 10-32 threads), but ended up going with the 1/8" hammer-in fittings after a couple of years.
 
yeah, tap extractors turn into a candy cane most of the time. I think they're more of a feel-good sort of thing than a truly useful tool. Maybe on big taps, useless on little ones though.

depending what the part is, you might be able to heat it up enough to anneal the tap, though this won't work if the heat will kill other parts in the process. Once in a while I've been able to use a punch to shatter the tap and pick out pieces but that doesn't always work either.
 
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