The Husky Tool Box: Home Depot’s Own Brand Is Surprisingly Decent
Is a Home Depot tool box any good? That’s not the right question to ask. Home Depot is just a retailer, and they carry a lot of different brands. You could go to Home Depot and buy a DeWalt tool box. Home Depot will sell you a Stanley tool box. Home Depot will sell you a Milwaukee tool box. They aren’t identical, nor is their quality.
But what most people mean by “Is a Home Depot tool box any good?” is whether the Home Depot Husky tool box is any good. Husky is Home Depot’s own-brand, and while they carry a lot of others, you can always find a Husky tool box at Home Depot.
The Husky tool box Home Depot offers is pretty decent for a budget line, as well. They are not a top-of-the-line brand by any means, but they never pretended to be. What a Home Depot Husky tool box offers is mid-market quality and features (for the most part) at a truly budget price.
Home Depot Husky Tool Boxes Come In 3 Basic Types:
Home Depot Plastic Tool Box
Of the three, these fall right about average in quality. They typify the Husky tool box Home Depot spirit very well. They are, first and foremost, really inexpensive. I’m not saying you can’t get a cheaper plastic tool box drop-shipped to you from Malaysia or something. But I am saying that if you are in the market for a $10 plastic tool box, you’ll be surprised at the quality the Husky options offer.
A Home Depot plastic tool box will be small, light, and reasonably sturdy for its price. Make no mistake, these are not for carrying heavy or expensive tools, nor are they for heavy use on an actual worksite. But if all you need is to keep the normal household screwdrivers, wrenches, and hammers organized and in one place, you can’t really go wrong with a Home Depot tool box.
Home Depot Rolling Tool Box
This is where you’ll find the Husky tool box on wheels, which takes pride of place at the in-store displays. These look like professional mechanic’s tool chests or combination cabinets. They work like them, too. Up to a point.
These are perfect for home use, really. If you need something that looks nice in the garage or shed-workshop, keeps your tools organized and actually locks, then this is fine. The quality is not top-notch, but it is solidly middle-of-the-road.
A professional might have 300 pounds of expensive tools in his bottom drawer, and 20 pounds of attachments or other fiddly things in the one above it. A Home Depot Husky tool box isn’t built for that. The steel isn’t thick enough, and its drawer slides aren’t robust enough. If you open and close the same drawer 200 times a day, it is not going to work right in 10 years, let alone 20. But for puttering around on the weekend or fixing the odd broken chair, it is perfect.
Home Depot Husky Truck Tool Box
There is a line of own-brand Home Depot truck tool box . It is not very good. But that can be misleading. A Home Depot Husky truck tool box isn’t assembled with any less skill than a Home Depot rigid tool box for the garage. It isn’t particularly weak or fragile compared to other bottom-of-the-market truck boxes. It’s not bad for what it is . The real issue with a Home Depot Husky truck tool box is that you really shouldn’t be using a bottom of the market truck box at all.
It all comes down to security. A Home Depot Husky truck tool box is very inexpensive, so it has to be made cheap. It is mostly aluminum (not steel), and pretty thin aluminum at that. The lock and its hasp might be steel, but when you can just bend the lid away from the hasp with a screwdriver and a minute or 2 of effort, the lock is little more than a polite request not to open the box.
Bottom line, these are not secure, they are not durable enough to use on the worksite, and you can’t trust the weatherproofing because the lid can bend. You should pay more for something better, or do without.
The Home Depot Mechanic Tool Box: The Good
The quality of the Home Depot Husky tool box line for the mechanic or technician is actually higher than their reputation would suggest. Husky’s rolling tool cabinets, top boxes and work stations can arguably be called a mid-market line. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend some of their higher end pieces to very young professionals or amateurs who actually get a lot of use out of their tools.
The Home Depot Husky Tool Box: The Bad
Now, we’ve been fair, and complemented Home Depot Husky tool box quality where compliments were due. However, there are a few things that really hold the line back, and keep it “at the top of the bottom” rather than a solid middle-of-the-pack option.
Their hand-portable tool boxes are fine for home use, but no more than that. Even then, don’t expect them to last 10 years. The plastic is too thin and not strong enough to take these onto the worksite, and even their few steel hand tool boxes are too feature-poor to win a professional over.
A Home Depot rolling tool box, good as it is for the price, has similar drawbacks. The steel on most models is too thin for professional garage use. It dents easily, and it just isn’t built to last decades like professional grade equipment. The drawers can’t hold the amount of weight they would need in a commercial shop, and the sliders can’t stand up to constant use.
The Home Depot truck tool box line is the worst of both worlds. They don’t offer the security you need. They don’t have the resilience to get banged around a work site without denting, and you really shouldn’t try to stand on them, diamond plate finish or not. They are priced appropriately for their quality and they look nice, at first. However, they won’t look good for long, and we can’t imagine many users not being disappointed.
All that considered, you won’t be surprised to learn that Home Depot Husky tool boxes have very minimal warranties. They are not the kind of “forever tool box ” a mechanic or other professional hopes to be able to afford (or pay off, anyway).
A Detailed Look At A Few Home Depot Tool Box Products
Home Depot Tool Box Organizer
This is an optional extra for the Husky connect 22-inch pit box set. You could use it on its own, but the connectivity is really the point. This set was intended to compete with similar organizers in the DeWalt Tough System or the Rigid Pro Gear ranges. It is a great way to keep many small tools or fasteners organized and hand-portable.
The Husky Connect set that this organizer attaches to consists of a very small 2-wheel cart, basically a 22-inch tool chest which you can move around like luggage. On top of that is a smaller 22-inch tool box, and then the 2-drawer parts organizer. You can then attach the top-opening small parts organizer that came with the set. Alternatively, Husky Connect makes a cantilever tool box that works even better at the top.
Home Depot 72 Inch Tool Box
This stainless-steel topped Home Depot Husky rolling tool box will look nice in your garage or home workshop, and gives you all the tool storage most home users could ever need. It is good quality for what it is, just don’t mistake it for a piece of professional grade gear.
You’d assume a Home Depot workbench tool box like this would come with some premium features, and you’d be right. You can buy the same model with a polyurethane-coated wooden top, but the stainless is not only more damage-resistant, it is easier to clean. We also like that the piece is 24 inches deep rather than 18 inches. This makes it large enough to become an actual work surface. Some users get an 18-inch top box to go on top, and enjoy the tiered effect. In my opinion, though, a 6-inch lip is just wide enough to be annoying when you realize you’ve piled stuff up in front of the drawer you need to open.
Home Depot 52 Inch Tool Box
The 9-drawer Home Depot rolling tool box is actually not a bad choice for home shop owners, weekend mechanics, and anyone who needs to organize and store a growing tool collection. It is a solid example of a Home Depot Mechanic tool box, if such a thing can exist.
It is made of 18-gauge steel, a literal cut above the other Home Depot Husky tool boxes we’re looking at today. The nine drawers add up to a little over 22,000 cubic inches of storage, and each of the drawers are rated at 120 pounds, a good 20% more than most Home Depot Husky tool boxes of the same scale.
The casters are the same quality we expect from Husky, and are well up to holding the possible 2,500 pounds of the unit (and a potential top box) full of tools.
Home Depot 40 Inch Tool Box
This 40-inch Home Depot Husky tool box offers 10 drawers of tool or equipment storage in a very small footprint. Both the top chest and bottom rolling cabinet are 18 inches deep by 4 wide, and the top hatch on the top box is set at a very convenient height. The drawers are small, though, and only rated at 50 pounds each (for the top 9) and 100 pounds for the 4-slider double size bottom drawer.
The caster situation is just about what you would expect from a Home Depot Husky tool box of this size, which is actually quite good.
The main thing for this little rolling tool chest is the price. I’ve seen this offered for substantially less than $200 on occasion. Not bad for a tool box set that would make any crafter, tinkerer, or back-yard mechanic proud.
Home Depot Truck Tool Box
The Home Depot Husky truck tool box is part of a line of truck bed tool box Home Depot makes and sells both in store and online. Sometimes sold as a Home Depot rigid tool box, that is a bit of a misnomer. It isn’t a soft-sided tool pouch or anything, but it is made of a very thin aluminum, and easily dented.
This is the example of everything we said about Home Depot truck tool boxes as a class, earlier. Insecure, indifferently weatherproofed, and more of an invitation to thieves than a deterrent. That said, it does look solid from a distance, and it’s a fine place to keep the groceries in a small-cab pickup.
The DECKED Tool Box – An Upgrade To The Home Depot Truck Tool Box In Every Way
It is hard to even call this an upgrade to the Husky-branded Home Depot truck tool box. They’re not even in the same class. The DECKED Tool Box is better in just about every measurable way. Not only is it made domestically, it uses a steel-reinforced high impact polymer to deliver long lasting, durable strength. It overcomes a lot of the drawbacks you might have thought were inherent to the saddle style tool box, as well.
The DECKED Tool Box can be equipped with an optional fold-away ladder which makes your tools or other gear a snap to access, even if it is mounted on one of any of the largest trucks on the market today. In terms of security, it can’t be beat. The lock and its receiver are literally armored in steel, and the only way into a DECKED Tool Box without the key would be power tools. Don’t worry, we sell replacement keys.
So, Are Home Depot tool boxes any good? Depends on which one you buy. Are DECKED tool boxes any good? Yes. Always.
ALL PRODUCTS VEHICLE SELECTOR POPUP
