5 Discontinued Harbor Freight Products We're Probably Never Getting Back

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Harbor Freight sells a wide range of tools and supplies, from hand and power tools to tarps and storage solutions. This selection, coupled with the store's reputation for discount prices, makes it an excellent place to gear up for your next project without breaking the bank. One of the ways that the company has managed to amass such a broad catalog is by constantly releasing new products and expanding the offerings from tool brands you might not know Harbor Freight owns. Those who subscribe to the company's emails will be intimately familiar with its New Product Alert messages, which seem to be a weekly occurrence. Harbor Freight doesn't just add products to its stores, however. It also takes them away.

Sometimes a product is just removed from the store temporarily. Maybe a popular item sells out, or supply chain issues prevent Harbor Freight from being able to keep it in stock, but sometimes the removal is permanent. The company will pull tools from its product lines when there's something wrong with them, when they don't sell well, or when a newer and more powerful model replaces them. There are even times when Harbor Freight might choose to phase out an entire brand as technologies grow and market demands shift. There isn't usually much fanfare when this happens. You might just go back to grab something from your local store one day and find that it's no longer there. But whatever the reason, the end result is the same — there are some Harbor Freight products that we're probably never going to get back.

Drill Master used to sit alongside Warrior as one of Harbor Freight's more prominent budget-oriented power tool brands. Now, there are only a bare handful of the brand's products that the retailer sells, including a circular saw, a couple of routers, and some accessories. But one type of tool that's conspicuously absent from Drill Master's current lineup is the very one it's named for: drills.

This wasn't always the case, however. One of the more noteworthy tools that has disappeared from the store's inventory is the Drill Master 18V Cordless Drill. The $20 hand tool was fairly popular until it ended up getting removed in one of the biggest Harbor Freight recalls in recent history. Back in 2015, Harbor Freight was forced to recall 1.7 million of these drills when it was discovered that there was a fault in the design that was potentially dangerous to users and their families. According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, "An internal switching mechanism can become stuck in the 'on' position and overheat, posing fire and burn hazards."

Harbor Freight later released another version of this drill, but it didn't last long. The company announced that it was unloading them in a liquidation sale, which ran until late 2020. It's hard to say how much of this decision had to do with damage to the brand's reputation and how much was simply due to the fact that the industry was moving away from the NiCad batteries used in the drill in favor of lithium-ion. You can still find several Warrior, Bauer, and Hercules drills at your local Harbor Freight, but it seems like Drill Master might be out of the race at this point.

Harbor Freight sells a handful of utility trailers through its Haul-Master brand. These can be handy for all kinds of different tasks, from big life events like moving across state lines to basic everyday chores like transporting firewood. There are all kinds of different reasons to buy one, and there are a lot of factors that go into choosing the right model for your needs. You have to pick one that's the right size for your vehicle, has enough square footage to hold your goods, and has an adequate weight capacity for your heaviest loads.

The Haul-Master 1,195 lb Capacity Folding Trailer was one of the more entry-level mid-sized utility trailers that the company sold. Its 4-foot x 8-foot footprint made it an ideal size for many who didn't need a massive trailer but still wanted to be able to transport a reasonable amount of goods. Harbor Freight never made a big announcement about taking this trailer off the market, but the model started to appear on clearance for just $329.97 back in 2024, eventually dipping even further to $269.99, and it has subsequently disappeared from the Harbor Freight website altogether.

In its place, Haul-Master has since released a 1,720 lb capacity 4-foot x 8-foot Heavy Duty Folding Trailer. With the same size and a substantially increased load capacity, it's easy to see why this is the superior model. It has an identical footprint, a higher weight capacity, and several other, smaller upgrades such as box channels and sturdier tow-bar mounts, making it an objectively superior product. That said, its $699.99 price tag might have some people wishing they'd caught the older model while it was still on clearance.

Harbor Freight doesn't sell guns, but it does sell gun safes. There are two main brands that the retailer carries in its stores: Apache and Union Safe Company. There's also one model from First Alert. Harbor Freight used to carry another brand called Bunker Hill Security, but you won't be finding any safes bearing that name in the store anymore. There are also two models in particular that you'll almost certainly never see there again.

Back in 2018, Harbor Freight was forced to order a recall on two handgun safes when serious safety concerns were raised about their security. This was specifically in regard to two 0.17 cubic foot capacity electronic handgun safe models that were sold under two different brand names. One was Union Safe Company, and the other was Bunker Hill Security. Harbor Freight was forced to recall 25,000 units due to a very serious flaw in their design. According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, "The handgun safes can open without the use of a key or combination upon impact and allow unintended access to the contents of the safe, posing a risk of serious injury to children and others." This is a big deal, since it means that those who shouldn't be able to access the firearm, such as small children, might be able to get to it simply by dropping the safe or hitting it with a blunt object.

Several handgun safes are still sold under the Union Safe Company brand name, but no new model of this specific side-opening box-style configuration is a part of Harbor Freight's current lineup, and the Bunker Hill Security brand can no longer be found on the retailer's shelves.

One of the things that Harbor Freight is well known for is its relatively affordable automotive jack stands. The Daytona line has gotten particularly popular after one of its models was considered so similar to its Snap-On counterpart that it got them sued. Now, Daytona makes six out of the seven jack stands that the company sells, with a single 3 Ton Aluminum Model from Pittsburgh. There used to be more Pittsburgh models, though. There was a 3 Ton and a 6 Ton model that were both made of steel, rather than aluminum. Unfortunately, these were both the subject of yet another recall.

Back in 2020, Harbor Freight issued a recall on more than 1.7 million of these jacks. A report from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration stated that, "Under load, with a potential shift in weight, on certain units the jack stand pawl may disengage from the extension lifting post, allowing the stand to drop suddenly, with potential to injure people near or under a lifted vehicle." Harbor Freight then sent out a missive warning its customers to stop using the 56371 Pittsburgh 3 Ton Steel Jack Stand, the 61196 Pittsburgh 3 Ton Heavy Duty Steel Jack Stand, and the 61197 Pittsburgh 6 Ton Steel Jack Stand. The company offered customers who brought the defective stands into their stores the right to exchange them for a gift card worth their full retail value.

The aluminum version of the Pittsburgh 3 Ton Jack Stand is now the last remaining option from the brand, but there are still Daytona 3 Ton and 6 Ton Heavy Duty Ratcheting Jack Stands with steel construction that seem to have replaced the old Pittsburgh steel models.

There are a lot of different uses for a good non-contact thermometer, from checking the surface temperature of your food while cooking, to automotive work, to finding the cold spots in your house where you might have an insulation leak.

The Cen-Tech Non-Contact Infrared Thermometer was a simple but effective device that would be helpful in any of these use cases. It had a gun-style design with a battery cartridge tucked inside a rubberized grip, a laser sight built into the face, and a backlit digital display that showed both the temperature that the infrared sensor was currently focused on as well as the maximum temperature that it had picked up in the area since being activated. This screen had a dedicated button just beneath it that allowed you to switch the display between Fahrenheit and Celsius. It also had several other features, like the ability to freeze the screen's readings for recording and later viewing.

It's unclear why these thermometers disappeared from Harbor Freight's lineup. Cen-Tech continues to make multimeters, code readers, and various other electrical measurement tools, but the only infrared thermometers that the store currently sells are made by Ames Instruments, with the closest model to the old Cen-Tech appearing to be the Ames Instruments 12:1 Infrared Laser Thermometer that retails for $22.99. You can still find the Cen-Tech thermometers floating around on eBay, but it seems unlikely that they'll be coming back to Harbor Freight.