They could use a good wipe-down with CLR. And then oiling the screws.

Milwaukee makes some seriously good quality stuff.

I've had their pair of left and right cutters. Probably a defect but it was disappointing to see it snap on the blade with the 2nd cut.

What’s a CLR? Curious.

calcium lime and rust remover

No you did not. I worked at Milwaukee as a product designer from 2007-2009 and the hand tools were just starting in the early development / ideation sketches . Those came on the market in maybe 2010-12 somewhere at the oldest.

Lol, so OP is off by at least 7 years?

I've got 50+ year old snips of unknown origin that are just as good as a new pair. I think the design requirements of tin snips makes them quite durable if the hinge mechanism doesn't get too sloppy.

Yup. We didn’t even start w snippers

Aviation snips and midwest-channellock body châssis from Milwaukee soon? 😇 3 blade crimpers.

If you cut a lot of tin those are trash. Real buy it for life snips would be Midwest or the old Prosnips(RIP) from before Irwin bought them out.

I'd suggest Klenk for OG aviation snips. Stahlwille, Gedore, or Hazet snips if you're really burning to buy once, cry once.

Klenk as well on that list unless they've gone downhill like Wiss.

Stahlwille, Gedore, or Hazet snips if you have cash to burn.

I prefer Wiss. Cheap, easy to find, made in US. Owned buy Crescent, which is still an American company. But also, yeah. Milwaukee didn't do hand tools back in 05

Thanks for the reply, never heard of any of those 👍 stock with wiss snips/Lenox crimper at the moment hehe.

Klenk and Midwest Snip are some of the OG American snips. The others I mentioned get you into the (painfully priced) world of German tools.

European, one of my teachers was always hard on European tools lol heard of the Klein Tools snips?

So you are saying they are in snip shape?

I had the same pair for like 5 years. I've cut through lots of joist hangers and all sorts of crap before they died on me.

Maybe I'm mistaken, but I definitely bought these long before I moved cross-country in 2011, Since I used them extensively on a loft buildout in 2010. Of that I can be sure. So it's possible I bought them in 2010 and got them confused with a previous pair I purchased earlier.

Just want to give you props. Milwaukee makes some legit good stuff that (a lot of) is made in the US. I took a lean manufacturing workshop with a couple of guys from the Greenwood facility (Sawzall blades) and got to hear about the fab and heat treat process.

Good stuff

These seem to have the smallest “beak” of all the snips I have seen. What is the true name of this model?

I have a pair of lefts and rights of these that I use every day, I will never give them up cause the new handle design of the Milwaukee’s isn’t as good imo

Yeah what like Milwaukee didn't even have its lithium ion line out yet, never mind any real hand tools

I’ve got three years into my $20 Milwaukee red snips; gotta replace them in about another year I’d say; they are my favorite on the budget side of things.

Yeah, Milwaukee hadn’t even birthed its prodigal son Alice Cooper yet, and OP claims to have owned these shears in advance of Billion Dollar Babies? Un-freaking-believable.

$234 for Stahlwille??????I'm not stranger to paying a premium for tools but this is absurd. I'm a Tinknocker. There's nothing you can do to stop stainless from bearing up snip blades

milwuakee used to have good hand tools... now they only focus on power tools that last 1 year since purchase

These are bulldog snips. Better for cutting thicker material. In the hvac industry you’d use these to cut through seams of ductwork where there’s multiple layers, or heavy gauge slip and drive which are used to connect and hang ductwork. They’re good for their purpose, but not great for making long cuts because they’re short. So good short cutters get good leverage for strong short cuts

would it make quick work if a 316-SS hose clamp?

Those are very likely not made by those brands. Hazet, Stahlwille and Gedore sell top end tools, but they mainly focus on manufacturing those basic forged handtools like the sockets and wrenches, a lot of other stuff is rebranded from other more niche brands.

I think Knipex does not make them either.

The most well known top end snips from Germany are made by Bessey and it is very likely they supply them to those top brands (Hazet, Gedore and Stahlwille). NWS also makes them.

Buying Bessey snips is cheaper than buying Hazet, even if they're the same just different branding...

I just don't like the style they go for with any plastic hand tools. The wrenches and the socket set looks really nice though.

They're 60-70€ here in Europe.

I don't know if Stahlwille, Hazet or Gedore really make them anyway. Bessey is the German manufacturer known for such snips, and NWS also makes them. It's likely the other brands get some of those and have them rebranded (but I'm not 100%...). For many tools, the niche manufacturers are the best. Hazet, Gedore and Stahlwille do manufacture their own stuff, especially sockets and wrenches, but they rebrand lots of stuff like Screwdrivers (I think both Hazet and Gedore supply them from Oplast, while Stahlwille might get them from Witte).

I can tell you tool bought from Ace hardware with the Ace Hardware brand on it will go too dull to do anything useful within 3-4 uses.

Milwaukee hand tools aren’t known for their quality, interesting those held up so long.

Would you really trust a handyman who uses straight snips though? Honestly

The color coding makes it look like half Milwaukee, half DeWalt

What's with the mismatched handles? Could it be that they're not actually Milwaukee, but that handle was replaced at some point?

Looks like Milwaukee and Stanley Frankensteined together

I have the same pair, that's just how they look. Red handles for right snips, green for lefts, yellow for straights, bulldogs got red and yellow or sometimes I've seen blue

Unlike your wife.

Looks like Milwaukee and Dewalt grips slid over some other pliers.

Someone, potentially before OP, replaced the warn grips.

Malco and Knipex, only high end tools I can actually touch in a store lol. Hilti also at Home Depot lol.

I hear back in they days (from How it's made, best show ever en passant!) that Mastercraft Maximum wrench key were produce in the same shop as Mac Tools! 🤫🤥

Does CLR really remove rust from tools? I’m in Florida and even my dry tools I. The garage get rusty just from humidity.

Absolutely! Not the person you were replying to before but I've used these exact style of snip for that exact thing and yes they will cut right through it!

Yes they are…

i'd expect them to have the left and right ones as well, each one does best at it's own job

/u/madmax_br5 is a big phoney

Milfuckee makes great cordless tools (my industrial contracting shop is mostly red) but most of their hand tools and especially their cutting tools like blades / bits are fucking garbage.

Project Farm on youtube proves this again and again. He does exceptionally well thought out tests and their tools perform poorly most every time.

Evidently this pair was one of the first to roll off the line; it’s possible they’ve cheapened them over time to save cost. I’m also surprised how long they lasted!

I thought their screw bits actually tested very well in project farm? but yes, definitely a “do your research” brand for hand tools

Aren’t they Chinese also?

Nope, that’s how the grips are on these I have a pair

I was gonna say, I don't remember this style being like that back then.

CLR can remove rust from metal (and other subtrates), but if the metal has corrosion that's eating into the mteal it can't repair that.

My city has tap water that leaves a crusty residue over a time, a fairly short time. I use CLR-soaked paper towels and lay them firmly on the surface of my porcelain & stainless sinks as well as around the fixture.

I also use CLR and a pumice stone to remove the toilet bowl hard water deposit ring.

Aviation straight shears, the most useless type of shears to exist. Those end up in the garbage. Offset shears are where it’s at. If you do any real tin work, yellow handled shears do not belong in your tool box.

You say milfuckee, but I work in tool rental/repair and all I ever see is Rigid coming in for repairs, and I live in Wisconsin, where literally everyone buys Milwaukee.

Same parent company.

But I did say that I buy the red cordless tools for my contracting company. They are mostly amazing, save for the 3-4 year old trash grade brushless onekey drills (top end models, bad chucks, weak bodies) and the new 1/2” impact wrenches that keep exploding. I’m so glad I bought the last gen impact.

Did you see the inside of the 1/2” impact failures yet? They removed 1/2 of the support on the planetary gearset so it just shears all the pins. It looks like they let a first year engineer go crazy with cost cutting inside there. Even the best companies make stupid decisions now and then.

Thanks I’m going to give it a try

What do you use these snips for?

meh. Klein tin snips are where it's at...

try the kleins...

Do yourself a favor and get a pair of klein snips...