Bought a cheap digital angle finder off Amazon for $25...

It was off by nearly 2 degrees on a miter cut for some crown molding in a living room remodel last Thursday. Anyone else had bad luck with those budget digital tools?

2 comments

2 Comments

bailey.sandra9d ago

My Dad always swore by those cheap Harbor Freight magnetic angle finders, said they were good enough for everything. But after I picked up a $22 one last month I feel like I totally get what you're saying now. I was cutting some baseboard for a closet and it was reading 90 degrees when I knew damn well the corner was closer to 88. I checked it with my old Swanson speed square and sure enough, the digital one was off by almost a full degree and a half. It just made me realize those little sensors they use in the cheap ones are basically toys, they don't hold true after you bump them around in the truck or drop them on a jobsite. Now I don't trust anything under $50 for real finish work, it's just not worth the headache of having to recut a whole run of molding.

thompson.xena10d ago

Last Thursday I had the same issue with a $30 digital finder from a different brand, it was off by 1.7 degrees on a simple 45 cut. The problem is those cheap sensors don't calibrate well and they drift after a few uses, especially if you drop them on concrete. A 2 degree error on crown molding is a disaster, you basically have to shim everything or start over.