Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Harbor Freight Concrete Mixer

Bought the cheapo concrete mixer, the small one they have 3 years ago. Since then I have run about 4500 pounds of concrete thru it via 80 pounds bags for various projects.

Its about as labor intensive as hand mixing it to be honest but after the first few bags I had the "fill line" for it perfect and had a rhythm to using is. I get consistent concrete from it every time. An 80 pound bag pushes the small one to its limit. If I had to do it over again, I'd probably go for the larger $250ish version

I think I paid like $180 for it and had to put together. I rinse it down every time I am finished with it and shoot all the metal bits that move with white grease.

Will probably last me a long time.

late yesterday afternoon I ran 10 bags thru it. I'd mix and dump it, wife would do the finishing on it. We're putting in a channel drain.

Will do about 10 more bags with framing around a drain tomorrow.



yesterday I was cutting the concrete to make the channel. I was cursing the son of a bitch who poured it 6 inches deep, then I remembered it was a much younger version of me back in my early 40's.

My wife grows flowers commercially. She's discovered that my cement mixer will nicely churn her potting mix concoctions. It doesn't get washed out after each use but at least it doesn't harden like concrete.

yea, that could be an industrial tumbler too

Built a deck for this old college professor [bleep] couple.
They had lots of exotic birds and mixed bird seed in one like that.

I have found HF has some good tools if you are only going to use a few times.
Mos of their stuff is junk,but better than paying big coin.

My mixer was made in the early 1950's and hasn't worn out yet. Thick steel in the drum, and cast iron framework. I do have a 5 HP Harbor Freight gas engine on it now. It's mixed lots of concrete and mortar in the past 70 years.

Thanks for this thread ... I was looking at these at Harbor Freight this morning. Now I know to go with the larger size(s).

Muchos graciass

Thanks, I've been looking for something used for awhile now, mostly for mixing compost.



And the odd concrete job, but that is work and I try to avoid that as much as I can nowadays.

I bought one for a project. I does the job but it's sort of flimsy. I sold it for about $15 less than I paid for it so it was cheaper than renting one.

I bought this one from Lowes to mix topsoil and compost when I replanted grass in the back yard. I was impressed with the quality for the price.
Resold it when I was done with the project. Overall spent less than if I had rented one.
Concrete mixer

I would much rather pay more for good, American made stuff than support China... OUR EMEMY!

A friend used one with the plastic barrel to tumble 45-70 brass. He used a lot of that.

I bought the larger one about 3-4 years ago for a project. Thing took FOREVER to assemble…and I do mean FOREVER! It worked…ok…for my pad that I poured. I will say that it was underpowered and would not mix the amount it was rated and advertised. With that said, if you babied it along, it did the job. I sold it after the project for a $20 loss because I didn’t want to store the thing.

I have one of those. I think I'll make me a large batch of black powder in it. Think that's too dangerous to do inside the garage?

I've gone through a couple of the big ones, mostly by overloading them. One of them runs for a couple of hours every Saturday, since we turned in into a fish scaler. Works like a charm, happy customers. Probably should repaint it this winter, it's getting kinda ratty.