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It arrived in two boxes. No sander is clean but this one isnt bad. I got this sander a couple of weeks ago. Set up was simple except for the weight of the thing. This has all the power I need. One box had slight damage. The dust collection compared to my old Craftsman is wonderful.
It made a mess for the first minute or two but is fine now. I used it fot a while before writing this. The graphite plate behind the belt was dead flat. The sander itself was well protected and completely undamaged. Weight is good. I almost bought the 1 1/2 hp model but am glad I didnt. If you get one like this one you cant go wrong.
I need a machine that I can sand/shape large radius on. Don't get me wrong here, this is a real good machine. The dust collection is great, it has plenty of power and tracks well. This piece is an intregal part of the tracking system and must remain on the machine when sanding. If I had kept the machine I would have changed them out for Gizzly 3" locking casters.If none of these are important to your use, I would recommend this sander. But I had to return it and replace it with the Shop Fox G4790(see separate review).
Changing the belt on this machine involves removing parts.too slow. Very heavily built, excellant finish, and very quiet. Second.I need a machine that I can quickly change belts, as I will go thru 4-5 differant grits in a 10 minute period. There were a couple of reasons for this. First you cannot remove the end piece from the belt sander and sand on the radius. The last item was the casters.they should be heavier duty.
It's a nice machine and I wish I could have kept it.
Plenty of power, smooth operation and the vaccuum system is helpful in dust removal. Purchased in February 2004 to replace a smaller sander that wore out after 15 years. Only negative was in the foot lever to lock the wheels which bent if I engaged the lock with a foot. I was impressed with the quality of the machine. Tracking was easily set up and has stayed true. Worked fine if one used a hand to set the lock. This flimsey locking mechanism should be improved.
I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS UNIT. IT IS MY FIRST JET PRODUCT AND I AM VERY SATISFIED WITH THE QUALITY AND OPERATION. WAS A LITTLE SKEPTICLE AT FIRST BECAUSE OF THE SMALLER H.P. MOTOR , BUT SOON FOUND OUT THIS IS NOT A PROBLEM.
There are sliding panels in the rear of the sander to direct the collection from either the disk or belt sander area. It wasn't on the Amazon.com site at the time.I went with the open stand because I wanted some storage below. I thought this was good idea. Not sure if that's an option thru Amazon.com.The sander was easy to set up. Though on the belt table, I had to leave a little extra gap between the belt and the table because when you tighten the table locks, it seems to pull the table toward the belt. It seems to have quieted a bit with more use. The belt table seems to be pressed from heavy sheet metal but has worked fine for me.
Bits of the graphite material get all over the place for about the first 15 mins of use but that seems to have taken care of itself.I found the belt a little tough to adjust as to maintain a given lateral position on the rollers. It runs smooth, though the graphite platen behind the belt sander it somewhat noisy. This is my first belt sander so that might just be due my lack of familiararity with the machine.The sander has ample power. It gives me extra storage with a shop-made plywood shelf and saved me a few bucks.
I bought this sander from Tool Crib a few months ago. It's not flimsy at all. It was fairly easy to square everything up and set the stops. Not a big deal though.Dust collection is better than I expected. The tables are very good. I find that the sander is very stable on the open stand. The fit and finish was excellent. I have a 1-1/2 HP Delta dust collector located about 15 feet from the sander and the combination seems to do a good job at keeping the sanding dust down.Other than the preceeding minor issues, I think this is a great sander.
I have yet to get it to bog down on pine, maple or white oak. The disk table is machined cast iron and well built. The value is hard to beat, if not impossible to beat. Though the closed stand does look nice I though function was more important.I recommend this sander highly.
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