Member
You want made in the USA, buy used vintage equipment. Go over to OWWM, you will find that machines manufactured today or 50 years ago have about 0 functional difference between them, besides lack of quality.
Watch CL like a hawk, $40 will buy you a heck of a lot these days....
Just my $0.02...
Member
Just to make you feel better about buying import stuff. You do buy it from an American business owner, with an American sales force, The item was delivered by an American truck driver, unloaded off the ship by American (mostly) dock workers. Your money does help the American economy, it also at the same time helps the world economy.
Just offering another way to look at it.
Contributor
Darl, the Clear Vue is still made in the US of A, but not on the east coast any longer. Oregon IIRC. Ed retired and sold the business a few months ago. But it has allowed him to be more active in his shop, and here at the Creek! Jim.
Coolmeadow Setters...Exclusively Irish! When Irish Eyes are smiling....They're usually up to something!!
Home of Irish Setter Rescue of North Texas.
No, I'm not an electrician. Any information I share is purely what I would do myself. If in doubt, hire an electrician!
Member of the G0691 fan club!
At a minimum, I'm Pentatoxic...Most likely I'm a Pentaholic. There seems to be no known cure. Pentatonix, winners of The Sing Off, s3.
Member
Yes Chinese equipment is considerably less money than USA made stuff. The economies of scale are one of the variables but so are government regulations that protect human life and welfare such as OSHA, EPA, Workmens Comp, etc.Originally Posted by Greg Book
We've all heard this before and in my mind it is true but taking the bait now just speeds our race to the bottom. Buy cheap now and pay many times over later.
Contributor
Ben,
Not everybody has the time, the skill or the desire to restore old machines.
I don't want to learn to pour bearings......I don't want to deal with taking things to a machine shop to have it machined to accept new parts. I don't want to spend days or even weeks or months looking for the replacement part or trying to find a welder who weld cast iron properly.
I would love to buy American NEW but frankly I equiped my entire shop for same price as an 8" Northfield jointer.
Would I like to have tools made in the US or North America? You bet. But the average Joe can't afford them.
That's the bottom line.
Last edited by Ken Fitzgerald; 09-23-2010 at 9:22 PM.
Ken
So much to learn, so little time.....
Contributor
Folks.......a friendly reminder ......political discussions are not allowed at SMC. That includes international politics.
Ken
So much to learn, so little time.....
Member
I hope he's doing well--I enjoyed visiting with him.
Member
Ken,
My shop is mostly outfitted with vintage machines, all of which I have done a bit of tinkering on. That being said, none of them needed the work (except my Unisaw which came home in boxes), I do it for the fun, you have to choose your battles/purchases! I agree that you can't go out right this second and outfit a complete shop like I have, but in the time period of a year you could (assuming you live in reasonable driving distance of a nice size city). I would make the argument that buying a new machine requires more set up time than a used machine (that was owned by a competent previous owner), I have had to remove cosmoline on one machine, a SC mortiser, and that was a nightmare, hope to never have to do that again.
I agree that most people place more intent on restoring the tools more than the actual use of them, but I am sure that there is plenty of example of people on the Creak that buy vintage tools, never touch them and receive plenty of years of service.
Ben, who people say enjoys working more ON his shop, than working IN it...
Contributor
You missed my point Ben or I miscommunicated it.
Some people don't have the necessary skills or desire to work on old machines.
I want to work wood not machines. I have been working on machines and electronics for over 40 years. I want to work wood.
To each their own.
Ken
So much to learn, so little time.....
Contributor
Go to one of the industrial woodworking shows sometime and you will see lots of high end US made machinery. Down at the consumer or prosumer level, the price tag is a tough sell. A 1:1 scale working model of the original is usually good enough.
JR
Member
Well said.
It's economics -- the allocation of scarce resources.
In my heart, I believe I SHOULD buy old iron, and fix it up.
In my head, though, I know that means I have to cut time from other things -- things that I prioritize.
Ah, yes. If time AND money were unlimited ;-)
Member
If you enforce your quality and grade control at a plant I don't think the nationality of the people working in the plant has anything to do with the quality of the product coming out. I do not think USA or N.A. made equals good quality always (think auto industry?), although often you get better products made here vs. China.
As for sawstop, I think it is a very well designed cabinet saw (best out there that i have seen) with good quality and implementation. Here is a photo comparison of one of the parts against its competitors:
Table Saw Arbors.jpg
There was another post in the Grizzly Bashing thread where a poster posted a photo of a powermatic cutter head and compared the bearings against an import machine and said that the photo says it all. That can be said in this instance too, right?
It's not all about the origin of the machine, it's the design and how well it is implemented.
Member
As somebody who dealt with offshore manufacturing, I happen to think you're 100% correct.
To make up numbers ... if Company X thought that they could cut their total cost of manufacture by 10% by moving production to Asia, while maintaining strict quality controls, and maintaining defect rates that are no higher than what they saw, with domestic production, they might be tempted to lower the bar, on QC, in order to maintain, say, 25% overall savings, instead.
Most companies that sell a product keep scrupulous track of defect rates (termed any way you want to -- return, refunds, replacements, customer satisfaction indices ... whatever).
It's invariably a business decision -- one which, unfortunately gives inadequate weight to "lifetime value of a customer" -- to decide that higher defect rates are "acceptable," given an increased near-term profitability, arrived at through further cost reductions.
As always, we're partly to blame. As long as we subsidize those business decisions, by continuing to buy products with higher defect rates, we send a message that ... the companies have found just the right sweet spot.
Incidentally, I looked for a star in the East, yesterday, after assembling about my fifth Harbor Freight tool stand, and finding exactly the right number and mix of fasteners, and NOT having even ONE be defective.
Or ... was it all just a dream
Contributor
I am not bashing Sawstop but I think this is an unfair comparison. The Sawstop arbor needs to be larger since it is slammed into a chunk of Al in a millisecond. It's like comparing some critical part on a F350 to a F150 truck. The one on the F350 is bigger because it needs to be. Does that make the F150 junk(not a Ford fan but only using as an example)? Not really. It does what it is designed to do.
Member
The picture of the spindles is misleading, at best. Was this picture created with the intention of misleading people? I bet most of the other pieces in a Saw Stop would look wimply by comparison to the Unisaw based upon looking at one at the local dealer.
The Powermatic and Delta spindles shown look very strong. If those designs are built with quality materials they look very rugged for the forces you would expect. The Saw Stop spindle has to be much more rugged since they are firing an explosive charge into the blade and the spindle must be able to absorb that force.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote