It was painful to read, but a good caveat emptor lesson. Thanks. I've had good luck with Amazon. They have a DeWalt DW872 14" multi-cutter saw that I put in my shopping cart but haven't actually purchased yet. No place to put it in my cramped shop so I guess I'm waiting on a project that needs it before I buy it. I already have a power miter saw for wood and aluminum, and an abrasive chop saw for steel. With an Amazon Prime membership, I get free two day shipping on most stuff. I seldom need something faster than two days, and if I do, it's often a $3.99 upgrade to next day delivery. They even deliver on Sunday via the US Post Office, which still freaks me out a bit.
I bought a $199 California Air Tools compressor from Amazon, back when it was sold as a GM brand and the Chinese manufacturer strongly implied an association with the big car company. Yeah, it sounds weaselly, and the price was the same or a little more than a name brand compressor with the same specs. I bought it because it generates only 65 dB when running, about the same noise as a laser printer. That's a great feature for a cramped home shop. I can easily take a phone call while standing next to it. The Porter Cable pancake compressor in the basement shop would shake the fillings out of your teeth when you're upstairs. If you stand next to it, I think it could rupture your spleen. Amazon also has a very good return policy, so you won't have the sort of non-warranty hassle you had with TSC. Most of all, I hate taking the time to leave the house to buy stuff, even though Lowes and Home Depot are each a mile away from me. I like shopping and ordering online, where I can read user reviews. UPS runs almost everywhere, and the benefits of online shopping seem even greater for people in fairly rural areas. Sorry if that reads a lot like an Amazon ad. It's a completely unpaid endorsement. I also buy stuff on eBay. Recently - toner for the laser printer, ER20 collets, solid state relays, a block of aluminum for a fixture, parallel port cards and parallel port I/O interface boards, RAM, four used Rasmi RFI filers that Andy recommended for VFD noise, stepper motor drivers and DC power supplies, a VFD, PC power supplies, a bunch of SMC pneumatics, etc. On 04/20/2015 10:42 PM, Gene Heskett wrote: > Greetings all; > > I don't recall if I mentioned buying a Kawasaki 14" cutoff saw from TSC > or not. > > But I did, something over a year ago when I was cutting bits off the end > of a 1x2" bar of TSC steel to make the nut holders for the balls screws > I put in my toy mill. > > It ran a little slow for a 14" blade, only 2800 revs, so it was difficult > to actually get the cutting fire started, and it ran perhaps 10 minutes > total, cutting 2/3rds of the way thru the bar, but then got noisy and > slowed considerably. I could turn it fwd by hand. but backwards, which > would be the working face of the stepdown gear in it was a draggy, felt > like the bull gear was plastic and had overheated, deforming the gear > teeth. > > Took it back to TSC, but they claimed I had to contact the vendor, which > was AllTrade. Had them look up a phone number and I came home & called > them. On giving them the model & serial data, they came back and said > that particular model had never ever been in their inventory, and > suggested that perhaps TSC had bought them off a rickshaw in Kowloon. > > IOW, a warranty claim against Alltrade wasn't possible. So I was a bit > peeved as I was out a buck and a half on it. I stewed a day or so, > still needed a saw, and when I went back in they had lowered the asking > on the dewalt version to the same price, so I brought one of them home > and finished that project. And although the dewalt was higher rpms, it > was still about 1500 slow for a good 14" wheel. The fire could be > started but had to be pushed to keep it going. > > So today, I drag the green monster back out of the shed, intending to > salvage the base and vice for something, and the motor for something > else. Knocking the reduction gear loose and working it out of the > houseing I was amazed at the gear condition, like new, looked like good > steel, all running in Torrington needle cartridges. Humm, go to other > end of motor & remove the end grill. Nice needle bearing cartridge > there, supporting the rear end of the motor shaft. Stuck a 17mm wrench > of the gear hub flat and turned it, turned fairly free. Turned it the > other way, back end of armature turned in the brushes, but not in the > bearing! A 10mm motor shaft was broken in two between the commutator and > the rear bearing, so the armature was bouncing about 1/32", totally > unrestrained by the bearing. I have never in my 80 years seen a shaft > broken off like that. So I saved the line cord and switch, and > deposited the rest in my trash trailer. > > That was a $150 lesson that says if you buy something green from the tool > shelf, it had better say Hitachi on it. Same for a yellow "Cub Cadet" > (an I.H. brand) lawn mower that claims a Kawasaki engine. The only thing > Kawasaki is the label on that turd. That was a $400 lesson as it was a > supposedly top of the line self-propelled mower. > > Cheers, Gene Heskett ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ BPM Camp - Free Virtual Workshop May 6th at 10am PDT/1PM EDT Develop your own process in accordance with the BPMN 2 standard Learn Process modeling best practices with Bonita BPM through live exercises http://www.bonitasoft.com/be-part-of-it/events/bpm-camp-virtual- event?utm_ source=Sourceforge_BPM_Camp_5_6_15&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=VA_SF _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
