Hi Mark, I have the larger Rikon (18") and after initial set-up (which wasn't difficult), it runs and functions more than well enough for me. I'm not doing production woodwork, nor cutting pinblocks every week, so I don't know about their value in heavy use situations, but for a one man rebuilding shop, it's been great. My biggest complaint about the 18" (and I would assume the 14" is the fence. It's really substandard for all but the coarsest stuff. It works, but......... With the 14", you'll have some options as far as after market fences go, and I'd consider getting one. William R. Monroe On Wed, Aug 11, 2010 at 1:30 PM, Mark Purney <mark.purney at mesapiano.com>wrote: > Valuable advice. I'll avoid Grizzly. But I'm finding it difficult to find a > bandsaw that doesn't have some negative reviews or complaints. > > Interestingly, I'm seeing many positive reviews on the $800 Rikon 14" > bandsaw. There are certainly some complaints, but most of them seem to be > minor or correctable issues. As for the 14" Powermatic, which is a little > more expensive (but it already has the Carter setup installed), it seems > like the reviews are mostly stellar. The people who are happy with it are > extremely happy, but quite a handful of people were very unhappy because > they received defective units with misaligned or improperly welded parts. So > the Powermatic seems like it is potentially the best $1000 saw, as long as > you don't get one of the "bad" ones. > > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20100814/18c2931a/attachment.htm>
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