Should I buy my friend's Shopsmith?

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RFGuy
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Re: Should I buy my friend's Shopsmith?

Post by RFGuy »

Ed in Tampa wrote: Mon Jul 12, 2021 10:58 am My question to you is what do you want to do on the SS that you can't do with what you got now? I am sure everyone will have a comment but this question is directed to you alone.
I have one other question to those that comment on the 4 inch jointer. How big is big enough? What in furniture making requires you to have a jointer bigger that 4 inches? I have built furniture, built houses and did general home maintenance and I was never stopped or had to do a major work around because of having only a 4 inch jointer. So I would like to know what size jointer is big enough.
Ed,

Opinions vary wildly on this forum, so my comments here are no different. IMHO the Shopsmith 4" jointer is only really useful for face jointing boards a few inches wide and at most 3' long. There are exceptions of course...I mean you can build your own infeed and outfeed tables that attach to the 4" jointer and with proper leveling you can joint boards longer than 3' (with minimal waste). However, adding infeed/outfeed tables will greatly complicate removing the jointer from a Mark V. You can remove the guard (something I don't like to do for safety reasons) and joint boards wider than a few inches. Because of its limitations I only ever use my Shopsmith jointer for edge jointing these days. Often in furniture building you need a solid wood panel, e.g. a table top or desk top. How do you propose using the Shopsmith 4" jointer to face & edge joint a 6" x 6' board, as one might commonly use in building a table top?
Last edited by RFGuy on Mon Jul 12, 2021 11:30 am, edited 1 time in total.
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chapmanruss
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Re: Should I buy my friend's Shopsmith?

Post by chapmanruss »

The two links RFGuy posted above adds to the information you have already been given. I'll add my two cents worth. $500 for a Mark V 510 is a really good deal unless it's a wreck. The larger table system is handy for a number of functions. The Shopsmith Bandsaw is a wonderful one to work with. After a little alignment to get the table aligned to the blade it is very easy to use with its simple blade tensioning and auto tracking. It needs a lot less tweaking than other Bandsaws. The Belt Sander works very well although it can be a little hard to get used to how the belt tensioning works. The Planer does a great job of getting stock to thickness. The tools are easy to service and can seemingly run forever. Many of us repair, refurbish or restore our own tools to keep them running like new. Something to consider about the Shopsmith tools is that although their basic design for the Mark V and the Bandsaw, Belt Sander, etc. dates back to the 1950's they can still out preform many stand alone tools. They can be upgraded with the newer feature. Stand alone tools change models after a few years in production and parts become less and less available as time goes by. A 1954 Mark 5 with a bad motor is still a useable tool by replacing the motor with a new or used one which can be easily found. Everything made for a Mark V today can go as a replacement part, upgrade or accessory on the older machines. How many tools can you say that about. Don't get me wrong, stand alone tools do have their place.

As you can already see there are a lot of opinions that go back and forth.

If you want to learn more about the Mark V, its history and differences over the years you might enjoy the thread at the link below.

viewtopic.php?f=7&t=24963
Russ

Mark V completely upgraded to Mark 7
Mark V 520
All SPT's & 2 Power Stations
Model 10ER S/N R64000 first one I restored on bench w/ metal ends & retractable casters.
Has Speed Changer, 4E Jointer, Jig Saw with lamp, a complete set of original accessories & much more.
Model 10E's S/N's 1076 & 1077 oldest ones I have restored. Mark 2 S/N 85959 restored. Others to be restored.
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Re: Should I buy my friend's Shopsmith?

Post by edma194 »

Ed in Tampa wrote: Mon Jul 12, 2021 10:58 am I have one other question to those that comment on the 4 inch jointer. How big is big enough? What in furniture making requires you to have a jointer bigger that 4 inches? I have built furniture, built houses and did general home maintenance and I was never stopped or had to do a major work around because of having only a 4 inch jointer. So I would like to know what size jointer is big enough.
I have rarely used my joiner. And I like calling it a joiner and not a jointer too. I haven't made much in the fine furniture category so I haven't needed it often, but even when I do need a nice straight side on an edge the table saw has worked fine. And now after many years I have a planer again, so if I did need to flatten a wide board I'd put it through the planer on a sled.

I recently saw a home shop with an 8" joiner that had a bed that must have been between 7 and 8 feet long. A really impressive machine, truly those massive cast iron pieces made it a work of art as well. But when does it get big enough? How wide is wide enough, how long is long enough, and how much must it weigh before it's a big enough joiner?
Ed from Rhode Island

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JPG
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Re: Should I buy my friend's Shopsmith?

Post by JPG »

Ed in Tampa wrote: Mon Jul 12, 2021 10:58 am My question to you is what do you want to do on the SS that you can't do with what you got now? I am sure everyone will have a comment but this question is directed to you alone.
I have one other question to those that comment on the 4 inch jointer. How big is big enough? What in furniture making requires you to have a jointer bigger that 4 inches? I have built furniture, built houses and did general home maintenance and I was never stopped or had to do a major work around because of having only a 4 inch jointer. So I would like to know what size jointer is big enough.
I consider the 4" jointer to be quite adequate for edge jointing.

For face planing boards wider than 4", there is the 12" planer(or a good hand plane).
$500 is a good price as mentioned above.
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Ed in Tampa
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Re: Should I buy my friend's Shopsmith?

Post by Ed in Tampa »

RFGuy wrote: Mon Jul 12, 2021 11:21 am
Ed in Tampa wrote: Mon Jul 12, 2021 10:58 am My question to you is what do you want to do on the SS that you can't do with what you got now? I am sure everyone will have a comment but this question is directed to you alone.
I have one other question to those that comment on the 4 inch jointer. How big is big enough? What in furniture making requires you to have a jointer bigger that 4 inches? I have built furniture, built houses and did general home maintenance and I was never stopped or had to do a major work around because of having only a 4 inch jointer. So I would like to know what size jointer is big enough.
Ed,

Opinions vary wildly on this forum, so my comments here are no different. IMHO the Shopsmith 4" jointer is only really useful for face jointing boards a few inches wide and at most 3' long. There are exceptions of course...I mean you can build your own infeed and outfeed tables that attach to the 4" jointer and with proper leveling you can joint boards longer than 3' (with minimal waste). However, adding infeed/outfeed tables will greatly complicate removing the jointer from a Mark V. You can remove the guard (something I don't like to do for safety reasons) and joint boards wider than a few inches. Because of its limitations I only ever use my Shopsmith jointer for edge jointing these days. Often in furniture building you need a solid wood panel, e.g. a table top or desk top. How do you propose using the Shopsmith 4" jointer to face & edge joint a 6" x 6' board, as one might commonly use in building a table top?
Okay 6 inch wide is that wide enough? How long 6 ft? Or should it be longer? How do you joint a 12 inch by 12 ft long board on a 6 inch jointer? My question was how big a jointer is big enough?
RFGuy
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Re: Should I buy my friend's Shopsmith?

Post by RFGuy »

Ed in Tampa wrote: Tue Jul 13, 2021 8:47 am Okay 6 inch wide is that wide enough? How long 6 ft? Or should it be longer? How do you joint a 12 inch by 12 ft long board on a 6 inch jointer? My question was how big a jointer is big enough?
Ed,

Kind of a moot point for me since my shop is too small to accommodate it, but ideally I would like an 8" jointer in my shop. IF I ever move, that is my plan to get an 8" jointer. IF I were independently wealthy with a large enough shop then I would love to have a 12" jointer. Most panel glue-ups that I do typically have 6-8" wide boards, so really an 8" jointer should suffice. Finding local stock much wider than this is a challenge in this locale. Sorry if I misunderstood your original comments on this thread. I just don't find my Shopsmith 4" jointer to be that useful in actual practice for the types of projects that I build, or want to build. That was the point I was trying to get across, though for other customers, that make smaller wood projects, the 4" jointer may be all they need.
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Mark V 520 (Bought New '98) | 4" jointer | 6" beltsander | 12" planer | bandsaw | router table | speed reducer | univ. tool rest
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chapmanruss
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Re: Should I buy my friend's Shopsmith?

Post by chapmanruss »

MatrixClaw,

Sorry the discussion has gotten a bit off topic. I hope we were able to answer your original questions. As you can see there are varying opinions to be found here. Some are simply personal preferences while others depend on the type of work the each of us does. The best guidance any of us can give you is decide what kind of woodworking you wish to do and than add the tools to accomplish the task. The Mark V you are looking at can be a good starting point.
Russ

Mark V completely upgraded to Mark 7
Mark V 520
All SPT's & 2 Power Stations
Model 10ER S/N R64000 first one I restored on bench w/ metal ends & retractable casters.
Has Speed Changer, 4E Jointer, Jig Saw with lamp, a complete set of original accessories & much more.
Model 10E's S/N's 1076 & 1077 oldest ones I have restored. Mark 2 S/N 85959 restored. Others to be restored.
RFGuy
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Re: Should I buy my friend's Shopsmith?

Post by RFGuy »

chapmanruss wrote: Tue Jul 13, 2021 10:50 am MatrixClaw,

Sorry the discussion has gotten a bit off topic. I hope we were able to answer your original questions. As you can see there are varying opinions to be found here. Some are simply personal preferences while others depend on the type of work the each of us does. The best guidance any of us can give you is decide what kind of woodworking you wish to do and than add the tools to accomplish the task. The Mark V you are looking at can be a good starting point.
Russ,

I am not so sure that we are "off topic". The OP stated himself that the Shopsmith jointer would probably be too small (see below). My comments were only to reinforce his viewpoint to try to help him with his decision (all relevant). The Shopsmith 4" jointer is a fantastic jointer for doing small projects. I agree that we would need to know more about the types of woodworking he wants to do to offer complete advice, but I agree with you that a used Mark V can be a great starting point for anyone getting into woodworking and presents significant value.
MatrixClaw wrote: Sun Jul 11, 2021 7:42 pm Most of what intrigues me about the Shopsmith are all the accessories. The jointer would probably be too small for me, but the bandsaw, belt sander and planer are all things I planned to buy soonish, regardless, and I imagine the attachments for the SS are higher quality than the cheaper individual tools I was looking at buying.
📶RF Guy

Mark V 520 (Bought New '98) | 4" jointer | 6" beltsander | 12" planer | bandsaw | router table | speed reducer | univ. tool rest
Porter Cable 12" Compound Miter Saw | Rikon 8" Low Speed Bench Grinder w/CBN wheels | Jessem Clear-Cut TS™ Stock Guides
Festool (Emerald): DF 500 Q | RO 150 FEQ | OF 1400 EQ | TS 55 REQ | CT 26 E
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chapmanruss
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Re: Should I buy my friend's Shopsmith?

Post by chapmanruss »

RFGuy,

Maybe saying a bit off topic wasn't the correct way of expressing it. I meant that is was getting to be more of a discussion back and forth between differing points of view on just the Jointer. I believe those points of view are helpful to the OP. As I went on to say
As you can see there are varying opinions to be found here. Some are simply personal preferences while others depend on the type of work the each of us does. The best guidance any of us can give you is decide what kind of woodworking you wish to do and than add the tools to accomplish the task.
Your point of view on the Jointer could be very helpful to the OP since he has already expressed concern over the size of the SS Jointer. I found the recent post by algale on Jointers with the video link to be a good presentation on Jointers "101" which would be good viewing for anyone considering a Jointer. That thread is linked below.

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=26057

The other information the OP was seeking was beginning to be lost and my hope was others would comment on those questions/concerns of the OP would be brought back into the discussion.

MatrixClaw,

Is there more you would like to know at this point? We are here to try and help in anyway we can. As for adding other tools patience can be rewarding. I waited quite some time before I bought my SS ProPlaner which is the stand alone one not the Mark Mount. I paid $200 for it and after sharpening the blade and a little maintenance it works like a champ.
Russ

Mark V completely upgraded to Mark 7
Mark V 520
All SPT's & 2 Power Stations
Model 10ER S/N R64000 first one I restored on bench w/ metal ends & retractable casters.
Has Speed Changer, 4E Jointer, Jig Saw with lamp, a complete set of original accessories & much more.
Model 10E's S/N's 1076 & 1077 oldest ones I have restored. Mark 2 S/N 85959 restored. Others to be restored.
MatrixClaw
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Re: Should I buy my friend's Shopsmith?

Post by MatrixClaw »

Thanks for all the answers, everyone. This is all super informative! I think going with the SS would be worth it for me - to be honest, I've only felt the need to use a jointer once so far, and I used my neighbor's 6" jointer to do some boards for some fencing I built on my house. I just know I've seen complaints on the SS jointer being too small, so thought I'd bring it up. I'd likely get more use out of the planer if I can find one used.

The majority of detailed work I plan to do will be guitar speaker cabinets and smaller projects (ie: cutting boards, coasters, I'd like to try a bowl on the lathe, etc.). I'll also be using it to build a dog house in the near future, but I don't know that I need anything other than the TS for that. I think I'll probably pick up the Bandsaw attachment I found locally as well for only $75!

He sent me a few pics, looks like it's a 510. Here's a few pictures, it does include the blade guard:

http://imgur.com/a/GBzoyxK

It looks really clean to me, anything standout that I should be concerned with?

I'm thinking I could probably sell my DeWalt and recoupe almost half the cost of the SS, and for that much, it seems like a pretty solid buy.

Thanks, guys!
Last edited by MatrixClaw on Tue Jul 13, 2021 7:04 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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