# Which 6 inch Jointer



## Dano (May 12, 2007)

Greetings All,

I have been in lurk mode for a few weeks and decided it was time to chime in with a question. I want to but a 6 inch jointer, yes I would love to have a bigger one but space doesn't allow it so I'll have to make do. So, what are your recommendations, locally I can get a Jet, Rikon, or Delta. I know nothing about Rikon or it's quality and I am currently leaning towards the Jet but that is all subject to change. Chime in and give me your opinions please.

Thanks,

Dan


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## mot (May 8, 2007)

You can't go wrong with the Jet. It's great tool. My brother inlaw has one and I prefer it to my Ridgid. The delta is a worth machine and Rikon is no slouch. I just don't think you would find anything to complain about with the Jet.


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## coloradoclimber (Apr 7, 2007)

I went through a similar exercise in the last 6 months. I had decided on a 6 inch, due to space and cost and all sorts of other reasons. I now wish I had an 8 inch. I'm very happy with the 6 inch but have already missed those two extra inches.

I had used a rikon 6 inch recently, brand new, fresh out of the box. My impression was that it was not designed very well. The fence would not lock in place, it wouldn't hold at 90, and setting the table height was a pain. It seemed lighter weight, it had a lot of vibration. Also it did not clear it's chips very well, even with a dust collector attached.

I went on to look at grizzly, jet, powermatic, and steel city.

The steel city looked pretty good, and was at a very good price, but I plan on having this jointer 20 years and I didn't want to go with a new brand. I want some assurance I'll be able to get parts 10 years from now. With no history behind it the steel city was too much risk.

The grizzly looked good, and it gets pretty good reviews, but I've never had great luck with grizzly tools. They're good tools at a great price, but anything anything I've ever bought from grizzly has required tweaking to get it right. So I decided it's just not worth it to me. I wanted to buy once and be happy. Grizzly jointers consistently get very good reviews in the magazines.

I wanted a longer bed so I only looked at the long bed jet and long bed powermatic, both 6 inch. Of the two the powermatic was bigger, appeared to be more solidly built, was "cleaner" more polished, fewer cosmetic defects, better fit and finish. The powermatic was also a couple hundred bucks more.

In the end I decided the couple hundred bucks, over the next 10 to 20 years was worth it for my peace of mind and feeling that I got the better tool.

I think you would have a hard time going wrong with any of the well known brands, jet, delta, powermatic, or grizzly. There are plenty of reviews out there, and plenty of opinions. Check out finewoodworking.com and do a search on jointers for some reviews and videos.


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## WayneC (Mar 8, 2007)

I would look real hard at an 8" and find one that is closer to the 6" in overall size if that is important. I'm another 6" owner that wishes they had an 8".


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## BelleCityWW (May 28, 2007)

Dan,

I would look locally on Craigslist and such to find one. Some good iron can be had if you wait long enough. I find 6" Jointers on my local Craigslist all the time. I have bought and sold on there and you can find some pretty good deals if you shop. Just a thought.

hth,
John


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## Dollarbill (Jan 26, 2007)

I am more than happy with my 6" Grizzly. The only problem is that it is not 8". I have made a good rip sled and so I rarely joint boards but I use my jointer to surface boards all the time.

Good Luck, Bill


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## USCJeff (Apr 6, 2007)

My brother in law just got an 8" Shop Fox Parallelogram Jointer through Grizzly. He got it to his doorstep for under $800 if I remember right. It's massive, but it's very nice! It runs on 220V, so wiring might be needed if your not equipped with those outlets. From the factory, the infeed and outfeed table were outside normal tolerances. It was easy to tune it to be true and the adjustments look as if they will stay in place under normal use.


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## Dano (May 12, 2007)

Well, I read with great interest what you folks posted and although I agree 8 inch is better I just don't have room. I checked on Grizzly and would buy one but the shipping is cost prohibitive so I bought a Jet locally At Woodcraft for 449.00. Having never used one before I was successful in turning good red oak into sawdust! I finally think I have the outfeed table adjusted properly and I am getting better results now.

Question, how do you determine if the infeed and outfeed are coplanar and what kind of tolerance is acceptable. Using a steel yard stick I determined that the infeed table appears to be 20 to 30 thousands of an inch off ( using an feeler gauge) with the end near the cutting head lower than the feed end. If this is unacceptable is there a fix that I can do?

Thanks for the info.

Dan


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## WayneC (Mar 8, 2007)

How sure are you of the steel yard stick? Is it similar to one from Lee-Valley or a Pinnacle Precision Steel Straight Edge?

Have you watched Marc's Jointer tuning video?

I belive you can shim the infeed table if needed. I have not had to do it.


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## WayneC (Mar 8, 2007)

A couple more tune-up links

http://www.owwm.com/FAQ/JointerTune.asp

http://www.taunton.com/finewoodworking/SkillsAndTechniques/SkillsAndTechniquesPDF.aspx?id=2643 (FWW Membership required)


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## coloradoclimber (Apr 7, 2007)

I assume this is one of the jets that ride on dovetail ways. If so they can be shimmed. But usually you think of shimming the out feed rather than the infeed. The infeed is moved on a regular basis, setting depth of cut, so shims there would tend to work out of place. The outfeed table is rarely moved so shimming that side makes more sense.

20 - 30 mils sounds like too much. I'd echo wayne first, how confident are you about your straight edge. If you flip the straight edge over do you get similar results, in similar places? How about if you check your table saw. Does it show a dip in a similar place on the ruler? If so there is likely a low spot in the ruler. How about flat across the jointer fence, across the infeed alone and the out feed alone? It's unlikely your whole world is bowed and crooked. First get a feel for the straight edge, then check again and let us know.


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## Dano (May 12, 2007)

I don't have much faith it the metal yardstick I was using but I did use both edges and varied the position. There is enough consistency to make me believe that there is a small issue with in-feed and out-feed parallelism. The amount is subject to debate due to the tools I used to measure it with. I do need to invest in more precision tools though so thanks for the straight edge links.

Dan


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