Am thinking of the Powermatic 31A 6″-Belt 12″-Disc sander ($1,000 at Amazon, before $50 rebate toward future purchase).
Was thinking of the Jet version, or perhaps the Delta, and thought it may be worth it to spring a few more bucks to get the industrial strength unit. Didn’t look too hard at other brands, because support and customer service are important to me. Experience with Jet and Delta has been excellent, never owned a Powermatic tool.
Request opinions.
Replies
Alfred: Powermatic is owned by WMH tool group, which owns Jet, Performax, Wilton vises, polishmaster, and columbian hand tools. So I guess you will get great customer service when you buy a powermatic tool. One question, did you look at a local tool distributor for your 31A? Most of the time they will match the price, and its a good place to get your paper for that machine also. Just a thought. Good luck
Well, I took the plunge. Didn't get any useful information that would help me understand what distinguishes this unit from others. I did want a closed stand. A good choice seemed the Jet. In response to my query regarding the the Jet and the Powermatic, the Jet product manager could only tell me that the Powermatic has more bells and whistles. Powermatic's tech person said the Powermatic is "more of an industrial type unit".
So for no particular reason other than to acquire my first Powermatic tool I coughed up the additonal $120 or so and treated myself to the 31A. It is here and assembled.
Haven't done any serious work with it yet, but it seems a fine tool. The motor is a Taiwan 1725 rpm. The disc runs beautifully. Tracking the belt seems reasonably straightforward. Everything is well finished. Thought I would share this since there is little info. out there on this unit.
Also learnt through this research process that much of Powermatic's stuff is (now) made in Taiwan. I will admit that like many others I prefer stuff made in the US. I will also admit that this is irrational. It in not where something is made that counts, rather, what spec.s it's made to, and how well the production conforms to those specs. I think that Taiwan and China and other places got a bad rap because initially US companies went there in search of cheaper stuff. And they got it. Over time I have seen really hign end stuff coming out from Taiwan (for instance), such as state of the art laptop computers, I have taken some apart and they are very well engineered. So stands to reason folks there can make excellent stuff, provided the buyer wants it and is paying the commensurate price. I hope someday to get over my instinctive/irrational instincts in this regard.
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