Delta 16" BS - suspect?

[radhak]

This craigslist advt is for a Delta 16" motorize bandsaw excelent condition. with lots of brand new blades still in packages at $250. Seemed too good to be true, so a brief search gave me this old thread : http://www.bt3central.com/showthread.php?t=1765.

Am I right to think that the CL BS is the same? And it seems to have a bad reputation?

[LCHIEN]

That's definately a 3-wheel bandsaw looking at the profile in the pic in the link you give. You can see the upper wheel housing is pretty small diameter and the loop for the bands is triangular in shape, not a big oval.

As explained in the older post, three wheels of small diameter are hard on the blade going around the small radius of the wheel and also hard to make track properly since there are three sets of offsets and tilts to worry about.

Three wheel bandsaws are a inexpensive way to increase the working width (that's why 16") and height for a smaller and cheaper machine, but with the compromises mentioned above.

Three-wheelers are Not very popular, I don't see one in Delta's current product line, or in any other major WW mfrs (Jet, Performax, Grizz etc).

Personally, I'd avoid.

PS I'm sure its the same unit, look at the pics in the CL posting and the link to the manual pic in my post in the old thread.

[Pappy]

Three wheelers are bad for a couple of reasons. The blade life is short because of the small wheels and alignment means trying to get, and keep, 3 wheels coplaner. Not familiar with that one, but most bench tops are underpowered. Another point is that the resaw capacity is limited.

[Uncle Cracker]

All Pappy's points are valid. I'd stay away from this one.

[radhak]

Thanks everybody.

Frankly, I am actually happy to let that slide - would have been heart-rending to let go of a good bargain for pecuniary reasons .