Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I placed an order for this unit direct from Grizzly. They included a free gift in the order . I chose a set of 115 titanium bits. The bit set arrived first. The metal box that contained the bits was low quality with a interfering mechanisms and a catch that didn't line up. Despite the cheesy metal box, I've used the bits several times now and they work well.
This made me concerned about the dust collector. My fears were warranted - the box showed up and was beat up. It had some minor crushing and a couple of tears and one good sized hole. The pallet onto which it was stapled had one of the bottom members torn off leaving bare nails sticking out.
The box had an extra piece of cardboard taped to the top which appears to be because the box was so beat up that it needed augmentation. The box looked like it had be opened and taped shut several times. Notice this: Grizzly shipped a 425 lb shipment in a cardboard box stapled to a pallet and it is not bolted down. I'm not an expert in this area, but other manufacturers have sent me such large items crated, bolted down, and with steel bands holding everything in place.
Most troubling, was that inside, the collector parts were haphazardly placed in a somewhat random fashion with pieces of cardboard taped to parts to try and prevent them from damaging one another during shipping.
It didn't work, there was a substantial gouge in the side of the blower housing that was created by a nearby bolt.
Aside from all this packaging/shipping/customer service nonsense, I was impressed with how the unit appeared to be designed. The gauge of the steel was heavy, the welds look good, and the manual is excellent. The finish on the replacement intake barrel was good. The finish on the original was fair to poor (rough surface where air would be flowing).Update: after all the hassle of replacing the intake barrel I got the machine assembled and running.
I measured the noise level with my meter (keep in mind I have a small shop of about 20x12). It's reading about 87 dbA in operation. Before purchasing, Grizzly claimed it was 83 dbA at one meter (I called and asked, this isn't published). I am satisfied with this 87 dbA at 2 meters. I think it's reasonably close to what they had told me.
The collector worked great - for a week. I then started hearing major squeaking from the motor when shutting down the machine that lasts for nearly a minute! After spending more time disassembling the motor w/ technical service on the line to trouble shoot it, we determined the bearings in the motor are bad.
I'm now an official believer in all the hoopla about buying American motors. It is such a huge pain-in-the-($#((*$# to replace a motor of this size, I'll never mess with a second rate import motor again.
I called back about getting the motor replaced and they told me they can't replace the motor w/o escalating this problem to their home office. The reason, again, being that I hadn't noted the exterior chinks in the packaging on the bill of lading at the time of delivery. In essence, it seemed to me they were saying "if you don't note package damage on the exterior of the box at the time of delivery, your warranty is void". This is despite the fact that I did take digital photos to note it's condition before opening the box and sent them to both Grizzly and Fed-Ex freight. Fed-ex sent out an inspector who seemed to agree with me that both Grizzly and Fed-Ex should take responsibility. As first observer, this looked like more of a problem on Grizzly's end than Fed-Ex.
Update: the home office called stating they would pick up the defective motor, repair it, and send me the repaired motor back out. I found this objectionable because of all the previous hassle and additional downtime and asked that they send me a new motor before requiring me to send the old one back. Now waiting for them to get back to me. This motor is 8 feet in the air and probably weighs over 100lbs. It is a major undertaking to disassemble the dust collector and send it to them. I had to hire two additional guys to install it in the first place because I don't have a fork lift.
Update 2: although the motor sounds like it has a the bad bearing and considering that I'm a light user of this tool, it is still operating reliably a few years after purchase.
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