Considering Used Shopsmith Mark V

[Mark Crenshaw]

Hello all.

This is my first post here. My main ww skills involve solid body guitars. I would like to expand them into furniture and other intruments.

I am considering a used SS Mark V 500. I would like some advice on the value of this machine. It appears to be post "91..when they moved the power switch over to the left of the speed control. It's the basic 500 plus the band saw and jointer. Also has the drill chuck/key, feather boards, offsets for the bandsaw, power couplers and sander disk. The owner is asking $600. Since looking at this one I have found others in the same price range that are in better shape but don't have the additional tools...which may not matter considering the codition of the band saw and jointer....see below.

The main frame looks good, the wheel assemblies work, the tubes are clear of rust, scarring or pitting. The headstock moved back and forth freely.

The band saw appears to need serious attention...needs new tires, blade quide/rollers, fence and new tensioning assembly. It has the newer table without grooves around the knock-out plate....wider smooth circle.

The jointer has rust on the tables but the cutter head appears to be fine...no rust, knives are clean and it rotates freely. It has the feather board and fence.

The headstock has new drive belts and sounds good...it ran up through the speed range with no problems or excess vibrations with the saw blade on.

Here are some pics...
http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss01.jpg
http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss02.jpg (http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss02.jpg)
http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss03.jpg (http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss03.jpg)
http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss04.jpg (http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss04.jpg)
http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss05.jpg (http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss05.jpg)
http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss06.jpg (http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss06.jpg)
http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss07.jpg (http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss07.jpg)
http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss08.jpg (http://www.crenshawweb.com/markv/ss08.jpg)

Thanks in advance for any advice and info you can offer.

Peace,
Mark

[Ed Sallee]

I have a 1953 model shopsmith, it was handed down to me from my father, who got it from his best friend..who bought it new. It came with the jointer & band saw.

I don't use the table saw function at all, as I have a Dewalt DW746 table saw that does everything I need.....

But.... I always use the Shopsmith for the band saw, disc sander, drum sander, drill press, horizontal boring and the lathe....if I ever need to turn something.... I find it invaluable for these things.

I don't use the jointer that much, as my Forrest WWII's do a fine enough job for that function.....

Bottom line..... it is the ideal tool to suit your needs either as a full on wood shop or just accessories.... You need to look hard at the application you will use it for.

I did my first 10 years woodworking on only a shopsmith... with the attachments stated above and a Lunchbox planer...

[Mark Crenshaw]

Bottom line..... it is the ideal tool to suit your needs either as a full on wood shop or just accessories.... You need to look hard at the application you will use it for.



Hi Ed.

Thanks for the reply. I think the SS will suit my needs very well. I want to continue to build guitars for now...cutting out body and neck profiles on the band saw, drilling as needed and ripping/crosscutting wood to dimension. I have a local shop do all of my resawing/jointing for tops but the jointer will make gluing tops/body blanks much easier as I can do it at home...that's the other reason I am going with a SS, I have very limited space in my 2 car garage.

Thanks again,
Mark

[keith ouellette]

I have never owned one but my brother in law owned one though I can't remember the model. I do know it had a lathe as well as other accessory tools. I can only tell you what he told me when I was looking for tools for my shop.

He did not like it very much and said he found it easier and just as well to use bench top tools.

He did like the lathe and the horizontal drill press. Said it was the best thing about the shop smith.

He went back to using his RAS (which he still has) for a saw. He said he used the lathe till he sold the machine a couple of years after he bought it. It was for sale most of that time. (this was before craigs so it was harder to sell stuff I guess)

I would hook up the jointer and make sure its beds are in the same plane and the fence is perpendicular to the beds. Its an important piece of equipment and that one doesn't look like it has been used much for some reason.

This discussion took place because I was offered one without a band saw for a very low price. It had been up for sale for a long time. I didn't get it.

[Mark Buchanan]

Mark

I just bought an 85 Mark 5 with band saw, jointer, dust collector, stationary planer, and power stand. I have owned a couple of these and they are a great tool. I have stand alone tools but currently have 2 shopsmiths as complements to the shop. They are versatile and quick to set up.
As for value I think $500.00 for a Mark 5 in good shape would be a good starting point. For the band saw and jointer around $150.00 each. These are the prices I see them selling on Craig's List and ebay.

Check out this sight www.shopsmith.net/forums (http://www.shopsmith.net/forums)

Hope this helps
Mark

[Paul Steiner]

Thats one of those tools people love or hate. I think that $600 is a good price for it. But is it a good tool for you? My friend has one and he loves it because of the space saving. I think I would hate it. The constant setup changes would bother me. The lathe, tablesaw, and drill press are all pretty good, the bandsaw is sub par. And no one messes with the shopsmith planer or joiner. I think any stand alone tool would be better quailty.
In my limited space of a 1 car garage I have a unisaw, 8" powermatic joiner, jet benchtop drill press, 12" dewalt scms, 12" craftsman bandsaw, 2 workbenches and a mechanics tool box.

[Steve Rozmiarek]

Mark, I used to have one of those that my grandmother bought my brothers and I when we where kids. I is a pretty well made machine I guess, and is actually capable of all the things that it claims, but I hated it. As my shop developed, it got relegated to progressively lower intensity jobs, eventually ending up as a lathe and horizontal drill only. That being said though, it may work very well for you. My desire was to build bigger pieces of furniture and cabinets, not guitars. For what I needed, it was an excercise in futility, but for smaller projects, it would work pretty good. Shoot, $600 for pretty much a full shop for guitar making? Not bad.

Even if you end up not liking it, they do actually hold value fairly well. There is also an avid collector/user group out there someplace that can help with parts and questions.

I guess my advice would be, if you expect to stay with small scale projects, then it will do the job, but if you want to build something else, pass on it. Change over time is also not real great on one of these, so make sure to allow for that in the thought process around workflows.

Good luck!

[Dave Lehnert]

Thats one of those tools people love or hate. I think that $600 is a good price for it. But is it a good tool for you? My friend has one and he loves it because of the space saving. I think I would hate it. The constant setup changes would bother me. The lathe, tablesaw, and drill press are all pretty good, the bandsaw is sub par. And no one messes with the shopsmith planer or joiner. I think any stand alone tool would be better quailty.
In my limited space of a 1 car garage I have a unisaw, 8" powermatic joiner, jet benchtop drill press, 12" dewalt scms, 12" craftsman bandsaw, 2 workbenches and a mechanics tool box.

Ok you just picked a fight LOL!!!

I have owned my Shopsmith planer for about 20 years now. Buy most all my hardwood in the rough. That planer is a VERY well made machine.
I have replaced a pulley and belt in that time.

As far as change over goes. IMHO it is not even close to as bad as people think it is. I compare it to changing the speed belt on your drill press. Odd enough you don't have to do that on a Shopsmith.

You should go over to the Shopsmith forum for help.

www (dot) shopsmith (dot) net/forums/ (http://www.shopsmith.net/forums/)

Here is a link to some great videos.

http://www.shopsmithacademy.com/Sawdust_Sessions.htm

[Pat Germain]

I agree completely when it comes to the proverbial Shopsmith debate. Some people love them. Others, not so much.

My advice would be to not get your heart set on one particular machine. The Colorado Springs area, for example, almost never has any large woodworking machines for sale. But there are always a lot of Shopsmiths for sale. And, for some reason, almost every ad uses one or more exclamation points. It's a running gag with me that any search for any woodworking tool on my local Craiglist yields half a dozen hits that say, "SHOPSMITH!!!!". :D

So, be sure to look around until you find just the machine you want at the price you want. You're quite likely to find it.

[Dewey Torres]

You know I would love to hear someone say that they own a shopsmith (fill in the accessory here) and also own a (fill in stand alone tool here) and the shopsmith is better than the stand alone.

The biggest value of the shopmith seems to be space and cost BC it is less than buying all of the separate tools but what does it really offer beyond that?

Caveat:
I am not trying to be arrogant as I will admit, I have never owned a shopsmith so I really would like to know what the draw is. There is certainly a huge number of these things on our local CL for pennies. Every other post is a craftsman tool or a SS.

[Brent Leonard]

I did get rid of a full size drill press because the SS was/is much better.

I do not use the SS for all the functions except Bandsaw, Sander (disk and belt), Lathe, Drill Press and as a router for mortises.

In my opinion, it is a very good machine. The multi speeds is great. I like the fact that the SS can be used is SO MANY different ways, I can always use my imagination and use the SS to make a cut or process that would otherwise be VERY difficult.

[Dewey Torres]

That is very interesting Brent.

[Joe Scharle]

I've got 2. First one, new in '81 and a recent used basic unit. If you use it only as a 12" disk sander, it's as good or better than a $450.00 Delta. The BS is a tinker toy, but you can tune it up to work surprisingly well and the 4" jointer is almost idiot proof. The drill press is really handy with it's 6" travel and tilting table. I still find uses for the SS in a shop full of 'regular' tools. I think you could put it to good use.

[Mark Koury]

I confess to having a ShopSmith Mark V for some 20 years. I keep it now for turning ( I don’t do much of it - it fills my needs there ) and the horizontal boring function. The drill press isn’t too bad, though it won’t run slow enough for metal and has considerable run out. I use the disc sander function sometimes because of the table and the set-up ability. The table - this is one of the problems with the machine. It is never flat. It is a bear to adjust. It is light-weight aluminum and too flimsy. It is not supported well enough and tends to move with any pressure. For example, if you try to use the mortise function it will bend and sag unless you support it several different ways. Frankly it is too high to be safe as a saw (for me - I’m 5 ft 10 in). The machine motor, however, is durable; mine hasn’t broken. I’ve only adjusted the drive pulley once in the 20 years.

Frankly, if you have the money and the space you wouldn’t buy one. 20 years ago I didn’t have either - it worked for me. Prior to that time I did all my woodworking with a Craftsman RAS and a couple hand power tools. The SS at the time was a revolution for me! I have a love-hate (mostly love for the memories) relationship now. :)

[David DeCristoforo]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

Not another ShopSmith "discussion". Puh-lease!

"Thats one of those tools people love or hate."

Hands down winner, 2008 Understatement of the Year award.

I have, in the past, been fool enough to offer an opinion about these machines. But never again. I may be a fool but I'm not stupid!

[Eric Roberge]

I owned one for many years handed down from my father with many attachments. I liked it for the drill press, band saw, etc, but did not like the table saw function.
Again, to quote several others, all in what you need. It saves space and offers you several tools in one. My father built several nice pieces of furniture with that SS.

BTW, Welcome to the creek!

[Mark Crenshaw]

Hello and thanks to all who replied.

I picked up the Mark V today. It seems to be in pretty good shape. There is some rust on a few of the components that has me concerned but it's all fixable.
A request for the owner to make one more pass thru his shop yeilded the miter gauge with lockdown, table extension, 5 new chisels, the guide/guard for the bandsaw and the tool rest. It never hurts to ask. I am going to spend the next week or so cleaning it up, and then adjusting it once the manual arrives.
I have an online journal going for my latest guitar project. It is just getting started so it only has 2D concepts and 3D renderings, woods I have selected, the building of my garage workspace and some shots of the Mark V. I try to update it weekly and I expect to be adding pics of actual production very soon. If you care to follow along here is the link.

http://www.crenshawweb.com/texastele/texasteleproject.htm (http://www.crenshawweb.com/texastele/texasteleproject.htm)

Thanks again to all who replied.

Peace,
Mark

[Dave Lehnert]

You know I would love to hear someone say that they own a shopsmith (fill in the accessory here) and also own a (fill in stand alone tool here) and the shopsmith is better than the stand alone.


1) Drill press. variable speed. No belts to change. The table is also made for woodworking.

2) Belt sander. Again variable speed. Can slow the belt down to work with small parts hand held.

3) Disk sander. Same as the belt sander.

4) Jointer- My 6" JET is nice for the wider boards over the Shopsmith 4" But I do miss the Shopsmith Variable speed when working with figured woods. Also the shopsmith blade guard also works as a feather board to keep the wood tight agains the fence.

5) Wood planer. I do not own another model but never had the feeeling I was missing something.

6) conical disk sander. Much better to sharpen planer and jointer blades over my PennState slow speed grinder.
http://www.shopsmith.com/ownersite/catalog/sand09/sn_conical_sanding.htm

http://www.shopsmith.com/ownersite/catalog/j_knifesharpener.htm

[David G Baker]

I am one of those that would take a Shopsmith if it was in mint condition and was given to me because I would find a use for it. If I had to buy one I would not do it. I have never cared for multi use tools due to the set up time. If I used it I would keep it set up for one use and leave it at that.
Like has been written you either love it or hate it, I am neither, I just am not interested in one.
I have seen them for sale at garage sales and cannot believe the price that the sellers expect to get out of a used one.
If you don't have much room and are an occasional woodworker a Shopsmith might work for you.

[Jim Andrew]

Thanks for the link, plan to watch your guitar project. Sent for a book just last week, plan to try my own guitar project directly. Jim

[Greg Hines, MD]

I have one, and I like it. It does a lot in a small amount of space. That said, you need to learn the ins and outs of your machine. They have a tendency to need aligning more often than stand alone tools, but not that much more. I have used it for all that you have, and have been pleased with the results.

Doc

[Stan Urbas]

The only thing I would add to all this is to regularly check Ebay for attachments and/or parts. Lots of postings there.