Russell Smallwood
11-30-2010, 8:54 AM
All,
Took delivery of a G0453PX yesterday. Thought I'd share my experience since there doesn't seem to be an abundance of information on this unit here yet.
First, kudos to UPS freight. Apparently the days of haggling with freight drivers about what lift-gate service means are over. Last two machines I've gotten, the driver was more than happy to help wheel the machines into the garage via the pallet jack. In yesterday's installment, despite the fact that the shipping pallet was too short for the pallet jack, my guy seemed determined to find a way to help me get the thing into the garage, which we did by using a spare pallet he happened to have in the truck. I offered to buy him lunch as a way of thanks. He said that wouldn't be necessary, so I bought him two ;)
Packaging: Big plywood box. Planer was also bolted to the shipping pallet via angle brackets. Took a while to get it all disassembled and the packaging onto the scrap heap. A lot of the parts that aren't assembled at the factory are stashed in the cabinet body. Seemed like every time I thought I was missing a part, I would dig deeper into the cabinet and find another box :)
Assembly: Pretty straight forward. The manual included is for the 453Z/454Z planers with a simple inserted parts list for the polar bear version which is not surprising given that they are basically the same machine. Other than dealing with the Cosmoline (which has been chronicled here ad infinitum), attaching and aligning the infeed/outfeed tables was the biggest challenge. I used K-body clamps as third, forth, and fifth hands to align them (thanks to another poster who's post I can no longer find) by placing the clamp heads on the floor and then reversing the moving jaw.
After that, everything went together pretty easily.
Note: I used Peels Plus (Peels Plus cleaner & degreaser (http://www.peelsplus.com/)) to remove the cosmoline which seemed to work pretty well and smells a whole lot better than mineral spirits. I just happened to have a 10-year-old can lying around but I think I'll order some more.
Wiring was simple, pigtail is included. No mucking around in the electrical box.
After getting it all assembled, I turned it on for the first time. For some reason, the motor seems a lot louder (in an induction motor kind of way) than the motor in my G0690 despite the fact that I believe they are the same power rating. That being said, it's still a hell of a lot quieter than the lunch box planer (G0505 which BTW is a good value at $275) I'm used to.
Height adjustment is very smooth, fit and finish is, in general, what you'd expect from a Grizzly, not perfect but definitely adequate; especially considering the value you're getting.
Another note, you might want to have some 80/90 weight gearbox oil at the ready as I noticed (at least in mine) that the gearbox oil was a little lower than the manual suggests from the factory.
As far as performance goes, I'd have to say my first impressions are pretty positive. Of course, I was a little teary-eyed when I ran some 4/4 cypress through the machine and realized just how quiet the spiral-head planer is.
On a personal note, running the lunchbox planer was about my least favorite thing to do in the shop due to the noise; just short of having dental work done without Novocaine. I always feel like a bad neighbor when I run that thing. The spiral is awesome in this regard.
Puts a pretty nice finish on the wood too.
I sold my lunchbox because it was having trouble with larger boards. I'm currently working on my front porch and had to mill a bunch of rough 5/4 cypress which are 10' in length. It didn't take long to realize that the lunchbox was just not going to get the job done without a lot of coaxing. The serrated metal infeed rollers on the 453, combined with the weight of the machine made the job a piece of cake.
All in all, I'm very, very pleased.
http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/6859/captureiby.jpg
Took delivery of a G0453PX yesterday. Thought I'd share my experience since there doesn't seem to be an abundance of information on this unit here yet.
First, kudos to UPS freight. Apparently the days of haggling with freight drivers about what lift-gate service means are over. Last two machines I've gotten, the driver was more than happy to help wheel the machines into the garage via the pallet jack. In yesterday's installment, despite the fact that the shipping pallet was too short for the pallet jack, my guy seemed determined to find a way to help me get the thing into the garage, which we did by using a spare pallet he happened to have in the truck. I offered to buy him lunch as a way of thanks. He said that wouldn't be necessary, so I bought him two ;)
Packaging: Big plywood box. Planer was also bolted to the shipping pallet via angle brackets. Took a while to get it all disassembled and the packaging onto the scrap heap. A lot of the parts that aren't assembled at the factory are stashed in the cabinet body. Seemed like every time I thought I was missing a part, I would dig deeper into the cabinet and find another box :)
Assembly: Pretty straight forward. The manual included is for the 453Z/454Z planers with a simple inserted parts list for the polar bear version which is not surprising given that they are basically the same machine. Other than dealing with the Cosmoline (which has been chronicled here ad infinitum), attaching and aligning the infeed/outfeed tables was the biggest challenge. I used K-body clamps as third, forth, and fifth hands to align them (thanks to another poster who's post I can no longer find) by placing the clamp heads on the floor and then reversing the moving jaw.
After that, everything went together pretty easily.
Note: I used Peels Plus (Peels Plus cleaner & degreaser (http://www.peelsplus.com/)) to remove the cosmoline which seemed to work pretty well and smells a whole lot better than mineral spirits. I just happened to have a 10-year-old can lying around but I think I'll order some more.
Wiring was simple, pigtail is included. No mucking around in the electrical box.
After getting it all assembled, I turned it on for the first time. For some reason, the motor seems a lot louder (in an induction motor kind of way) than the motor in my G0690 despite the fact that I believe they are the same power rating. That being said, it's still a hell of a lot quieter than the lunch box planer (G0505 which BTW is a good value at $275) I'm used to.
Height adjustment is very smooth, fit and finish is, in general, what you'd expect from a Grizzly, not perfect but definitely adequate; especially considering the value you're getting.
Another note, you might want to have some 80/90 weight gearbox oil at the ready as I noticed (at least in mine) that the gearbox oil was a little lower than the manual suggests from the factory.
As far as performance goes, I'd have to say my first impressions are pretty positive. Of course, I was a little teary-eyed when I ran some 4/4 cypress through the machine and realized just how quiet the spiral-head planer is.
On a personal note, running the lunchbox planer was about my least favorite thing to do in the shop due to the noise; just short of having dental work done without Novocaine. I always feel like a bad neighbor when I run that thing. The spiral is awesome in this regard.
Puts a pretty nice finish on the wood too.
I sold my lunchbox because it was having trouble with larger boards. I'm currently working on my front porch and had to mill a bunch of rough 5/4 cypress which are 10' in length. It didn't take long to realize that the lunchbox was just not going to get the job done without a lot of coaxing. The serrated metal infeed rollers on the 453, combined with the weight of the machine made the job a piece of cake.
All in all, I'm very, very pleased.
http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/6859/captureiby.jpg