Buy table saw from eBay then ship It?

[Travis Conner]

Has anyone bought a table saw from eBay then had someone hotshot deliver it? Or could you have an LTL freight company pick it up then deliver It? Say for example I live in Texas and want to buy a saw in California. Or would that cost too much?

[Thomas Wilson]

Don't know about sellers in general, but I have a Delta Unisaw with 52" Unifence I am going to be selling soon. I will crate it, take it to Holland Freight and have it delivered to your door. Let me know if you are interested. It is not listed in the Classifieds yet because it and the rest of the shop are in storage. That situation is soon to be remedied. Get in early and make your offer.

TW

[Jamie Buxton]

My experience is that shipping individual pieces of furniture is prohibitively expensive. Figure out your shipping cost before you buy the saw.

[andy bessette]

About the only practical way to ship a large machine that far is to palletize it and take it to a Fastenal store for shipping to a Fastenal store near you. I shipped an 8" jointer from Los Angeles to Kentucky this way for ~$200.

[Stewart Lang]

Has anyone bought a table saw from eBay then had someone hotshot deliver it? Or could you have an LTL freight company pick it up then deliver It? Say for example I live in Texas and want to buy a saw in California. Or would that cost too much?

Travis,

I bought a 16" old iron Moak jointer from a guy off eBay in PA (I'm in FL) and had it shipped to me. Weighs probably 2000lbs. Talk to the seller first. Some won't bother with shipping anything large (usually because they don't have experience and they seem to think it's a hassle, or perhaps they don't have a forklift, etc.), but other people will. Some guys will arrange the freight for you and add the cost to the listing. Other people will say they'll palletize and that's it, and in that case all you have to do is arrange the pickup from the freight company. Just a call a good freight company. I use Saia mostly. They have a quote calculator on their website, enter the zip for pickup/dropoff, along with weight and dimensions of the pallet and you can get a quote. Pay for it and the truck comes and picks it up when you schedule it.

If the seller has a forklift, that makes it very easy for pickup. The truck comes and they load it in and you're good to go. Other sellers don't have a forklift so you may need to pay extra for a liftgate from the freight company for pick-up ($50-100).

The one thing that happened with my Moak jointer however, is that I forgot to tell the seller to bolt it to the pallet. He just set it on and put two straps across it. It slid off mid-transit and broke some castings on the cutterhead and outfeed table (Fortunately I have a friend who is an excellent welder and welded all the parts and it's basically back to normal. Cost me like $300 from him, but I did get like $700 back from insurance on the shipment so it wasn't bad lol). So make sure the seller is aware of how to secure an item to a pallet. Straps work depending on the weight, but if you can screw blocks to the pallet to prevent it from shifting or bolt it down, that's even better.

Freight cost should be $300-600 roughly. Sometimes less, sometimes more. Depends on location and freight class (weight-to-size ratio, basically the density).

Despite the issues with the jointer, I've personally shipped probably 10+ large machines out to buyers and made sure to secure them to the pallet well and never had a single item damaged in shipment.

[Marc Jeske]

I have used U Ship twice... a pair of clotheswasher size speakers 300 lbs ($300 Phoenix to E TX) and a Delta 12/14 saw 1000 lbs from Georgia, Ebay. ($450 to E TX)

Both times excellent experiences.

No crating was needed as these were blanket wrapped and shipped "White Glove" in enclosed car hauler trailer.

As they use independent haulers it is VERY important to vet your choice.

Definately my transporter choice in future.

Marc

[Jeff Monson]

freightquote.com just plug in the information and you will get a price. I have done it a couple times, very good luck.

[Marc Jeske]

https://www.google.com/search?q=freightquote.com+scam&oq=freightquote.com+scam&aqs=chrome..69i57j0.9887j1j4&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

[johnny means]

I've had 2000# machines shipped from halfway across the country and shipped car sized crates cross country. LTL Freight can be surprisingly affordable. I found the most difficult part to be arranging timely loading and unloading.

[Alex Zeller]

I watch auctions all the time but have never placed a bid on something that I couldn't pick up. Getting a freight hauler to pick it up is easy. It's the prepping it for shipping. Something like a cast iron table saw can easily be mounted to a pallet but if not strapped down well or the cast iron not protected it could get costly. I'm not sure if the freight hauler will take responsibility if it's not secured correctly. Uship sounds like an interesting option.

[Grant Aldridge]

guys I live and breathe logistics- LTL, hotshots, full size flatbed/van etc. Like has been mentioned LTL is a great option IF the seller is willing to (and capable of!) properly secure and protect it. Stewart you should buy a lottery ticket with the money a carrier paid you- typically in that situation they will just say it was insufficiently packed.
keep in mind on LTL carriers it will be moved from trailer to trailer a handful of times. With a hotshot it won't. I'm always happy to help a fellow member here if I can, just ask.
Happy bidding!

[Bill Dufour]

Regardless, after it arrives you will find one for sale local at a better price if you include the shipping cost.
Bil lD

[Marc Jeske]

Freightquote looked real good - then this below.........

Marc

https://www.bbb.org/us/mo/kansas-city/profile/trucking-transportation-brokers/freightquotecom-inc-0674-10080600/complaints

[Ray Newman]

Doesn’t sound like a very good idea. Maybe that is because I have heard about too many problems with shipping, misrepresented tool descriptions, etc. In my opinion, hard to tell exactly what you are buying.

Would you send to money to buy a used car just by reading the newspaper ad without looking at it and doing a test drive?

[Darcy Warner]

I ship large heavy machinery all over the country.
It's really not that expensive or complicated.