Grizzly or Jet 8" Jointer System?

[Robert Mayer]

These two tools are identical in price (once you spend about $100 on a mobile base for the Jet). Both are local and I can pick them up. My first guess is Jet is probably a bit higher quality, but they look very similiar. Both helical heads, jet has 2hp, grizzly has 3. Both are 220v.

I cant decide....I am a bit of a Grizzly fan, they have a great facility here in Washington which could be helpful for repairs.

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[jamil mehdi]

Helical heads or spiral heads? My guess is the grizzly has a spiral head. If the jet is a helical head, get that one.

[Mike Kees]

Check them out with a straight edge to make sure tables are in alignment and flat. Then if it was me I would buy the one with the longer table. I do not think there will be any marked difference in quality ,both are Asian machines. Don't wait to long thinking about it though.

[Robert Mayer]

Good call, helical on the jet, spiral on the grizx

[Bill Dufour]

System? I do not think you will add much of anything to the base machines so brand is not really a consideration. I suppose they may offer a direct bolt on stock feeder base where the feeder itself could be moved from one machine to the next.
I am not aware of any company ever offering a jointer knife grinding machine that was not pretty generic and easy to mount on a different make.
Bil lD

[Mark e Kessler]

Won’t matter they are both made in Asia, i would skip the insert head and go with tersa/straight knife on a standalone jointer if it saves you money, i would do insert on a planer or j/p

[John C Bush]

Hi Robert,
I have the 12" Grizz with spiral head and it has been a great machine. I live in Seattle too and brought mine home in my trailer. I think you would be happy with either machine and you are welcome to visit and take mine for a test drive if you think that will help your shopping!! I'm in Edmonds. Good luck.

[tom lucas]

I have that Grizzly Jointer. It works fine for me. No snipe whatsoever. No tearout to speak of either. The only thing I don't like is the fence. If you move it, you have to check square every time. Not a big deal, takes like 30 seconds, and done very often anyway.

[Mel Fulks]

Tom, I've used a number of fine " old iron " jointers....never seen one with a fence that stayed square. When jointing
boards for panels, I lay them out for good grain match, mark sequence with a big "V". Joint one board face toward fence ,
next board face away from fence for perfect alignment .

[Jim Becker]

There are a lot of "modern" machines that don't hold square when the fence is moved. It's kinda a best practice to always check it before edge jointing no matter what machine you own.

[Mark e Kessler]

My AD941 stays square no matter the adjustments made and the fence is moved all the time, my old scm FS350 did as well. Some times some tweaking to the mechanism is required, that was needed on my FS350 but the AD941 did not.

[Jim Becker]

Yes, many machines do hold adjustment, but checking before committing to the wood is still avery good practice. You just never know when something can be a hair off and that can affect the project and it doesn't take much at all. My FS350 is inconsistent in this respect, but I rarely edge joint, too.

[Mark e Kessler]

True, but i am confident mine stays put, I will occasionally check on a super critical cut... I would gotten fired or at least a glue bottle thrown at me (don’t ask how I know) if i checked a jointer fence every time I went to make a cut. What is good practice is to calibrate your equipment to hold it’s settings if it doesn’t then fix it, you shouldn’t have to check the jointer fence every single time. I get that some equipment will not hold its settings no mater what in that case I suppose yo would have to check every time

[Alex Zeller]

Usually the difference between hobbyist to light duty commercial equipment and true commercial stuff is things like the fence not needing to be checked each time it's moved. I bought a couple sets of cheap Chinese machinist angle blocks. It's the set with one 45 and one 30/60 in it. It comes in a blue plastic case. They are perfect for checking the blade on a table saw and the fence on a jointer. They are 1/4" think so they will sand up on their own but are thin enough so they fit between the carbide teeth of a 60 tooth 10" saw blade. I keep a box on each so it takes less than a minute to check (unless the fence needs adjustment).

[Robert Mayer]

So I ended up getting the Jet. It was only 20 minutes from my house and it looked perfect except for a small dent at the bottom. I checked everything with a straight edge/feeler and its DEAD flat. very excited to get this set up. And I also picked up a DW735 kit! I am ready to flatten some lumber now.

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[Mike Kees]

Nice.That looks like new. Have fun with the new tools.

[glenn bradley]

Congrats!

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[Ron Selzer]

Nice, looks well taken care of or not used but stored well. Let us know how it works out for you, esp that helical head
Ron

[jamil mehdi]

Congratulations on the new jointer. The possibilities are endless