Good buy? Used Jet 10-20 plus drum sander

[Steve Werbnlund]

Have an opportunity to buy a used jet drum sander. Date on the motor is October 2015. Asking price is $500. Looking for guidance.
Regarding a possible purchase. Is this a reasonable price and are there any specific things that I should look at regarding the sander.m? Thanks for everyone’s help.

[Ted Diehl]

I dont own a drum sander but my neighbor has the Jet 1632 drum sander that I use from time to time. He has mentioned out loud to me that he wished he had bought the the Jet 1836 drum sander because it would be more practical for the woodworking he does.

[Bruce Page]

I have no experience with that sander but $500 seems high for a used 10” drum sander. I had a Delta 16/32 and while it technically could sand panels wider than 16” the results were not always great.

[Jim Becker]

I agree with Bruce....I bought a "used" (hardly...it was really nearly brand new) 19-28 drum sander a couple years ago for $900. Unless you primarily work on very small things, I'll also agree with Bruce that you may not be happy with sanding material wider than the 10" even though you can.

[Chris Schoenthal]

I've had the PerforMax 10-20 (built before Jet bought them) for many years and it's served me well. It's a good drum sander with a small footprint.
Like everything, it all depends what you want to do with it. I've mainly used it on boxes and cuttingboards, so the size isn't a factor.
Like Bruce says, the results aren't always great when you try to flip something around to sand the other half unless you take a lot of time to fiddle with the adjustments.
I'm actually thinking about getting a larger one as soon as I can figure where to put it.

As far as the price, you're not going to find a bigger used one close to that and a new 10-20 is $1500.

Things to look for:
- make sure everything is there and works smoothly
- check the conveyor runs smoothly and tracks
- check the drum alignment on both sides of the belt.

Good luck

[Richard Coers]

I've not read much good about the 10-20. In my shop I ignore the second number since I have no faith about flipping a panel around and getting a perfect line. So i would consider that you are getting a 10" drum sander for $500. Isn't adjust the parallelism on the 10-20 a real task?