Steel City or Rikon Bandsaw

[Rick Jeschke]

Thinking about getting either the Steel City 14" bandsaw or the Rikon 14" deluxe bandsaw. Anyone have any thoughts on these? Won't be doing much re-sawing so I don't know if its worth getting the Rikon.

[Nancy Laird]

Go with the Steel City unit, Rick. You won't be sorry.

Nancy (96 days)

[Graham Skinner]

I have the steel city 14" bandsaw and I like it a lot, its very well made for something thats come out of china and it's very heavy.
It ran smoothly straight out of the box, but I think a little tuneing could have it running like a Swiss watch.

The big selling point over the General INT 14" was the 1 1/2 hp motor and the built-in mobile base (the base wheels are only made out of cheap plastic so don't expect them to stand up to a lot of rough use, but are fine for times when I want to shift it around a bit in the garage).
The steel city did'nt come with a fence, but the Kreg bandsaw fence fits stright on, and only takes about 20 mins to install.
I bought the riser block to go with it and that is very well made as well, it was about $89 cnd, so thats another expence to think about.

Can not comment about the Rikon as they are not avalible in Canada, but if they were! I would have had that model on my shoping list as well.

To round off I think that you need to see what the prices are like in your area, and go with whatever your wallet is happy with, as I think both saws will more the fullfill your needs.

Hope this was helpfull...Regards Graham...

[Nancy Laird]

Rick and Graham,

SCTW's manufacturing plant is on mainland China. They own their own manufacturing facility--none of the cookie-cutter plants for them. They do manufacture machines for a couple of other brands, but I'm not sure which ones. They built their own plant because they wanted to have better control over the QA than they could get at a cookie-cutter plant. They also own their own quarry in China where they are quarrying the granite they are using on the cabinet saws, band saws, and jointer fences.

The guys who work there--Scott, Tom, Jim, and Mark--and all the others are straight-up guys. They started the company to "build a better mousetrap" and so far they have succeeded.

If you are looking to move the saw a lot, look into putting it on a mobile base rather than using the base wheels that come with it. Delta makes a mobile base that you customize for each machine. The kit comes with two swivel casters, two non-swivels, and the lift mechanism. You just put your own 1-1/2" square steel tubing on it cut to the length you need. We have that base on about 6 or 7 of our machines and they work like a charm. They don't move when the lift mechanism is locked down.

Nancy (96 days)

[Graham Skinner]

Oh! I forgot to mention that the bottom door that covers them blade will not stay closed on my saw as the door hinge has been drilled out of line, I will have to fix that problem with a bit of tape, and there was a small half moon shaped piece of metal in the bottom of the packaging box that looked like it had fell out/off from somewhere, I emailed steel city about that but never got a reply so its probaly not important.
Apart from that it a real nice saw.

All the best...Graham...