Buying Festool via ebay.de

Hi, I know this ground has been plowed before and I did look at the previous threads on this subject. I do have a few questions for those currently in the know. I am looking to purchase a Domino 500 or XL and accompanying tenons.

1) Has anyone ordered Festool from ebay.de recently? How did it go and were savings realized?

2) Previous threads indicated that you can change the language to English on ebay.de. For the life of me, I can't find a button to do so. I do not read German so I am concerned about messing up an order.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Cheers, bob

I've got a retailer in Germany that ships to the US. PM if interested.

amazon.de allows you to change language to english, you may be thinking of that site. Folks here have purchased festool stuff on that site in the past, but last time I tried to order some dominoes none of the vendors would ship to USA.

remember any tool purchased will operate at 220v 50 Hz. So, while you can run the tool at 220v, you will still be at 60 hz, so the motor will be running 20% faster. Not sure what this will do to the tool over time.

Also you will lose any warranty support from Festool USA.

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Originally Posted by Eric Anderson

remember any tool purchased will operate at 220v 50 Hz...

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This was the first thing that popped into my head as well. Plus, the warranty-thing. How much cheaper are they if you buy them that way? Felder is actually a Festool dealer in Germany (I have a cheat sheet with the product code we use) but not available to be ordered outside that country, to the best of my knowledge.

Erik

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Originally Posted by Erik Loza

This was the first thing that popped into my head as well. Plus, the warranty-thing. How much cheaper are they if you buy them that way? Felder is actually a Festool dealer in Germany (I have a cheat sheet with the product code we use) but not available to be ordered outside that country, to the best of my knowledge.

Erik

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I looked yesterday on amazon.de and eBay.de (and I do read German) they're not that much cheaper. They used to be a lot cheaper in the US. Certainly not cheap enough (IMO) to deal with grey-market lack of service, support, and warranty.

Buying accessories and things like Dominos from "over the pond" makes sense if you can get someone to sell and ship to you...I did that for the initial Domino sets/tooling via amazon.de and saved about a hundred smackers per unit. But I wouldn't buy the actual tools that way for both power and warranty as already noted. It's gotten harder to buy even accessories this way, however, as I think there has been some enforcement/pressure around "selling within your region" after so many folks mentioned these international buys online.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Eric Anderson

remember any tool purchased will operate at 220v 50 Hz. So, while you can run the tool at 220v, you will still be at 60 hz, so the motor will be running 20% faster. Not sure what this will do to the tool over time.

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That's true for an induction motor but not for a universal motor. I suspect that most of the Festool products use universal motors or brushless motors so the hertz probably doesn't matter.

Mike

Lots of cool Festool stuff not available in the US or Canada eg: Centrotec Installers Set, CMS Saw Insert, metric shank router bits, etc. I personally care if there's a warranty on those items or not.

Costs for Festool are almost always less in Germany, especially if the retailer will deduct the 19% Mehrwertsteuer (VAT) when ordering. That alone usually covers shipping.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Eric Anderson

remember any tool purchased will operate at 220v 50 Hz. So, while you can run the tool at 220v, you will still be at 60 hz, so the motor will be running 20% faster.

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Not so with cordless tools...

Thank you all for your input.....To be on the safe side, I will likely limit my purchases from Germany to the accessories. Cheers, bob