Shaper selection

[Albert Lee]

What about SAC, I know nothing about them. There is a 2002 T145, cast iron slider, tilt 9hp on ebay for 8k, seems a bit high. Also with forward (towards operator) spindle, that seams awkward as far as usability compared to tilting away.

SAC went bankrupt almost 10 years ago. not sure about parts.

$8k seems high? if it can tilt both ways then I dont mind the forward spindle. if only one way then its forward... not really user friendly.

I am sure you can find a SCM shaper with cast iron slider that tilts away for near 10k or less?

[Jared Sankovich]

What about SAC, I know nothing about them. There is a 2002 T145, cast iron slider, tilt 9hp on ebay for 8k, seems a bit high. Also with forward (towards operator) spindle, that seams awkward as far as usability compared to tilting away.

Most of the tilting shaper I'm aware of tilt towards you. Felder being the exception and Martin tilting both ways if I'm not mistaken. SAC is up there with griggio, casolin, Casadei and rest of the euro lines. Martin Wasner had a bunch of SAC t120s if I remember.

[Joe Calhoon]

I had a SAC stacked spindle profiler for a while. I think they are a cut above a lot of the other Italian machines. Pretty stoutly built.

My vintage T23 and The Hofmann shaper both tilt 5 degrees back and 45 degrees forward. On both these machines the fence can swivel all the way around it you wanted back tilt. I think this was typical of German machines of that era. Not sure about the Italians.
the T26 tilts both ways and find I use both forwards and back on that one.