Shop Fox W1681 Buffing Assembly

I like the shop fox unit and it works well, however, I did have to turn the shaft around. First time I tried it, the nuts tried to unscrew themselves. In the directions, it says the left hand threads go on the left side - they were on the right. It's not hard to correct, and maybe this was an anomaly, but thought you'd like to know. Except for that, it's the best in 3/4 inch that I could find.

The packaging on this item was terrible. It was packed loose in a flimsy box. When you receive it, make sure you check for damage. Despite the bad packaging, there was no damage to the buffer, but make SURE you check yours as soon as you get it to report damage. Also, the paint job is a bit sloppy--sort of like they had the local kindergarten class paint it for a class project. BUT, this is a heavy buffer that does its job well. It's heavy and so far it seems very tough. Don't be afraid to buy it. The belt is kind of cheap, but that's a minor issue.

Solid investment here

The box was all messed up. I didn;t think much about it. I opened (term used loosely) it....and found a unit that had clearly been used, to include shop dust. Then someone got out a can of off white, yellowish spray paint and gave it a coat...and a bit of the belt as well. Had I picked this up fpr $50 at a garage sale....I would have been ok. But "new" means new and $110 means......$110.

I am with others in saying that the packaging of this product is lacking. But there was no damage and it works very well. I have had no problems with static arcing as others have reported. But I also only use it as a guitar buffer at very low rpm’s.

Putting together a buffer for instrument finishes and thought I'd save a few hundred dollars making my own vs. the StewMac "complete outfit". It seemed small and very lightweight upon opening it up, but it functions fine enough.After firing it up, I noticed a popping noise every few seconds. It was arcing between the shaft and the housing... after looking online for a bit, I contacted Woodstock International Inc (the parent company of ShopFox) and talked to a tech. Even though I explained that I had a licensed electrician check my wiring, he had his heels dug in that it had to be a problem with my wiring. I told him it seemed like the arbor and housing were not connected (by steel), but he assured me that was untrue. And that he had been with the company 17 years and knew what he was talking about.So I took it apart and found that it was true. They use rubber grommets that separate the shaft from the housing. I installed a jumper wire and the problem was solved. Took 5 minutes to fix the problem, hours to determine why it was happening..... So in typical fashion, an inexpensive Asian import saves pennies on a machine and I loose my time fixing it.That being said, it works pretty well now and I'm sure I'll get my money's worth out of it....eventually.

Haven't used it yet, but it looks great. Powder coated, not painted. Nicely machined spindle. I wonder if they fixed the sparking problem too?

I bought this for buffing guitars and furniture.Pros: it's cheap and seems to work. Quality is OK.Cons: I have the same problem as another reviewer with it creating static sparks between the shaft and housing. They occur about every two seconds. To prevent the sparks, i have to ground the shaft.I was going to return it, but I can't find an alternative near this price. I cannot recommend this buffer until this problem is solved by the manufacturer.