I received the grinder today. The eBay seller was very fast and the grinder was packaged very well. Kudos to him on that part.
I've never owned a grinder before, so I can't compare it to any other. It is made by Tecomec, but I was suprised at the VERY low quality of the plastic parts, particularly the wheel guard. The instructions were OK, but I had some trouble attaching the upper part to the lower base. One reason is the instructions weren't clear, and the other reason is that the quick-adjust plastic dial/wheel that "threads" to the bolt holding the upper and lower together was not threaded. There was a metal insert, but alas, no threads. I called Kyle at E&E to see if he had one set up to see if I was missing something...yep, I'm missing something; the threads. I'll need to thread it with a 10 mm tap. I found that the blue paint/powdercoat on this blue "Carlton" Tecomec is pretty poorly done. It scratches very easily. I'm not too impressed at this point.
Anyway, I worked around this and got the grinder together, adjusted the angles to 60/30 with a speed square and dressed the 3/16" wheel so I could start grinding. I mounted the grinder to a piece of 3/4" plywood with a 4"X4" cleat underneath that I put in a vice. Started it up and immediately was surprised by the noise and vibrations. I tried different wheels and checked to see if they perhaps were out of balance. All the wheels did the same thing. Maybe I need to get this clamped to a table instead of sitting in a vice.
I did get to grind a chain and the results were decent. Defintely need more practice. I'm sure over time, the issues I have will sort themselves out, but for now, my impression is that I didn't get such a "great" deal on a grinder. Maybe I'm being too picky.
