charnwood vs record Bandsaw

[Adderley]

Hi l am a rocking maker here in stoke on trent l am undecided what bandsaw l should but i am stuck between the Record 12 inch or the charnwood 12 l would like your views

 

[Alexam]

Definatly not the Charnwood. The Record would be better and has a 5 year guarantee if you are buying new ? I have the BS400 and its a great bandsaw that works extreemly well.

R.s. Paskin of Kidderminster have a Record show on next Wednesday the 9th Dec and they will be there to answer all your questions. Also a good show discount and free delivery at the show. I bought mine from them and they are great to deal with. Try and get there if you can 10am to 4pm.

Alex

 

[Adderley]

thanks so much for the info l will have a run down to have a look l feel much better getting hands on its ok to look on the Tin Ter Net but nothing like the real thing

thanks
allan

 

[mseries]

NB at the Harrogate show the price of the BS300E was the same as that that Yandles, Record Power and D&M Tools have had all summer.

EDIT: I was wondering about a Charnwood or a Record Power as the Charnwoods do look like more for the same money. In the end I got a Record Power largely because I couldn't find many negative comments and good comments about their customer service in the event something isn't right or is damaged in transit and the 5 year guarantee

 

[doubleb]

I was in the same predicament as you a couple of weeks ago and after some great advice on here I went for the Record. Went way over my budget but pleased I made the choice. It arrived yesterday and after a fair bit of head scratching had my first play a couple of hours ago. This was my first go on a band saw.....bb

 

[Adderley]

Thank very much for all your help its funny my son has a saying "buy cheap pay twice" he may be right lol ok thanks again
allan

 

[Alexam]

I was in the same predicament as you a couple of weeks ago and after some great advice on here I went for the Record. Went way over my budget but pleased I made the choice. It arrived yesterday and after a fair bit of head scratching had my first play a couple of hours ago. This was my first go on a band saw.....bb

Well done. We await seeing a photo of your first project, or just you with the bandsaw.

Alex

 

[Adderley]

well l will only be using it to cut the rocking horse shapes out and the odd little items

thanks
allan

 

[Hemsby]

Thank very much for all your help its funny my son has a saying "buy cheap pay twice" he may be right lol ok thanks again
allan

Confucius he say

Quality is remembered long after the price is forgotten

 

[Random Orbital Bob]

Came to this late...please don't buy Charnwood. On this forum members have reported nothing but problems with them. After sales service has been described as zero to terrible! They're one of the worst of the clone brigade, adding no value except a paint job. RP on the other hand are a reputable British company, young, enthusiastic, riddled with good ideas about product development and of course lets not forget they now own Startrite who make really quite good bandsaws!! They add value to Chinese machines and some of that thinking comes from Startrites engineers.

They give 5 years warranty and I recently met the MD at an exhibition. The team was an MBO fairly recently and they're going from strength to strength. In the hobby range, frankly there's no-one to touch them.

 

[Adderley]

thanks guys l got my new 12 inch record bandsaw been delivered today i did have thoughts about the chranwood and in fact l even phoned our local tool store (Kraft Cabin) and they recommended the Charnwood, mind this is the shop where l went to buy a small sprite level from only to find all the liquid in the uint had somewhat dissapered god knows how long they had have them in stock. anyway after further investigating l went for the record i am the kind of guy who might take a while to find out what l want and when l do l want in same day lol

 

[lurker]

I think I have to defend Charnwood here.
Please link posts where "On this forum members have reported nothing but problems with them."
Because I don't recollect any.

I bought a "shop soiled table saw" from them and experienced a weird problem (I have a background as an electromechanical designer). Charnwood could not have been more helpful and suggested they replaced it several times. The chap I dealt with was highly knowledgable and we batted ideas about for a day or two including him sending me spares to try.
Incidentally, I also have experience in equipment safety design and can spot tiny safety design faults and solutions well beyond the layman's understanding. The TS I have exceeds all current relevant standards and is incredible value for money.
I speak entirely as a satisfied customer.

 

[lurker]

RP on the other hand are a reputable British company, them.

You might like to note that Charnwood has been around for a good 20 years to my knowledge.

Record is a reincarnation of a reincarnation. I'm assuming they buy stuff from the same sources (China etc) so they are nothing more than a british middle man (like Charnwood).

 

[Random Orbital Bob]

I have no intention whatsoever of dragging through posts to find the complaints about Charnwood but the most recent memory was from a chap in France who took one over and had nothing but problems with it. Whats happened is that over several years I've clocked posts from folks complaining about their kit and its ended up forming my view. Ironically, your assertion of their value is the very first time I've heard them praised! And that's fine, I'm glad they have a fan.

Record Power on the other hand are investing heavily in both new product development and improvements to existing Chinese clones which go way beyond a paintjob and sexy logo. For example at the D&M toolshow they launched their new chuck range. They used to rebadge the teknatool chucks as the Nova series and have recently redesigned and now manufacture a complete new range. I went (somewhat painstakingly) through every single jaw they've re designed and was staggered by how much thought they've put into the design changes. All as a direct result of feedback from customers using the Nova series for turning.

The BS350 and 400 bandsaws have a completely different fence mounting assembly (cast iron) which is a direct copy from the Startrite design because it's clearly superior. To accomplish this they co-invested in tooling with the Chinese factory which is of course one of the reasons those models are by far the best sellers in their class. They've recently acquired the "de facto" standard extraction for Turners ie Camvac.
They give a 5 year warranty on their tools which is almost without equal in the industry and its because they stand by their tools and their customers. They have dedicated staff in a technical support capacity that you can phone with any/all problems and if they cant solve it with you, they replace the parts or the entire machine without quibble.
Bottom line they're an intelligent, responsive, innovative company that's really going places. Quite frankly, they've got some balls too with some of the risks they've taken recently, not least was putting their personal money where their mouths were with the original MBO about 15 years ago. Watching this delightful British company go from strength to strength is a real tonic to a Yorkshireman who has witnessed the levelling of most things metallic in the Sheffield area where I was raised.

I don't mean to be nasty to Charnwood but am simply reporting, (albeit anecdotally I accept) my memories of posts from members. But the idea of wading through the search facility to defend my position with actual data....forget it, life's waaaaay too short

 

[lurker]

There was one chap here earlier in the year slagging off charnwood crap table saw (same machine as mine). I pmed him a number of times to offer help.
In the end it was the usual.
There was nothing wrong with the machine but he had no idea how to use it.
You might remember the first part (there was lots of noise!) but not the latter as he was a bit sheepish when the light finally came on.
Like I say, I am just trying to put the record (pardon the pun) straight. I would not describe myself as a fan, but I have seen no evidence of them being as bad as you painted them.

 

[AJB Temple]

In the current December 2015 issue of The Woodworker magazine there is a review of the Charnwood BS350 premium bandsaw. It is listed as being for light trade use.

The review is generally pretty positive with praise for the double (4) bearings set up, decent performance, good blade (unusually for OEM). It requires careful set up, has alloy wheels and various other bits so build is not as heavy as some.

Review seems fairly objective but I would rather buy Record than Charnwood. Some positive experiences recorded on here. Plus good source of help and advice here. I actually bought a larger Jet myself but for a heavier duty machine.

 

[Random Orbital Bob]

(Response to Lurker...AJB crossed in the ether)

No fair enough. I don't want to be disingenuous for the sake of it believe me. The chap that really stuck out for me was a bandsaw buyer who took the machine to France and it was damaged from the start. He had a series of teething challenges and poor quality post sales service. I'm quite prepared to believe I'm being somewhat jaundiced in my view but it's just born out of an anecdotal "collection" of woesome tales. Were they all to be investigated thoroughly it may turn out that all the users were in error.

I guess whats really telling here is that these sorts of problems frequently occur with both Axminster and record Power too but in almost every case they jump through hoops to get them fixed because they place a high value on customer service. They all accept that things go wrong, its how you deal with them that separates the leaders from the followers. I just cant fish back in my memory and recall any positive war stories from Charnwood....except yours. So now they have a positive count of 1 Your opinion is also one I have a lot of respect for so I'll make that a positive count of 5 for arguments sake

 

[lurker]

Bob,

I'm not even disputing the record bandsaw is not the one I'd buy (I'm umming and arring at the minute!)

For me (and I guess you will concur) the mark of a good supplier is one who sorts you out when things go wrong.
Charnwood did that for me in spades with rapid and very knowledgable responses. I don't think I was just lucky, it seemed like normal to me.
I think we can both guess all suppliers are bombarded with complaints from the clueless and the majority are nothing to do with kit at all.

 

[Random Orbital Bob]

Agreed. I wonder whether the complainants I've formed my view from were actually hacked off with their dealers more than with Charnwood themselves??? However, since the answer to that involves wading through the search facility...........

 

[Adderley]

You know l am sure there is good and not so good in most item we all buy these days to my mind if you are happy with what you bought well for me thats really good, i was going to say l like to buy british but l guess even record if not now will get parts from china And to add to this l was at one time buying in guitar from china and l must be honest the quality was very very good you see there are good and not so good traders in any country

but thanks everyone
allan