Dear Abe,

snip of, looking for info on General International 15-250

Almost without question, I am sure I have the most experience with that
machine than anyone else on here. The company I work for is in the top 5
dealers for General and General International worldwide. I have sold *many*
of these machines and I know them very well.

The few small problems I have had with them are,

- A couple had a snipe problem that required a service call, and one that
could not be fixed in the field that we replaced with a new machine and
returned the defective one to General.
- Table levelling problems. This seemed to stem more from shipping than
anything else. Only the most mechanically uninclined users were unable to
fix this themselves when the procedure was explained to them.


The biggest problem I have had with the machine is pilot error. It is not a
planer and as such, like any drum sander, it can only remove so much
material in each pass. One client that we delivered a machine to said it was
a total POS and insisted that I go back and pick it up. When I sent the
service person to visit, the client was trying to run the machine without
dust collection. Duh, no wonder it didn't work. The machine has two 4" dust
ports on it, dust evacuation is very important on a drum sander. Some people
have tried to run a single 4" pipe to the machine and then split it into the
two fours that the machine required. While this will work, barely, it is not
how it is supposed to be run and your results will not be as good as they
should be due to lack of CFM. You need to run a 6" to the machine and just
before the hood, break it off into two 4" lines. From users who cannot get
the machines to work for them, the major complaints is burning. Ninety nine
percent of the time this is, again, due to pilot error trying to take off
too much with too fine and grit. Mix that with not enough CFM at the machine
and of course the results were not very good.

I sell these machines all the time and I like them. For a 3 hp dual drum 25"
sander it is a very good value. There are no known issues with this machine
that would make me suggest you not buy it. What I do strongly suggest
though, is that you buy it from your local dealer. If and when you need
support, your local dealer is the best person to provide this. If you do
find a substantially lower price somewhere else, at lease give your local
guy the opportunity to get as close to that price. A good dealer who stands
behind the products they sell is worth much more than saving a few bucks by
internet shopping.

If you have any specific questions about the machine, please ask.

Oh, and the machine is made by this company,

http://www.maoshan.com/

and this is the specific link to the sander,

http://www.maoshan.com/p4_ds-25.htm

Thanks,

David.

Every neighbourhood has one, in mine, I'm him.

Remove the "splinter" from my email address to email me.

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