A few weeks ago I took a leap on an ebay auction for a still in the box
craftsman professional 8" jointer from a 0 rated seller.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...tem=4301761360
&ssPageName=STRK:MEDW:IT

I happen to have stores in the area, happened to have a saleman who
lived close by the seller. Same salesman has a pickup and was willing
to be a mule to bring the jointer to the store.

From the store I have a trucker friend who runs from Spokane to
Sacramento every single week and back to Spokane on a dedicated run.

Great, it looked like it would all work out. Seller was moving and
wanted the item gone even though it did not meet the reserve price. I
send a money order to my salesman, who picked up the jointer. I was
advised it was still in the box, but the box would likely not survive
further. I had them place it upon a pallet and keep it at the
dealership.

The first weekend was memorial day, and routing of the truck prevented
pick up as the store was closed. The next weekend the route was changed
and timing on the return trip didn't work out. The third week time was
again wrong and no trip was possible. I was beginning to fear I would
have to pay shipping to Spokane on nearly 500#'s with the pallets. Week
4 was fruitful, my jointer was picked up, my trucker friend got a hell
of a buy on LED lights we had at the store, and the jointer made it home
in one piece. The crate made it off the truck and into my pickup in a
couple of pieces, but mildly intact.

That night I was able to remove the jib, the fence, and a few other
parts to lighten the beds, as they were all bolted to the head assembly
already. The stand, motor, and hardware were in two other boxes. With
the assistance of the neighbor, I was able to lift the jointer out of
the truck and into the garage for the next few days.

A couple of trips to the hardware store, a few peeks at the sears.com
parts website, and a bit of head scratching I got the motor mounted into
the base. The switch had taken a hit from the motor at some point in
it's 10 years of sitting around unopened. However, a bit of superglue
fixed it right up.

Then it was a few trips to the BORG to adapt 240 to the jointer. I
ended up taping off a surface mount arc welder plug with a standard
sidways prong and an outside outlet box for power. Someday I will have
a electrician friend let me know the code way to handle it.

After the motor was up and going, I concentrated on cleaning off all the
sheetmetal with a grill pad, a scumbuster, some polishing powder, some
400 grit wet dry sandpaper, water and lots of elbow grease. It took a
night to clean it all up, and some blood from running my finder right
down the quite sharp blades.

Then I had to wait another week before my HTC2000 stand arrived from
Amazon courtesty free shipping. It took me about 2 hours to assemble
the stand over a couple of nights and bolt the jointer down to it. They
work quite well and make the 300# machine easy to move around. I will
buying one for my bandsaw next month.

Then I borrowed the neighbor again to lift the jointer onto the stand to
try it out. After spending a couple hours looking for the damn 2 nuts I
misplaced I was able to locked down the fence and face joint an 8 1/8"
wide piece of beech wood I had. It was wonderful. The machine is just
a bit noisy, the dust shoot is fine with a box under it. I'm working on
technique to avoid face jointing snipe.

Total cost:

$405 to buy new NOS 8" jointer
$11.00 for fed ex money
$0.90 for money order
$4.57 in bolts
$25.00 steak dinner for the freight from California
$48.46 for a mobile stand to put it on

I think a hell of a deal. A Sunhill is weeks out, $300 more, + sales
tax, + shipping.

a photo of my new/old jointer:

http://alan.firebin.net/images/jointer_8.jpg