Charnwood Machinery Ltd Anmeldelser 137

I bought a Charnwood universal stand in Dec 23, it has a couple of fixing brackets for your mitre saw or other machinery to be mounted, and Charnwood rightly stated how useful it is to be able to just buy more brackets for this stand and fix them to other machines for easy mounting, rather than having to remove and refix a set of brackets every time you change the machine to go on the stand. Here we are, only 8 months later, and they have discontinued not only the stand, but the brackets.
If they had advised that the product was going to be discontinued in Jan 24, when selling these in Dec 23, I would have been aware of the fact that it is now next to useless for my other machines to be mounted. It is a Charnwood in-house brand, which makes it all the more frustrating that they carry no spares or parts after discontinuing.

Full marks for both quality and service. I mislaid a vital piece of their frame joining machine. I rang them and the woman who answered was friendly and very helpful. She knew exactly the machine and the mislaid part and had a replacement to me by the next day. No charge. This level of service is rare these days. Well done.

I bought a 'factory reconditioned' Charnwood planer thicknesser which had too many defects to be classed as 'reconditioned'. The only thing that was reconditioned was greasing the tops of the feed tables.
The planer knives were blunt; the infeed table was badly out of alignment; bolts were missing for the base assembly; the infeed clamping lever was stripped and not functional etc. etc.
This was a second hand machine which currently retails at £800 on eBay. I paid £999 for what - greased tables. It was a breach of the Trades Description act as a 'reconditioned' machine.
Not a helpful company to deal with but eventually managed to get replacement blades and warranty items.

I bought a Charnwood W629 table saw from one of their dealers. It comes partially assembled on a pallet.
On assembling it I found that three rather crucial holes in the cast iron table top were drilled in the wrong position by about 3mm. This meant that the fence would not slide across the top. After two weeks of emails and phone calls with their engineer Dave, he insisted the holes were in the correct place, despite my sending him photo evidence. Finally he suggested drilling them out to make it all fit.
I now know this to be a certain defect yet Charnwood are still sending these machines out, packed as they come off the ship from China, not even checked. Very poor, don't buy one unless you have a metal workshop equipped to rectify their manufacturing faults.

Purchased Charnwood bandsaw from Poole machinery and had a problem that I couldn't sort and bandsaw nearly 12 months old. Their response was superb and they came to our address to check over and sort the problem. The problem turned out to be user error and was sorted and they talked over the machine adjustment and no bad attitude that it was a user issue just 110% passion for their products and business so I would only recommend that you should consider their products first because I have had awful experience with buying machinery on line and could write a book on why you should never buy Bosch so a big thumbs up from JMP Window Systems family business

The after sales was terrible. They sent item with missing parts and when I reported this they made me pay return postage.

Absolutely brilliant support.
From beginning to end.
Guided me through removal of a bearing which I was having troubles with.
Returned calls quickly.
I would certainly purchase any future woodworking machinery from Charnwood.

I have purchased a variety of products from Charnwood Machinery, and the quality is superb in my opinion. The customer service and Technical help is by far the best I have ever experienced. In particular David in Technical support, they have bent over backwards on quite a few occasions to help and it’s very much appreciated. Thank you. Ray Hall

I was surprised when, receiving my £300+ planer it turned out to be identical to £150 Screwfix Triton offering..down to the last wobbly part

I purchased a Spindle Thread Adaptor from one of their stockists. It arrived with a problem with the internal thread, so I contacted their engineering department and was very pleased with the initial response. I was asked to supply a video of the problem as they did not have knowledge of the Myford lathe I own, which I did and also added additional information regarding the lathe and it's similarity to those models listed on their website. I was advised that a decision had been made that the problem was with the model of lathe I have, not the adaptor thread. I have since purchased a tap and corrected the problem myself. It seems that if there is a problem they won't admit it or they are technically incompetent and don't understand that manufactured threads should be to a standard.

I placed an online order for a replacement spindle pulley set for a woodturning lathe on 04/11. Received a confirmation email. I contacted Charnwood 4 working days later as I had not received the item. I was told they had emailed me to suggest the spares were not available, nor going to be available until January. I received no such email in either my inbox or my junk mail folder. This is the second order I have placed with Charnwood and the second refund they have had to provide as a result of not having items available and on both occasions I have had to contact them to find this information out. The first being a hose adapter. Poor communication and poor service with unavailable spare parts

Whilst the base machine is adequate for my DIY use I find the quality of the blades provided very poor. Most of my work is with thin plywood, 3.6 -5mm and pieces of 12mm Quadrant or similar but I’m lucky to get 15hrs of use from a blade. It makes the use of this machine becoming expensive. I thought it might be the thinner 6mm blades that were at fault so I purchased the 13mm blades and they are no better.

I bought the Charnwood W715 bandsaw via a retailer and it was sent out promptly direct from Charnwood.
It arrived inadequately packaged for such a heavy piece of equipment (33kg) using pre-formed polystyrene foam. The heavy cast iron table had broken out of the foam and smashed the plastic blade alignment knob. Not a disaster, easily replaceable.
There was a tiny blob of weld (or metal fragment) on the side of the table that needed filing off before the rip-fence guide could sit squarely against the table. Also not really an important issue.
Spent about an hour setting up to find that there was over 2 mm of lateral discrepancy between the highest and lowest positions of the blade guide structure so there had to be 2mm lateral play of the blade.
I phoned and spoke with Dave at Charnwood who thought that it must be due to the loose table damaging the alignment of the whole structure (doubtful to my mind) and said they would arrange collection and replacement.
The second W715 saw arrived a week later in exactly the same condition as the first, table broken out of polystyrene and smashed knob. Rip fence and mitre guide loose in the box along with all other small bits.
In setting up this one I found that to approach alignment of the blade, the top wheel started rubbing on a welded reinforcement plate on the frame so I had to dismantle it and grind away some of the plate. I then found it also rubbing on part of the aluminium blade guide structure before the blade could be aligned so I had to dismantle it again for some filing before the wheels could rotate freely at the correct alignment. This saw has a 1mm lateral discrepancy between the highest and lowest position of the blade guide. Not great but I decided I could live with that rather than send it back again.
Other issues so far:
The rip-fence is riveted significantly out of square meaning that some accurate shimming needs to be done to make it usable.
There was a spare bolt in the packet with no reference in the sparse set-up instructions. Another phone call with Dave told me where to put it (under the table as a stop at 90 degrees).
Now it is set up ok I hope it will be adequate for the basic tasks I need it for.
This product is at the lower end of their range so I don't know if their more expensive tools have a better build quality. These saws are Chinese made and containered in 50 at a time (according to Dave) so the quality will never be great (according to me).
I found their service to be very friendly and professional. Dave phoned a few days later to ask if I had received the 2nd saw and if it was OK, which was very much appreciated, and has agreed to send me a box of stuff (spare blade, spare guide bearings, motor belt etc) to make up for my inconvenience (hence 3 stars)
However, great service is nice but will never make up for such a poorly made product with no quality control or checking and fettling in the UK before being dispatched to the customer. I won't be buying my other workshop equipment from Charnwood.

I have ordered a lot of products from charnwood, I find the service to be second to none and they have good quality supplies and a showroom with many different products including exotic wood blanks, this is all followed up by amazing customer service and aftercare. I would recommend charnwood to anyone from hobby to professional users.