Bought the Rikon slow grinder at Woodcraft.
I saw lots of reviews, and also youtube videos. First off price is good.
There was a steel city grinder there for 269, but for that price I'll go with a baldor. The steel city still had stamped steel guards.
The Rikon was only $99 , but it is only worth $99, not 140.
First the wheels wobble side to side. I have tried to eliminate it and only got it to go so far. I took an indicator to the shaft... it's very good. The first problem is the stamped steel arbor washers. They are out. I trued them up. But the wheels themselves are out. After playing quite a bit I have given up, they are close enough for the price point. I will try to get new washers and wait on the wheels.
The grinder motor is nice and smooth The guards are too thin and not centered on the wheel. one is, the other is way off, not sure where the problem is.
The rests SUCK!. The drill bit indentation makes that rest unusable. But more important is the lack of fine adjustment in angle. The adjustment is toothed and too coarse. Then they are not at a right angle to the support arm. The support arm is cast aluminum so I can't bend it. The problem is in the rest themselves they are not 90, probably 93 or 94 degrees... temporarily I'll attach a piece of 1/8" aluminum to the drill rest.
This unit came with a diamond truing tool. Well the diamond wore off during the truing.. So much for the tool..
So I was looking at the warranty and it says to fill out the card and send it in.. What card.. Mine did not come with a card.
I knew what this was going in, all though the reviewers never found any problems. These were of Baldor quality if you listen to the reviewers... But in reality it's an ok grinder, not a great grinder.
This will serve to shape and sharpen tooling for my metal lathe, and sharpen my tools for my wood lathe which I have not used yet. I have a few Crown tools that came with it.