Moving miracles

Either I’m extremely lucky, or my movers were top-notch: All my machines are in perfect working order.

Before my move, I considered not moving my machines, and instead selling them and then buying replacements. My thought was that I’d save a lot in moving costs for that heavy equipment, and they’d all need so much tuning up after being lugged across 700 miles in the back of a truck that buying replacements might be best.

I ultimately decided to move them. On the one hand, my moving costs were high – shockingly so – but replacing all that equipment would have been pricey, too. Plus, I have good stuff and the replacements might not have been so nice. However, I needn’t have worried about their condition.

First, I prepped them carefully for moving: coating or covering all cast iron surfaces, disassembling what could easily be disassembled, boxing up machine components, and even using bright painters tape to mark handhold spots for the movers. Second, those guys were super careful with my stuff.

This week I fired up the band saw, and found that it tracked and ran perfectly. I thought surely I’d need to redo tracking and such, but no. Then, since I already had a mess of sawdust on the floor (no dust collection yet), I figured I might as well try a few other machines.

I ran several pieces through my jointer, to find the tables were fine and didn’t require any adjustment at all. Ditto the jointer fence. I likewise tried out my planer and the only adjustment needed was to tweak the infeed table ever so slightly. My big drill press was also just fine, with vertical travel still true and square. Same with my big disc sander, belt sander and miter saw.

In fact, the only tool I didn’t try out was my table saw. I haven’t yet decided exactly where I want it to be, and so haven’t yet reattached the heavy extension tables and rails. However, since the process of assembling a table saw requires so much adjustment and tweaking anyway, I’m sure it’ll be cutting like new when I’m done.

All in all, a pleasant surprise that’s helped make a major move a lot easier.

A.J.