I wouldn’t rule out buying in the US. If you can find something for sale and they will put it on a pallet shipping is not that expensive. I buy doors from Walzcraft in Wisconsin. They get trucked to a terminal in Grand Rapids , Mi. A local Woodstock trucking company charged me $85 (cdn) from Grand Rapids to Woodstock, ont. customs brokerage fee was $41.50. Most of my machinery came out of US. Buy a Rotary phase converter and you will never look back. I run 2 20 hp units. There is a 40 hp unit on this site in Machinery exchange. 3 phase is the way to go

Anon:

I meet your criteria as a sole shop owner. I replaced a Powermatic 12" planer and a Grizzly 8" joiner with a new Hammer A30 12" combo planer/joiner. Hammer, the less expensive brand of Felder, has worked well for me, and I believe they ship to Canada (US Delaware location). It has taken everything that I have fed it, as have the other machines, for that matter. It converts easily between modes (30 seconds) and has indexed HSS knives that are reversed when dull, and then disposed of, perhaps 10 minutes to change over the knives. I have never had curly maple plane better than on this machine. 15 years and still have replaced nothing other than the knives.

I use a space on my residential property as a shop, so 3 phase was out of the question. This single phase machine has been trouble free for me, perhaps because I am the only person using it. The smaller scale machinery is adequate for a one man shop, unless you are doing millwork of a size that is scaled for a castle.

Conference tables, paneling, entertainment centers, furniture pieces, moldings, doors, windows and cabinetry have not been an issue with my "underpowered" machinery. I have a 3HP Unisaw (Rockwell, before they became Delta again) that I bought new, and in 35 years of daily use all I have replaced are the arbor bearings one time. It rips 8/4 oak without bogging down.

I think that the criteria for purchase should be comfort level with the machine, space requirements, affordability, ease of maintenance, and having it be a good fit for the type of work you do.

Everybody likes the bigger toys with more horsepower, but for cabinetry/furniture/small millwork, the single phase "cabinet shop" machinery has proven to be adequately powered and has served me well. For my work, I don't run machines all day long. There are enough people like me buying these machines where resale should not be an issue.

"Underpowered" machinery has yet to be an issue; since I am on in years I am usually the one who is underpowered.

Hope this helps.
TonyF

Let’s start with your current setup.
6” jointer. Unless it’s an old school 50 year old Powematic, it’s got foot long infeed & outfeed tables. More or less useless for straightening boards. 6” width is narrow.

I’m guessing that you haven’t used an 8” jointer. They are the most common because they cover 95% of all woodworking needs.

Unless you are making trim or moulding(which needs limited straightening and flattening) the most common largish stick of wood 4/4 x 8” x 10’.

It’s not good practice to use boards over 8”. Typical 8” jointers equivalent in length to a Delta or Powermatic will accurately straighten 10’ boards.

2hp is all you need for a jointer, unless you are hogging material off of a 12” wide board. Jointers are typically used to finish cut 1/16-1/8” a pass. No need for a big engine.

To the best of my knowledge the one thing that a 12” jointer would be good for is flattening 12” wide bottom door rails.

Unless you are making piles of doors tor every weekly 12” isn’t necessary.

I can explain in a few sentences how to use a 8” jointer to flatten a 12” board.

Save your money. Buy a bigger better shaper or planer. Stick with an 8”. You can always move up later.

I've had a DJ-20 forever now. I buy all my stock either rough or skip planed. My joiner and planer are used in each and every project. I want freshly trued lumber so things are perfect for running on other machines.

For the most part 8" does the job. 12" would be a nice upgrade for some things. But I would rather have a wider planer or a widebelt sander than a 12" jointer.

You can easily glue up smaller boards (after facing on a jointer) and then run them through the planer and if you did things correctly they will remain flat and true.

My DJ-20 did not come aligned very well and it took me quite some time to finally get it working nice. I can do 16 footers and only have a 64th gap between 2 jointed boards. When I do 3-4 foot boards they butt up perfectly and I could glue them using masking tape.

I have an Scm jointer and I love it to death, however I had a DJ-20 as well for a long time and I really enjoyed using it.
I think Leo said something very important, he had to spend time to get the machine set up and finely tuned.
The list of machines you first mentioned are manufactured off shore and generally they are a harbour freight, or princess auto if your in Canada type quality. The components are cheaper, the castings are not as nicely done and the overall fit and finish is a little off. If you spend some time with these machines you can tune them up and they will usually last a long time, a big advantage is by the sounds of it you will be the only one using it, employees are hard on equipment.
It all comes down to $$$$, why spend big bucks for a machine that you don’t use that often, if I was in your position I would be patient, I would look for a good used machine, some manufactures like minimax are a little lighter built as Karl mentioned, but they also build a lot of their equipment with a single phase motor, that saves you from buying and setting up a phase converter.
I think there will be a lot of used equipment up for sale in the coming year or two .

Let me put it another way. At our old shop we had (1) 12” scmi. (2) old Powermatic 8”.

The only time I used the 12” was for bottom rails & over 10’ boards. I would choose to use the 8”. It’s more comfortable and not scary.

agree with Karl on this. I bought new General stuff early 80s. 8" jointer fine for most of the jobs and would likely build the same still even on the larger jointer. Materials were selected for the job.

The old guy looked at the General and said mickey mouse. He offended me at the time but it was accurate. Only I didnt know till I bought his SCM Invincible 14". On his machine he said its no Mercedes. Geez can I do anything right :)

He learned when shops were just coming off belts and his teacher was often given machinery to use to try and he sometimes wrote reviews on them. He was around good machinery in Europe from very young then in companies he ran in Canada.

For me using the General jointer is like driving a K Car. Using that model of SCM is like driving a 91 560 SEC. I hardly ever turn on the General why when the other machine blows it away in every way.

Jacks statement of 1 Hp per 4 inches is good for jointers.

If I had to buy an 8" jointer for some reason id get used Poitras and at least not have to listen to a flapping metal base.