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Old 07-20-2017, 10:02 AM
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Steve_Greenway Steve_Greenway is offline
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Join Date: May 2012
Location: Cumberland, WI
Posts: 210
Thumbs up This wheel is so easy to use

If anyone is on the fence about ordering one of these wheels, I highly recommend you take the plunge.

I recently purchased one of these wheels and I was surprised at the improvement in my shaping. Will asked me to write a little about my experience with the Tomassini wheel - so here it is.

I previously had a wheel that I thought was ok. I knew it wasn't great, but it was inexpensive and generally got the job done - at least I thought it did. Nearly all my training and experience was with fabricated frames, and anvils having flats. Will was suggesting the Tomassini Wheel to me and I was a little skeptical. Will's sales pitch sounded a bit too good to be true. The cast frame sounded interested, but I had tried full radius anvils in the past, and my experience was not good.

In my mind I was set on ordering one of Kerry's machines (I've used them and like them a lot.) But Will had a payment plan that worked better with my budget. (Half now, half later, buy the wheel and anvils even later.) He even bent over backwards when I came up short on the shipping.

I've had it in my shop and set up for a couple of months now and any thoughts of selling it are long-gone. I cannot say for sure whether it is the cast frame or the Hoosier Profile wheel and anvils that make it better (I assume it is a combination of the two)

I'm not an experienced shaper like many people on this forum are, but this has definitely improved my shaping ability. The panels raise faster, yet remain smooth - no tracking lines like I used to have with other full-radius setups. I would imagine I could get tracking lines if I really tried, but before I thought they were hard to avoid and now they are easy to avoid.

Some of this is hard to verbalize, it just seems that the results are more predictable now. Before, fixing one spot often meant creating a problem somewhere else, I spent a lot of time chasing problems around the panel. It seems like I have a lot less of that now.

Overall, I'm much happier with this wheel than I expected I'd be. Peter - you did a great job designing this!
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