Customer Reviews

Weston #8 Heavy Duty Manual Tinned Meat Grinder

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(16)

 

 

Upon receiving the package, the front ring nut wasn't machined properly and it even had a hole in the side; looks like a poor cast job. I called customer service and got a replacement. It also seems to fit better too.

Okay, now onto using it. It grinds stuff fairly well, and there won't be any complaints here. However, after using it, I washed it, dried all of the components, reassembled it and put it back in the box for storage.

The next time I used it, I noticed rust along all of the non-tinned parts. This includes the crank handle, the knife, the plate, the clamp screw, the thumbscrew. They should have made this from stainless steel instead of tin plating.

No big deal, I just re-washed it and coated it with vegetable oil. Now, after having used it a few times, the tin plating has chipped off the plates, the auger and grinder body where they meet when spinning; along the shaft as well as at the ends.

I think it's too late to return this now, and probably too much hassle. I would not recommend that anyone purchase this item. It looks like cheap overseas manufacturing with no quality control.

Bought the #32 manual grinder. I got the first one from a different place (more expensive). It wasn't a Weston but it looks almost exactly the same. The first one broke after about 180 lbs of grinding when the little pin which keeps the plate from spinning broke. I rigged a decent fix by jamming a short piece of a drill bit into the indentation. I returned that grinder then bought this Weston one. I've ground 120 lbs so far and it hasn't broken; although I won't be suprised if it does (the design looks the same). Not too big of a deal though; my drill bit fix worked good. On the Weston grinder, the bolt which holds the handle on was the wrong size; good thing I had some metric bolts around to fix it. Also, the blade on the Weston grinder seemed dull compared to the first grinder. I sharpened it myself and the performance improved noticeably.

I timed my performance. I ground everything twice - first with coarse plate, then with fine plate. I could grind 2.75 lbs/min during the second grinding and 1.5 lbs/min for the first grinding. It definately pays to regularly clean the blade and plate by removing the tendons which plug it up. Grinding is fairly fast compared to the rest of the process (cutting meat into 2" cubes, cleaning the blade/plate, wrapping). As an example of overall performance, I ground 65 lbs of burger (130 lbs of grinding since I ground it twice) in one batch in 3.5 hrs including cutting meat into 2" pieces, grinding, cleaning the plate/blade, and double wrapping in 1 lb packages. Meat grinds a little faster if partially frozen.

I wanted the grinder as pictured. However, I was mailed the Clamp down. Upon advising the vendor, I was e-mailed back stating that I should have been specific that I wanted the bolt down as shown on photo....okay, whatever. To add to insult the grinder sent appeared to be a return or restock. I'll have to try to get rid of it in a garage sale..Weston 36-1001-W Deluxe H/D Manual Tinned Meat Grinder w/ Deluxe Accs Kit (#10)

WOW! Defect after defect after defect! I bought this after completely disregarding all the negative reviews. I'm in the restaurant business and know that often times people misuse kitchen tools then mistake them for faulty products. Now, having written that, I AM A FOOL! I read all I could about grinding and sausage making for 2 days before pulling this out of the box. Excited to get started, I washed it then tried to assemble it. 1st problem- the grind plate did not fit on the shaft. The shaft was slightly oval and the hole in the grind plate was perfectly round. I decided to try the other plate and it fit on just enough to assemble the entire unit. 2nd problem- I was screwing it to the counter and the small round part of the clamp that actually meets the underside of the counter- BROKE OFF! I decided to screw it into the underside of the counter anyway. I situated my small cubes of nearly frozen beef and with crossed fingers and hopes high put them in the feeder, gave it a good 10 or 12 cranks then heard an awful grinding noise followed by a snap. Upon further investigation I found the meat that did actually make it out of the grind end was full of metal shavings and the grind plate (which is supposed to remain stationary) was spinning. Apparently the snap sound was the small pin that holds the plate in place. Upon dis-assemblage I noticed the other end of the round screw shaft (opposite the end which I wrote was oval earlier) that runs down the center of the unit was completely round but nested into a semi-oval opening. Shame on you Weston for wasting my time, money and meat!

I ordered this from another site that showed a Porkert #10 grinder but actually sent me a Weston #10 grinder. What a horrible mistake! The grinder is poorly tinned and I'm not surprised others complained about pieces of metal in their meat -- casual inspection of the grinding plate shows loose flecks of metal just waiting to come off over time.

This is NOT a Czech Porkert grinder, but a Chinese imitation. It is poorly made, with poor plating and rough machining. On the positive side, it actually does grind meat - but I had to sharpen the blades first.

Blade is not sharp enough, adjustable burrs get rusty in 30 minutes if you don't dry them right away after washing. The body is poorly made, metal pieces come off. It does the job, but hard to work with.

My husband and I ordered the #10 grinder to grind venison. We read the reviews and thought it would be good enough for the few times we'd use it. As it turned out, it didn't work very well at all. It attached easily and seemed sturdy, but the grinding itself was horrible. We bought this grinder to replace a very old one and it took us twice as long as it did before to grind packages of venison.

On the plus side, I returned the grinder to Amazon and received a full refund, which included shipping. While the grinder wasn't good, we will continue to order from Amazon because of the quick and kind customer service. The packaging was also good.

i use this to grind up chicken and bones for my cats' raw food diet - its works really well

It works well, it can get stuck from time to time but you just have to crank the other way and it's fine.