Long story - I will try to be brief. I have a Steel City thickness planer bought 10 years back, with a carbide cutterhead. It's similar but not identical to the Shelix head. The main difference is that instead of spiral cutter placements they are inline and parallel to the bed. All works well. A while back as part of the regular 'sharpening' I rotated the cutters 90 degrees. In the process, the Torx t-handle head that engages the threads of the mounting screws stripped both itself and the screw I was attempting to remove. Ugh! Fast forward many moons and I have finally decided to remedy this. Today, I drilled out the stripped screw and successfully removed it. In my search for a replacement I discovered that Steel City went out of biz 5 years back. I had a brain cramp that perhaps I could source the very unique and hard to find screws through a Shelix part from Byrd.
I checked their website and the screws look to be identical, although I cannot say for certain. I called their support line for information. I was told that I could order 10 screws for a flat fee of $15. Ouch! I only need one so this was a painful decision, however, there wasn't another place to find these screws, so I bit my lip and said okay. Ready for this? After passing my CC the price was $25! I learned that I mistakenly thought the 'flat fee' of $15 was for the part. Instead if was for the privilege of placing an order. The parts were $10.40 additional. NET: a single replacement screw is a very expensive item to be had. To add to my misery, I can only hope that they are going to fit.
Lesson to be learned - if you want to own a Shelix cutterhead expect to pay Mercedes prices for parts.
I checked their website and the screws look to be identical, although I cannot say for certain. I called their support line for information. I was told that I could order 10 screws for a flat fee of $15. Ouch! I only need one so this was a painful decision, however, there wasn't another place to find these screws, so I bit my lip and said okay. Ready for this? After passing my CC the price was $25! I learned that I mistakenly thought the 'flat fee' of $15 was for the part. Instead if was for the privilege of placing an order. The parts were $10.40 additional. NET: a single replacement screw is a very expensive item to be had. To add to my misery, I can only hope that they are going to fit.
Lesson to be learned - if you want to own a Shelix cutterhead expect to pay Mercedes prices for parts.