Used Machinery Buying Guides

KD Machinery publishes seven used-machinery buying guides: CNC lathes, vertical machining centers and Swiss lathes, press brakes and waterjets, blow molders and granulators. Each one covers what size or capacity you need, what moves the price, which builders to look at and what to check before you buy, using the machines we have listed and sold. Shannon Treger of KD Machinery writes them.

CNC machines

• Used CNC lathes: control, live tooling and sub-spindles, how to read the hours, and why a Daewoo lists for less than a Doosan.
• Used vertical machining centers: spindle taper, builders, inspection and factory options.
• Used CNC Swiss lathes: when a Swiss lathe earns its place, bar capacity, and guide bushing or no guide bushing.

Fabrication machinery

• Used press brakes: working out tonnage and bed length, why older brakes are still good buys, and the back gauge and control.
• Used waterjets: table size, pump pressure and pump condition, and how Flow and Omax compare.

Plastics machinery

• Used blow molders: accumulator head or continuous extrusion, head count and head centers, platen size.
• Used granulators, shredders and pulverizers: which machine you need, beside-the-press or central, horsepower, knives and screens.
• Injection molding machines: browse used injection molding machines; a full buying guide is in preparation.

Prices: asking and realized

Most figures in these guides are asking prices from KD Machinery’s own listings, and each guide says so. For what buyers actually paid, see the KD Machinery price guide, which publishes realized sale prices for models we have sold at least eight times since 2020.

Selling instead of buying? Tell us about your machine.