What to watch for, thinking of buying meat grinder?

[daddyzaring]

What do I need to look for in a good meat grinder?

 

[plj]

I've owned/borrowed/used a dozen over the years, from small to large hand cranks, converted hand cranks, kitchenaid attachments, small to large electrics, commercial...

IMO the amount of meat you want to grind, the ease/convenience of use, and speed of grinding are the 3 foremost considerations.
Grinding 10-20 lbs of deer once a year for burgers was easy with the small hand-crank when I was a teenager, upgraded to a bigger hand crank when a good deal presented itself. But when I started doing 50-75 lbs of venison plus another 50 lbs of pork for sausages, I started borrowing electric grinders from friends. Did 200 lbs once, brought that to a butcher do grind & mix it for me.
A few years ago I got deal on a reconditioned 1 HP electric, its rated to do 12 lbs/minute. 100 lbs of meat in 10 minutes is nice - I have WAY better things to do these days than tending the grinder. Now my buddies borrow my grinder instead of the other way around.
Using the kitchenaid is easy & convenient if I only want to grind up a few lbs, but more than that it becomes tedious.
Weight might be a consideration for you - the bigger ones get a bit heavy.
hth.

 

[daddyzaring]

So a 1800 watt, 2.4 HP would be good?

 

[holdem]

Thats huge...what do you plan to grind and how often?

 

[memphisbud]

I've just got a little 320 watt job, that will go through 5 lbs pretty quick...but I don't do large amounts. It does a good job for my purposes.

1800 watts is huge.

 

[mballi3011]

Now if I were you I would go the Northern Tools adnt hey have a small unit thats built really well and I hear that they have metal gears too. I boiught the smaller and cheap one from Gander Mtn. and it works just fine and all but I hear that the model from northern is better built.