I would be very grateful if someone was able to assist me here. I live in New Zealand which makes things difficult when in a situation such as this.

I ordered a 3 jaw chuck from PSI code C3J-4. This was on 26 October. I received a reply that advised the order number which is 152266. The email also advised they would be in touch again re shipping charges.

Well, I have never heard from them again. I have emailed them quite a few times now and still no response. I have now even rung them. I did allow for the time differential. I got the answer phone because all their customer services representatives were busy. I left a message. I hold little hope of these people ever contacting me.

I would appreciate if there was someone here who deals with PSI and has a contact there if you would be kind enough to pass on the above information and get them to contact me and have this order processed.

At the time of ordering I input my credit card details also. I havn't been charged yet. They say they only charge when order is confirmed and shipping costs are known etc. And yes my email is working and I did receive the initial reply from them. And yes my credit card is good.

I am very surprised by this situation. Any assistance offered here will be gratefully received.

Thanks
John

PS I cannot get a 3 jaw chuck in NZ, certainly not one this size. There are some massive ones that would hold rocket launchers in place however!

I'll be happy to forward this to them from my end, but that's all I can do. I don't personally know anyone from Penn State that I could talk to.

...............

Thanks Tom. I have had an offer by mail to help sort it so I will go down that path right now. Cheers John

My question is why do you want a 3 jaw chuck. Unless what you are going to turn is already round, you won't be able to hold it with this chuck. I have a PSI 3-jaw chuck, not the model you've ordered, and it is literally a piece of garbage. I now have a Nova Precision Midi Chuck which will hold round or square objects, runs true, and will also hold a 1/4" mandrel. I believe are made in either NZ or Australia and should actually cost you less by the time you pay freight from the US.

Gerry,

To hold mandrels to turn cork on and also reel inserts once a hole is bored through them. I have a 4 jaw chuck made in NZ for holding blocks of wood etc. I am just starting out on this side of things so hope I have it right?

John Re: Penn State I had problems with them also received this on the 27th and my order three days later

Please accept my apology in regards to your order. On Friday the 13th of October we had a major computer problem. We could not get our Internet orders off of our web site. Also our own system was down at the same time.

I will process your order this morning and make sure that it ships out today.

Once again please accept our apologies for any inconvenience.


Sincerely,

Kathy Farmer
Customer Service Manager
Penn State Industries

I would suggest trying to e-mail them again as they are back, fairly sure they lost some of their info
John

John, if the chuck you have is a Nova or Technatool, you should be able to hold a 1/4" mandrel with just the jaw slides. If it's some other brand and the jaws are mounted, take them off and see if it will close far enough. The chuck you now have will not doubt be more accurate than the PSI chuck. If it won't close far enough, check with whoever you bought it from to see if there are pin jaws available for it.

John,

Stick with just the 4 jaw. I have the 3 jaw that you ordered as well as a Penn State 4 jaw and the 3 jaw is not needed for anything!! To hold the small mandrels, use a drill chuck in your headstock and the 4 jaw for everything else. Much less hassle!

Mike (Southgate, MI)
If I don't want to, I don't have to and nobody can make me (except my wife) cuz I'm RETIRED!!

Everybody, thanks so much for your help. Problem solved and saved me bucks too which is even more pleasing.

Gerry, you are so right. I have a Technatool chuck. Yes is works brilliantly using just the jaw slides, just tried it. Seems real obvious now. Great advice, thanks.

Mike, Yes I have a drill chuck and I tried this but I did not like the amount of room it takes up, I would have to have shortened up the mandrels as they do not go through the drill chuck and into the headstock like they do when using the technatool chuck. I didn't really want to shorten them. It probably would have been OK if I had an extension bed but at this point I do not.

Hank Aldridge responded by email and made contact with PSI for me. Thanks so much.

John, thanks for explaining what the problem was at the PSI end.

What a great site this.

Cheers
John